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"...science fiction is sort of like a sociological genome. It's a huge range of possible futures, most of them useless; some vital. You never really know in advance."
- Peter Watts
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| Spider Robot | ||
| A mechanism in the form of a spider. |
As far as I know, the first use of the phrase "spider robot".
| In one of these cubbyholes under the bench a large black spider crouched motionless. That is, it looked like a spider and its glittering dark eyes seemed alive. Its body was as big as that of a chicken and its inch-thick legs would have straightened out to a full three feet in length apiece if they were not gracefully curved to support the huge body.
If it were a spider it was of no species of spiders known on Earth — or for that matter, any other place in the universe other than Jerry’s mind and workshop.
 (Spider Robot from 'The Mystery of Element 117' by Milton K. Smith) It was a robot shaped like a spider. Jerry had built it to act as a bodyguard, and put into it reflexes that would cause it to attack anything that entered the room. When he slept the robot’s reflexes acted and the spider stood guard. When he was awake he could control it verbally or by a pocket radio. The word “quiet” shut off its reflexes. After nearly loosing his life once when he fell asleep without turning on the spider’s reflexes, he had fixed it so that his breathing while asleep would activate its reflexes so it could protect him. He had built it in the shape of a giant spider because a man is more afraid of that shape than any other — especially if it is unbelieveably large and springing through the air with its glistening eyes and clashing mandibles. The sight of it would paralyze the most daring of marauders automatically, leaving them wide open. While Jerry slept the robot lurked under the workbench, its eyes taking in the whole room, its legs motionless until some sudden movement would cause them to spring. |
| Technovelgy from The Mystery of Element 117,
by Milton K. Smith. Published by Amazing Stories in 1949 Additional resources -
|
Here's the excerpt with the phrase "spider robot":
A look of frustrated rage entered Jerry’s eyes. One of the policemen was speaking.
“We shot the spider thing,” he was saying apologetically. “The elevator boy told us afterward it was a mechanical gadget of yours, but we thought it was alive at the time.
Compare to the metallic spider from The War of the Worlds (1898) by H.G. Wells,
the scarab robot from The Scarab (1936) by Raymond Z. Gallun, the spider robot guard from Mars-Tube (1941) by SD Gottesman,
the mechanical hound from Fahrenheit 451 (1953) by Ray Bradbury,
the metal insects from The Invincible (1954) by Stanislaw Lem,
the Sheem spider robot from The Witches of Karres (1966) by James Schmitz,
the spider tripod from Rendezvous With Rama (1972) by Arthur C. Clarke,
the spider cable device from The Web Between the Worlds (1979) by Charles Sheffield,
the spider robotic insects from Runaway (1985) by Michael Crichton and the recon spiders from Minority Report (Movie) (2002) by Steven Spielberg.
The door was open. Inside three men lay motionless on the floor. Atop one of them was the shattered remains of the spider robot.
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Tech news articles related to The Mystery of Element 117
Tech news articles related to works by Milton K. Smith
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news articles:
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| Epirus High-Power Microwave Defeats Drones |
| It's A Giant Robot! You Reporters Have Been Warned! |
| Tactile Skin Supplier Map |
| Robot Bees 3D Printed By Festo |
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'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
'The vast spinning sphere of Factory in the Sky loomed above and ahead of us, gleaming white against the unfathomable jet depths of surrounding space.'
'And if it doesn’t work,' inquired Lazarus, 'what does that make us? Sunspots?'
'The Dillard people had performed a miracle and put all the works in a girl-modeled case.'
'Our study of your race has convinced us that you are not fitted to leave your planet in the present state of your civilization.'
'...the spreading beam of the deranging ray struck them, and Then one toppled and fell. Then another.'
'Within seconds the material was spread out over fifty yards, in a matter of hours it might occupy several cubic miles of space...'
'The men are dead, but their acquired wisdom lives on and I am the beneficiary.'
