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"But the problem with reincarnation is that it's hard to imagine what the storage medium for past lives would be. Not to mention the input-output device. I hesitate to rule it out completely, but I'd need pretty definite proof."
- Arthur C. Clarke
 |
| Frictionless Cups | ||
| Cups with a special surface to which liquid does not adhere. |
| "Maybe I'll have to go to the Belt after all," he said lightly. Thinking: Or talk Robinson into sending for the files. The eggs were ready. He served them into the cups all backpackers carried at their belts...
... They poured the remnants of eggs out of their frictionless cups and filled them with coffee powder and boiling water... |
| Technovelgy from Protector,
by Larry Niven. Published by Del Rey in 1973 Additional resources -
|
Niven used this idea with Jerry Pournelle in the following year's blockbuster The Mote in God's Eye:
Compare with the frictionless coating from Clifford Simak's classic 1963 novel Way Station and the
water repellent surface from Frank Herbert's Dune.
Thanks to Winchell Chung of Project Rho for contributing this item.
The bathroom - the toilet was different. Just as he had sketched it. Wrong; there wasn't any water in it. And no flush. What the hell, there was only one way to test a toilet. When he looked, the bowl was sparkling clean. He poured a glass of water into it and watched it run away without leaving a drop. The bowl was a frictionless surface. Have to mention this to Bury, he thought. There were bases on airless moons, and worlds where water, or energy for recycling it, was scarce.
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| PLATO Spacecraft, Hunter Of Habitable Planets, Now Ready |
| Did The Yautja Have These First? |
| Jetson ONE Air Races Begin, Can Air Polo Be Far Behind? |
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'The observation vehicle was of that peculiar variety used in conveying a large number of people across rough terrain.'
'The real border was defended by... a swarm of quasi-independent aerostats.'
'I ... set my automatic astronomical instruments to searching for a habitable planet.'
'...haven't you a section of the factory where only robot labor is employed?'
'... oblongs were all over the floor and surfaces.'
