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"People are choosing to allow television and Electronic Arts to do all their imagining for them."
- Peter Watts
 |
| Space Lock | ||
| An airlock on a spacecraft. |
This is a very early use of this phrase.
| A quarter of an hour later the people who were to remain here on this planet saw the first of the monsters of the space rise slowly from the ground and leap swiftly forward, then, one every ten seconds, the others leapt in swift pursuit, rushing swiftly across half a world to the giant space lock that would let them out into the void. Then one at a time they passed out into the mighty sea of space, Pirates of Space! From one system, careening on its way through the void, they were sweeping out to another system, to take it, and overrun it with their people! |
| From The Black Star Passes,
by John W. Campbell. Published by Amazing Stories in 1930 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the inflatable air lock from Murray Leinster's 1953 novel Space Tug and to 'Doc' Smith's use of the more conventional air lock in his 1928 novel Skylark of Space. Also, see this variation on the force field idea, the pressure curtain from Niven and Pournelle's 1974 classic The Mote in God's Eye.
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'The world ... is drenched in unfamiliar information all the way to the horizon.'
'He saw one hiss by him as he rounded the corner, trailing a short whip antenna...'
'It may be organic damage. It may be permanent. Time'll tell, and only after you are off Substance D for a long while.'
It's the polite thing to do, and has been the polite thing to do for about four generations.
