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"I have been a soreheaded occupant of a file drawer labeled 'Science Fiction' and I would like out, particularly since so many serious critics regularly mistake the drawer for a urinal."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
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| Vision Strip | ||
| A circular vision strip for robots. |
A strangely modern presentiment of machine vision.
| Tiny and black, a mass of hanging arms and legs, the thing went gliding down the slope of a hill. Steffens saw it clearly for a full second, saw the dull ball of its head tilt upward as the ship came over, and then the hill was past.
 (Robots from 'Orphans of the Void' by Michael Shaara) A band of clear, plastic like stuff ran round the head—it would be the eye, a band of eye that saw all ways. On the top of the head was a single round spot of the plastic, and the rest was black metal, joined, he realized, with fantastic perfection. The angle of sight was now almost perpendicular. He could see very little of the branching arms of the trunk, but what had been on the screen was enough. They were the most perfect robots he had ever seen. |
| Technovelgy from Orphans of the Void,
by Orville Shaara. Published by Galaxy in 1952 Additional resources -
|
Compare to this very early reference to Computer Vision (Artificial Eye) from The Metal Giants (1925) by Edmond Hamilton.
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Orphans of the Void
More Ideas
and Technology by Orville Shaara
Tech news articles related to Orphans of the Void
Tech news articles related to works by Orville Shaara
Vision Strip-related
news articles:
- Prosthetic Vision Device ala Star Trek
| Artificial Skin For Robots Is Coming Right Along |
| Robot Guard Dog On Duty |
| Wearable Artificial Fabric Muscles |
| Dancing Robots Taught Dance Moves |
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Science Fiction
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'Power could be compressed thus into an inch-square cube of what looked like blue-white ice'
'It's so light that you can set it up in five minutes by yourself...'
'Heavy penalties... were to be applied to any one found driving manually-controlled machines.'
'Buy a Little Dingbat... electropen, wrist watch, pocketphone, pocket radio, billfold ... all in one.'
'... an elastic, tinted material that had all the feel and appearance of human flesh and epidermis.'
'It is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature...'
