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"A science fiction story is a story built around human beings, with a human problem and a human solution, which would not have happened at all without its scientific content."
- Theodore Sturgeon
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| Remote Control Taxicab | ||
| A cab that is piloted by a remote operator. |
Very early reference to this idea, an interesting counterpoint to the idea of an autonomous cab (which Dick talks about in The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch [1965]) or a regular cab that is piloted by a robot (which Dick talks about in A Present for Pat [1952]).
| Beam started slowly back toward his lab. Then, abruptly, he changed his mind and turned in the direction of the business area. When a free-wheeling cab came by, he hailed it and clambered in.
“Where to, sport?” the starter at cab relay asked. City cabs were guided by remote control from one central source. |
| Technovelgy from The Unreconstructed M,
by Philip K. Dick. Published by Science Fiction Stories in 1957 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the driverless drones from the 2007 novel Halting State by Charles Stross.
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| Japan Automated Cargo Transport |
| Tesla Electric 'Giga Train' Operational In Germany |
| San Francisco Autobus |
| Volvo's Autonomous Truck |
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'Nemourlon armor of reasonable weight resists penetration by most fragments and any bullet that is not both reasonably heavy and fairly high-velocity.'
'Several thousand of them formed the positioning grid on the rubble pile.'
'Its slack walls tightened, bulged, were crossed by ripples and waves of movement.'
'Norman... had never ridden any motorized device that lacked onboard steering and balance systems.'
You will note that HG Wells also figured out the aspect ratio of the future!
'As though a switch had been turned off, the pain stopped...'
'At the ringside opposite them a table had been removed to make room for a large transparent plastic capsule on wheels.'
'... he realized that the moving thing inside was - of course - a robot.'
