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"The writing is clicking away in my head and piling up, and unless I get it on paper somehow it's going to create uncomfortable pressure in my skull."
- Isaac Asimov
 |
| Empath | ||
| A being capable of telepathic empathy with others. |
It seems fair to assume that this word is modeled on "telepath", but see the discussion below.
| "How exactly does the government use empaths?" Tim shrugged. "We can tell the level of a man's loyalty just by meeting him. We can walk around a factory and sense that there's going to be a strike." |
| Technovelgy from Empath,
by J.T. McIntosh. Published by New Worlds in 1956 Additional resources -
|
How does it work? One character explains it:
The origin of this word seems straightforward enough, but if you look, you can find it earlier. Bear with me.
John FM Dovaston wrote a long poem Fitz-Gwarine: A Ballad of the Welsh Border in Three Cantos in 1811. It contains these lines:
Science fiction fans feel right at home in these lines. In The Empath episode of Star Trek: TOS, when Scotty learns about Gem, the young woman empath, he says "Scott comments that she must have been a "pearl of great price" and they all agree. Yes, the "pearl of great price" is a parable from the book of Matthew, but is there some sort of in-joke here that I don't know about?
The Star Trek TOS episode The Empath (1968) was striking enough that I remember it from childhood. In Star Trek: TNG, one of the main characters is an empath, counselor Deanna Troi.
Compare to the Voight-Kampff Empathy Test from m Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (1968) Philip K. Dick and the empathy box originally from The Little Black Box (1964) also by Dick.
"It isn't telepathy. No one can pick words or ideas out of another person's brain - yet. It's a sensitivity to atmosphere, to aura. To feelings... You can't tell what's going to happen, or what people are thinking. You can just feel things - and guess."
Lord, when I look upon thy starry sky
With pearls empath'd like scatter'd dust of gold,
I humble me, lost in amazement high,
To think what he thy gifted son hath told,
Far-sighted Newton; that round each are roll'd
Un-number'd worlds.
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'Space-sickness is one of the most unpleasant sensations that a human being can experience. Not all are subject to it...'
'...I saw a nice black heavy-looking cloud sailing by just now, and I can get the electrical machine out in five minutes to draw it down.'
'From a distance it could resolve the cosmic rays reflected from various substances.'
'The answer to the dumb student's prayer.'
'He had travelled the space-lanes of the solar system for the greater part of his life...'
'The dinner was excellent. It was completely vegetarian — grown in specially prepared gardens in this Moon base...'
'Telepaths had their sensitiveness enlarged to an immense range by the pin-sets, which were telepathic amplifiers adapted to the mammal mind.'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
