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"I can't tell whether or not there's going to be a Singularity. I don't really believe the rapture of the nerds stereotype..."
- Charles Stross
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| Vitalium | ||
| A rare radioactive metal which enables solar power cells. |
| It utilizes the remarkable properties of the rare radioactive metal, vitalium, which is believed to be the very basis of life, since it was first discovered to exist in minute traces in those complex substances so necessary to all life, the vitamins. Large deposits were discovered at Kepler and elsewhere on the moon during the twenty-first century. Under the sun's rays vitalium undergoes a change to triatomic form, storing up the vast energy of sunlight. The vitalium plates from the sunshine are built into batteries with alternate sheets of copper, from which the solar energy may be drawn in the form of electric current. As the battery discharges, the vitalium reverts to its stabler allotropic form, and may be used again and again. The Vitalium Power Company's plants in Arizona, Chili, Australia, the Sahara, and the Gobi now furnish most of the earth's power. |
| Technovelgy from The Prince of Space,
by Jack Williamson. Published by Amazing Stories in 1931 Additional resources -
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| MXenes - Atomic-Thin Metal Sheets Now Easier To Make |
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'If the biological robots were not living creatures, they were certainly very good imitations.'
"Everybody and his dog, it seemed, wanted to live out in the country; transportation and communication were no longer isolating factors."
'... the new typewriter that could be talked to, and which transposed the spoken sound into typed words.'
'... underneath they consisted of networks of cooling tubes against the skin.'
'My cars talk to one another. I have no doubt about it...'
'... the imprint of her image on the telephoto cell.'
