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"The SF approach: an awareness that things could have been different, that this is one of many possible worlds, that if you came to this world from some other planet, this would be a science fiction world."
- Neal Stephenson
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| Personal Solar Plant | ||
| A single-home solar-powered energy source. |
An early take on this idea.
| "...For instance there is the solar plant. You know what a solar plant is."
Vickers nodded. "A power plant operated by the sun." "Exactly," said the salesman. "This plant, however, is somewhat more efficient than the usual solar plant. It not only heats the house in winter, but supplies electrical power for all the year around. It eliminates the necessity of relying upon a public utility for your power. I might add there is plenty of power, much more than you will ever need." |
| Technovelgy from Ring Around the Sun,
by Clifford Simak. Published by Galaxy Science Fiction in 1952 Additional resources -
|
Compare to black power from Larry Niven's 1995 novella The Woman in Del Rey Crater, the solar power reception screens from Robert Heinlein's 1940 novella The Roads Must Roll and the shipstone from Heinlein's 1982 novel Friday.
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Science Fiction
Timeline
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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.'
