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"One could imagine a very ascetic sort of life ... where the body is ignored. This is something I've played with in my books, where people hate to be reminded sometimes that they have bodies, they find it very slow and tedious."
- William Gibson
 |
| Gyrotomic | ||
| A small gyrostabilized hovercraft. |
| And all the time the fellows told me that Ianay had taken it upon himself to privately tutor Rosalie in her gyrotomic-flying.
Which hurt more than anything else! |
| Technovelgy from Ra For The Rajah,
by John Victor Peterson. Published by Astounding Science Fiction in 1938 Additional resources -
|
The gyrotomics could also be used in team sports:
Five small gyrotomics, their wings and fuselages etched in guarded neon-tubes, constitute a team. The ball is a five-foot, positively charged, helium-filled sphere which is thrust back and forth by plus-charged force beams in the 'tomic's noses.
Compare to the flying platform from Locked Worlds (1929) by Edmond Hamilton, the
hoverlimo from Steel Beach (1992) by John Varley, the
landspeeder from Star Wars (1976) by George Lucas and the
hovercraft from Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988) by William Gibson.
(Rocket Polo from Ra For The Rajah)
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'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
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'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
