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"The point sticks in your head: physics rules. Virtue does not triumph unless the physics allows it."
- Larry Niven
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| Distrans | ||
| Device produces a temporary neural imprint on the nervous system of Chiroptera or birds. |
In Dune, a variety of animals from earth have been introduced. Bats are used as message carriers. But Frank Herbert has a great twist on the idea of tying a message to the leg of a pigeon.
This is such a striking idea; it meets the author's need to present a medieval society that nevertheless uses space travel. A bat is also an animal more in keeping with the dark tone of the novel
| "We will fight in the time of fighting," the man said. He reached beneath his robes, brought out a small cage, lifted a creature from it. Hawat recognized a tiny bat ... Saw its blue-within-blue eyes. The Fremen stroked the bat, soothing it, crooning to it. The man took a tiny tube, held it beside the bat's head and chattered into the tube; then, lifting the creature high, he threw it upward. The Fremen folded the cage, thrust it between his robe... |
| Technovelgy from Dune,
by Frank Herbert. Published by Putnam in 1965 Additional resources -
|
The creature's normal cry then carries the message imprint which can be pulled out of the normal cry (carrier wave) by a matching distrans unit carried by another person.
Compare to the Argento-Platinoid Dispatch Box from Schachner and Zagat's 1931 story Venus Mines, Incorporated, the personal capsule from Foundation (1951) by Isaac Asimov, the single sheet molecule from Dorsal! (1960) by Gordon R. Dickson, truffle skins from The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (1965) by Philip K. Dick and the message cylinder from Dune (1965) by Frank Herbert.
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'What would you do,' Eric asked the robot cabdriver, 'if your wife had turned to stone, your best friend were a toad, and you had lost your job?'
'those suits they wear -- call them 'stillsuits' -- that reclaim the body's own water...'
'Now, except for weight and heat, the same conditions prevail in this chamber as in space.'
'there were so many worms and counterworms loose in the data-net...'
'Now, look, let's start with the three fundamental Rules of Robotics...'
'..the synthetic intellects at the Place of Knowledge had far outstripped the minds of men.'
'But after washing and drying clothes had to be smooth - free from fine lines and wrinkles ...'
