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"Science and science fiction, how do you even distinguish the two?"
- Jerry Pournelle
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| Ethical Suicide Parlor | ||
| A comfy environment in which you might commit ethical suicide, and thereby serve society. |
| There was a Howard Johnson's next door to every Ethical Suicide Parlor, and vice versa. The Howard Johnson's had an orange roof and the Suicide Parlor had a purple roof, but they were both the Government. Practically everything was the Government...
All Hostesses were virgins. They also had to hold advanced degrees in psychology and nursing. They also had to be plump and rosy, and at least six feet tall... Their uniforms were white lipstick, heavy eye makeup, purple body stockings with nothing underneath, and black-leather boots... In a really good week, say the one before Christmas, they might put sixty people to sleep. It was done with a hypodermic syringe. |
| Technovelgy from Welcome to the Monkey House,
by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.. Published by Not known in 1958 Additional resources -
|
In 1882, Anthony Trollope wrote a futuristic novel, ''The Fixed Period,'' in which he foresaw retiring large numbers of old men to a place where they would be encouraged to enjoy a year of contemplation, followed by a peaceful chloroforming.
Jack Williamson used this idea in science fiction much earlier; see the Halls of Euthanasia from One Against the Legion (1939).
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Tech news articles related to works by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
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'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
'So the parent drone carries a spotter that it launches...'
'...nurse drones that would cruise around dumping large amounts of power into randomly selected pods.'
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
