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"I was perfectly satisfied to write science fiction knowing that it would pay very little, that it would be seen by only a very few people."
- Isaac Asimov
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| Artificially Pulsating Star | ||
| A star that has been modified to pulsate with a message to the entire universe. |
| Brains flashed out his lighted message across the
moving tape. The electronic genius had done its job, not only cracking the code of the pulsating star, but
ferreting out the language behind it, and then translating those words into our language.
Darby's face held pride. And perhaps the hum of the machine, too, was triumphant at its nameless feat. And at last the answer was there, before their eyes, the message from M-81. "Warning to all galaxies. Danger awaits to strike you, as it has struck us. But before we were wiped out, we sent this message. "We caused one star to fluctuate like a variable, by means of subatomic force-fields that serve as curtains around the star. We installed the controlling unit on a planet of that star, set to continue flashing its signals long after we were gone. "A synchronized tape message automatically controls the unit, making the star flash bright and dim according to a universal code built from pure mathematical fundamentals. Intelligent beings with astronomical science would note the variable star that obeyed no known laws, and soon realize that it conveyed a warning. " |
| Technovelgy from The Cosmic Blinker,
by Eando Binder. Published by Science Fiction Plus in 1953 Additional resources -
|
Compare with the slightly earlier the space beacon from Troubled Star (1952) by George O. Smith and the hyperspace beacon from The Repairman (1959) by Harry Harrison.
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'Chris, the City Fathers are not interested in your welfare; I suppose you know that. They're interested in only one thing: the survival of the city.'
'Drake was the young spatial engineer he employed to terraform the little rock...'
'It diverts integers of the data, the fundamental message-units, so that they no longer agree.'
'Clothes are no longer made from dead fibers of fixed color and texture that can approximate only crudely to the vagrant human figure...'
'Books were just a commodity that had to be produced, like jam or bootlaces.'
