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"The wealth of the universe is all over your head. We need to take command of the solar system to gain that wealth..."
- Larry Niven
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| Cardioplate | ||
| A device that could take seconds or minutes off your life, one beat at a time (or all at once). |
If you are caught late in this future society, you must answer to the Master Timekeeper - or as everyone calls him, the Ticktockman.
| EFFECTIVE 15 JULY 2389, 12:00:00 midnight, the office of the Master Timekeeper will require that all citizens to submit their time-cards and cardioplates for processing. In accordance with Statute 555-7-SGH-999 governing the revocation of time per capita, all cardioplates will be keyed to the individual holder and -
What they had done was to devise a method of curtailing the amount of life a person could have. If he was ten minutes late, he lost ten minutes of his life. |
| Technovelgy from 'Repent Harlequin' Said the Ticktockman,
by Harlan Ellison. Published by Galaxy Magazine in 1965 Additional resources -
|
Worse yet, if you were found to be consistently tardy, you might be told that as of a particular date and time, you would be turned off.
This idea precedes that of the palm flower from the 1967 novel Logan's Run by William Nolan and G.C. Johnson.
15-Sep-2011: Harlan Ellison is suing the makers of the fall film In Time for plagiarism. The film uses a similar idea; a measurement of life time remaining on the forearm.
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'It is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature...'
'Briquet’s head seemed to think that to find and attach a new body to her head was as easy as to fit and sew a new dress.'
'...copy was turned out in a charming and entirely feminine handwriting.'
'It was almost unheard of for slunch to spread that fast...'
'He then started hand movements of definite pattern...'
'The leg was to function, in a way, as a servo-mechanism operated by Larry’s brain...'
