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"I took the Minnesota multiphasic profile test once, and I tested out as paranoid, cyclothymic, neurotic, and schizophrenic. But I also tested out as an incorrigible liar!"
- Philip K. Dick
 |
| Nullentropy Bin | ||
| A compartment in which entropy was halted. |
In the novel, the ghola Duncan Idaho encounters objects from Dune's past. The nullentropy bin is a great plot device, keeping even food in a state of preservation.
| Duncan sat alone at the autoscrubbed table, a cup of brown liquid in front of him. Teg recognized the smell: one of the many melange-laced items from the nullentropy bins. The bins were a treasure house of exotic foods, clothing, weapons, and other artifacts - a museum whose value could not be calculated. There was a thin layer of dust all through the globe but no deterioration of the things stored here. |
| Technovelgy from Heretics of Dune,
by Frank Herbert. Published by Putnam in 1984 Additional resources -
|
This is a spectacularly useful plot device. This is the fifth of the six Dune books written by Frank Herbert; it is an interesting work, but inevitably derivative of the original work. The nullentropy bin allows the characters to have a true experience of the past.
The earliest use of this concept that I can find is the stasis box (Larry Niven).
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'Once in the very first weeks of the war, before everyone had been evacuated from the surface...'
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'...it raised its front end off the ground and waved its antennae at them, then raised one armoured claw as if to snip them out of the sky.'
'Henry... assumed the curious absent look of a robot talking on the TBR circuits.'
'The king, an old hand in the running of tyrannies, instantly grasped the directions...'
'...a hemispherical force field enclosing his head.'
