Latest By
Category:
Armor
Artificial
Intelligence
Biology
Clothing
Communication
Computers
Culture
Data Storage
Displays
Engineering
Entertainment
Food
Input Devices
Lifestyle
Living Space
Manufacturing
Material
Media
Medical
Miscellaneous
Robotics
Security
Space Tech
Spacecraft
Surveillance
Transportation
Travel
Vehicle
Virtual
Person
Warfare
Weapon
Work
"This is a predictive tool I've used: There are goals we've sought for ten thousand years, and we'll go on seeking them. Instant transport and travel, immortality (or at least longevity and miracle cures.), instant learning …"
- Larry Niven
 |
| Ultrawave Relay (or Hyperwave Relay) | ||
| Instantaneous, faster-than-light communication system. |
This is an early reference, but Lester del Rey uses the idea (and the word hyperwave) in his 1939 short story Habit. See the entry for hyperwave.
In this wonderful passage, Theo Aporat, High Priest, curses an entire space ship.
| "In the name of the Galactic Spirit and of his prophet, Hari Seldon, and of his interpreters, the holy men of the Foundation, I curse this ship. Let the televisors of this ship, which are its eyes, become blind. Let its grapples, which are its arms, be paralyzed. Let the nuclear blasts, which are its fists, lose their function. Let the motors, which are its heart, cease to beat. Let the communications, which are its voice, become dumb. Let its ventilations, which are its breath, fade. Let its lights, which are its soul, shrivel into nothing. In the name of the Galactic Spirit, I so curse this ship."
And with his last word, at the stroke of midnight, a hand, light-years distant in the Argolid Temple, opened an ultrawave relay, which at the instantaneous speed of the ultrawave, opened another on the flagship Wienis. And the ship died! For it is the chief characteristic of the religion of science that it works, and that such curses as that of Aporat's are really deadly. |
| From Foundation,
by Isaac Asimov. Published by Doubleday in 1951 Additional resources -
|
And here's the other reference:
"He [Aporat] knew the ship. He had worked directly under the holy men from the Foundation itself in repairing the ship. He had gone over the motors under their orders. He had rewired the 'visors; revamped the communications system; replated the punctured hull; reinforced the beams. He had even been permitted to help while the wise men of the Foundation had installed a device so holy it had never been placed in any previous ship, but had been reserved only for this magnificent colossus of a vessel – a hyperwave relay."
Comment/Join this discussion ( 8 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This |
Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Foundation
More Ideas
and Technology by Isaac Asimov
Tech news articles related to Foundation
Tech news articles related to works by Isaac Asimov
| BrainNet Social Network Of Brains |
| Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence (METI) Workshop |
| Burner Generates Temporary Phone Numbers |
| HushMe Bluetooth Device Reinvents The Hush-A-Phone |
Want to Contribute an
Item?
It's easy:
Get the name of the item, a
quote, the book's name and the author's name, and Add
it here.
| <Previous | Next> |
|
|
|
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
|
'... little machines, that went from plant to plant, apparently on caterpillar tracks, cutting off the ripe fruit.'
'We dump everything that's waste into the tanks, pump the oil off the top.'
'She is a personality-construct, a congeries of software agents...'
'The inner leaves were beginning to curl faster than the outer leaves.'
'Of course not a vehicle moved by means of internal explosions of a derivative of rock oil...'
'When he had first built them, they had been crude indeed, flying mechanisms with little more than a reflex-response unit.'
'If you couldn't see the ads, how would you know what was fashionable?'
