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"What has allowed so many Psychopathic Personalities to rise so high in corporations and government, is that they are so decisive. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reason that they cannot care what happens next."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
 |
| Weather Integrator | ||
| An entire technology for controlling the weather. |
Lazarus Long, oldest member of the Howard Families, is flying a space freighter down to Earth when he runs into a bit of a surprise.
| Entering the stratosphere and circling two-thirds of the globe took no longer than he had estimated. He used part of the hour's leeway he had allowed himself by being very stingy in his maneuvers in order to spare the worn, obsolescent injection meters. Then he was down in the troposphere and making his approach, with skin temperatures high but not dangerously so. Presently he realized what Ford had meant about the weather. Oklahoma and half of Texas were covered with deep, thick clouds. Lazarus was amazed and somehow pleased; it reminded him of other days, when weather was something experienced rather than controlled. Life had lost some flavor, in his opinion, when the weather engineers had learned how to harness the elements. He hoped that their planet-if they found one!-would have some nice, lively weather. Then he was down in it and too busy to meditate. In spite of her size the freighter bucked and complained. Whew! Ford must have ordered this little charivari the minute the time was set-and, at that, the integrators must have had a big low-pressure area close at hand to build on. |
| Technovelgy from Methuselah's Children,
by Robert Heinlein. Published by Astounding Science-Fiction in 1941 Additional resources -
|
The weather integrators were not able to handle everything Mother Nature dishes out:
"...this emergency will be somewhat less troublesome than a low pressure minimum too big for the weather integrators."
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and Technology from Methuselah's Children
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Tech news articles related to Methuselah's Children
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Weather Integrator-related
news articles:
- Chinese Government To Control Olympic Weather
- Rain-Making Bacteria May Affect Climate
- China's Weather Modification Office
| Tiny Flying Robot Weighs Just One Gram |
| Some Ringworld Configurations Are Stable |
| Darpa 'Defiant' Unmanned Autonomous Ship |
| DNA Printed Book By Isaac Asimov Now Available |
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'Hocus-pocus religions and archaic weapons are no substitute for a good blaster at your side.'
'Oscar picked up a trowel. 'I'm the tool for the mortar,' the little trowel squeaked cheerfully.'
'... he waited for the robotrix attendant to finish fueling up his ship.'
The Roujin Z system provides care to fully bedridden patients - and then some!
'Aerostat meant anything that hung in the air. This was an easy trick to pull off nowadays.'
'The Ringworld had no horizon. There was no line where the land curved away from the sky.'
'An adjustment panel outside the door would cause it to extrude various appurtenances in memory plastic...'
'Annealed in any shape for a time, and codified, the structure of that shape is retained down to the molecules.'
It's not really polite to tear the limbs off robots.
'...the imaginary companions discovered by needful children.'
