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"Building one space station for everyone was and is insane: we should have built a dozen."
- Larry Niven
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| Sunshades | ||
| Sunglasses that darken and lighten based on ambient lighting. |
| Red Wig walked tall, tiny beads of perspiration seasoning her upper lip, eyes hidden behind sunshades which had darkened themselves as much as they could. |
| Technovelgy from This Immortal,
by Roger Zelazny. Published by Ace Science Fiction in 1965 Additional resources -
|
Photochromic glass were developed by Corning in the early 1960's; they contain a layer of material that will darken when exposed to ultraviolet rays.
I still think that this use is a good example of how science fiction can promote a use for technology before it becomes generally available. Glasses that contained this material were not commercially available until the mid-1970's.
Compare this idea to the polawindows from Frank Herbert's 1972 novel The Godmakers.
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'Hocus-pocus religions and archaic weapons are no substitute for a good blaster at your side.'
'Oscar picked up a trowel. 'I'm the tool for the mortar,' the little trowel squeaked cheerfully.'
'... he waited for the robotrix attendant to finish fueling up his ship.'
The Roujin Z system provides care to fully bedridden patients - and then some!
'Aerostat meant anything that hung in the air. This was an easy trick to pull off nowadays.'
'The Ringworld had no horizon. There was no line where the land curved away from the sky.'
'An adjustment panel outside the door would cause it to extrude various appurtenances in memory plastic...'
'Annealed in any shape for a time, and codified, the structure of that shape is retained down to the molecules.'
It's not really polite to tear the limbs off robots.
'...the imaginary companions discovered by needful children.'
