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"Science fiction is what scientists would do if they could - if they had enough grant money, enough time, and enough brains to do the wonderful things they would like to do."
- Greg Bear
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| Bore-Pellets | ||
| Anti-underground bomb shelter ordinance. |
When this short story was written, it was the height of the cold war. Plans for building bomb shelters were in every popular magazine.
But can you keep up with the Joneses, and still be safe? What if those pesky Soviets come up with something new.
| The next day the news-machines shrilled out the news. The first revelation of the new Soviet bore-pellets.
Bob Foster stood in the middle of the living room, the newstape in his hands, his thin face flushed with fury and despair. "Goddamn it, it's a plot!" His voice rose in baffled frenzy. "We just bought the thing and now look. Look!" He shoved the tape at his wife. "You see? I told you!" "I've seen it," Ruth said wildly. "I suppose you think the whole world was just waiting for you in mind. They're always improving weapons, Bob. Last week it was those grain-impregnation flakes. This week it's bore-pellets..." …They're going to put some kind of metal grill on the market, as soon as the government approves it. They spread it over the ground and it intercepts the bore-pellets. It screens them, makes them explode on the surface, so they can't burrow down to the shelter… The bore-pellets were specifically designed to penetrate the surface and seek out warmth… |
| Technovelgy from Foster, You're Dead,
by Philip K. Dick. Published by Star Science Fiction Stories in 1955 Additional resources -
|
In the story, PKD combines cold war paranoia and capitalist sales hucksterism. Bob's despair doesn't end with the fact that his bomb shelter had been made obsolete. There was something new for him to buy! See the entry for grill-screen adaptor.
Also, sf fans with that underground bunker mentality may want to take a look at the robot earthworms from Harry Harrison's 1962 story War with the Robots.
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Foster, You're Dead
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and Technology by Philip K. Dick
Tech news articles related to Foster, You're Dead
Tech news articles related to works by Philip K. Dick
Bore-Pellets-related
news articles:
- Bunker Busters and Bore-Pellets
| Bunker Busters and Bore-Pellets |
| Can A Swarm Of Deadly Drones Take Out An Aircraft Carrier? |
| Has Turkey Been Stealing Rain From Iran? |
| We Need To Build Anti-Drone Systems For Civilian Spaces |
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'He found a barber shop which, he thought, would be good for an idle hour.'
'Thirty rounds of fighting is tough work. Even for machines.'
'...the excavations were already in progress, for he saw gray slopes of rubble.'
'...the walking mills of Puffy Products began to tread delicately on their centipede legs across the wheat fields of Kansas.'
'Here is a Clerk that would work incessantly, and neither eat, sleep, want payment, or grumble.'
'ZARNAK, YOU'RE TO COMMAND A SCOUTING EXPEDITION --- FIND OUT WHAT THIS IS ALL ABOUT!'
'These are your rudimentary seed packages... Some will combine in place to form more complicated structures.'
