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"Science fiction operates a little bit like science itself, in principle. You've got thousands of people exploring ideas, putting forth their own hypotheses. Most of them are dead wrong; a few stand the test of time; everything looks kind of quaint in hind"
- Peter Watts
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| Robot Mice | ||
| Tiny cleaning robots. |
This item comes from a short story that is a Cold War classic, and well worth reading.
| Nine-fifteen, sang the clock, time to clean.
Out of warrens in the wall, tiny robot mice darted. The rooms were acrawl with the small cleaning animals, all rubber and metal. They thudded against chairs, whirling their mustached runners, kneading the rug nap, sucking gently at hidden dust. Then, like mysterious invaders, they popped into their burrows. Their pink electric eyes faded. The house was clean. |
| Technovelgy from The Martian Chronicles,
by Ray Bradbury. Published by Various in 1950 Additional resources -
|
And for larger items, the 'copper scrap rats' would come and seize the offending matter with their miniature jaws.
Although the iRobot Roomba is perhaps more famous, the world's first automatic vacuum cleaner is the Electrolux Trilobite, presented to the public on the BBC in 1997.
This item comes from the story There Will Come Soft Rains, published in 1950.
(Wally Woods' cartoon version)
Robot mouse fans might also be interested in the Greg Bear's dustmice, tiny robotic detectives from his 1990 novel Queen of Angels. As far as I know, the first example of this kind of technovelgy are the golden shuttles from a 1941 story by Eric Frank Russell (writing under a pseudonym).
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Martian Chronicles
More Ideas
and Technology by Ray Bradbury
Tech news articles related to The Martian Chronicles
Tech news articles related to works by Ray Bradbury
Robot Mice-related
news articles:
- Electrolux Trilobite: Programmable Robot Vacuum Cleaner
- AMouse: Bradbury's Robot Mice Get Real Whiskers
- BIOTACT Whiskered Robot Rat
- Fukitorimushi Floor-Cleaning Robot - An Inchworm Dust Mop
- SCRATCHbot Robot Rat Whiskers Video
- Mini Robot Swarms
- Kilobot Robot Swarm
- Shrewbot Uses Whiskers As Sensors
- OMG! DIY Arduino Robot Vacuum Cleaner Like Bradbury's Mice
- Autonomous Robots Navigate Like Rats
| Korean Exoskeleton Suit F1 Helps You Put It On |
| Humanoid Robots Spotted In Homes Performing Household Chores |
| Bambot Open Source Cheap Delivery Robot |
| Robot Collective Acts Like A Smart Material |
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'You couldn't have the capstone without the pyramid to hold it up.'
'the unobtrusive inspections with tiny remote-cast snoopers...'
I'm hoping that this procedure becomes a normal part of medical practice!
'... nothing was perfected until M. Pantalon announced the completion of his automatic valet.'
'...its streets were of remarkable width, with few or no buildings so high as mosques, churches, State-offices, or palaces in Tellurian cities.'
'...it was all composed of tiny, identical cubes, carefully laid to form a tilelike surface.'
