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"At its best, SF is the medium in which our miserable certainty that tomorrow will be different from today in ways we can't predict, can be transmuted to a sense of excitement and anticipation, occasionally evolving into awe."
- John Brunner
 |
| Methuen Treatment | ||
| Injections that increase intelligence. |
Professor Methuen is described in the story as a "storklike man with a gray goatee" - and he has a rather puckish sense of humor when it comes to inventions. Especially after he tries his own special treatment to increase intelligence.
| "I think my original theory was right; that the electrical resistance of the gaps between human neurons is already as low as it can be, so the Methuen injections won't have any appreciable effect on a human being. Sorry, Johnny, but I'm afraid your boss won't become any great genius as a result of trying a dose of his own medicine.
The Methuen treatment had raised Johnny's intelligence from that of a normal black bear to that of a human being... |
| From The Exalted,
by L. Sprague de Camp. Published by Astounding Science-Fiction in 1940 Additional resources -
|
It turns out that the Methuen Treatment does have an effect on human beings, but not quite in the manner expected. Click on the link to the story title in the above paragraph to see some of his prankster inventions.
Research shows that the processing speed of your brain does decline with age; some neuroscientists believe that a slowdown in processing speed may be the primary factor in age-related changes in cognition. Processing speed declines consistently across the adult lifespan.
Compare to the electro-culturer from The Ancient Brain (1929) by A.G. Stan gland and the bubbleheads from The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (1965) by Philip K. Dick
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Okay, sf fans. If you could have some art created from a science fiction sentence, what sentence would you pick?
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It's fascinating to me how the Apollo program forced people to think outside their usual boxes.
'Some will combine in place to form more complicated structures, like excavators or centipedes.'
'the hair-fine wire going deep into Owen's brain, down into the pleasure center.'
'There was a dim whirring, and the spheres tipped and began to rotate...'
'The houses are prefabricated units... and they sell at the flat rate of five hundred dollars a room — set up.'
