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"There's a poetry in the materials we use to construct our world of artifacts; it speaks of our long history as a technological species."
- William Gibson
 |
| Rubber Soled Feet | ||
| Silent padding for clanky robots. |
There is nothing more jarringly unpleasant than the clanking of metal robot feet on hard floors!
| They were terrified at what they saw. It was
described as being “a huge iron mass that resembled a man.” Violet-colored blazes raced over the
hideous giant. Brilliant red lights glowed where its
eyes should have been. The thing had arms and
legs. It stood erect, turned its head from side to
side in a monotonous manner with a mechanical
leer on its metallic features.
The salesmen were paralyzed with fear as it stalked down the aisle of the store. Its feet were shod with rubber, apparently; for when it moved there were no noises other than a slight grinding whirr. According to the Daily Bulletin, it walked, or rather glided, to the vault, reached into the trays, and scooped up a handful of blue diamonds. |
| Technovelgy from The Robot Terror,
by Melbourne Huff. Published by Scientific Detective Monthly in 1930 Additional resources -
|
You'll also find this in Isaac Asimov's Reason:
The robot rose erect smoothly and his thickly sponge-rubber soled feet made no noise as he followed Powell.
Compare to the silencer-padding from Robot Unwanted (1952) by Daniel Keyes and the rubber hoof from The Warlock in Spite of Himself (1969) by Christopher Stasheff.
"Cutie," he said, "I'm going to try to explain something to you. You're the first robot who's ever exhibited curiosity as to his own existence – and I think the first that's really intelligent enough to understand the world outside. Here, come with me."
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Robot Terror
More Ideas
and Technology by Melbourne Huff
Tech news articles related to The Robot Terror
Tech news articles related to works by Melbourne Huff
| Athena Smart Security Guard Robot With Face Recognition |
| SpaceHopper Microgravity Robot Lands On Its Feet |
| No Tips! Robotic Food Delivery In Phoenix |
| Micro-Robots Are Smallest, Fully Functional |
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Science Fiction
Timeline
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'You are who we say you are, Dr. Dakin,' Turner said.'
'It's area, and its consequent light-gathering capacity, was many times greater than any rigid mirror...'
'Tell me your torments,' the Padre said, in an elderly voice marked with compassion.
'...a slender-legged tripod surmounted by a spherical body no larger than a football.'
'... making the point that their likenesses, every move they made, were being transmitted.'
'But the stars are only atoms in larger space, and in that larger space the star-atoms could combine to form living matter, thinking matter, couldn't they?'
'...to build up a video picture would require, say, ten million decisions every second. Mike, you're so fast I can't even think about it. But you aren't that fast.'
'The area affected was five hundred kilometres across, and perfectly circular.'
