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"Cyberspace is a metaphor that allows us to grasp this place where since about the time of the second world war we've increasingly done so many of the things that we think of as civilization."
- William Gibson
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| Chevaline | ||
| An open robotic vehicle for one person, shaped like a horse. |
Seems to derive from the French word for an equestrian statue. Most of these seem to be large public monuments, as opposed to small garden statues.
| A horse, or something built around the same general plan, was coming down the street at a hard gallop. Its hooves did not make the pocking noise of iron horseshoes. Bud realized it was a chevaline - a four-legged robot thingy. |
| From The Diamond Age,
by Neal Stephenson. Published by Bantam Books in 1995 Additional resources -
|
As unique as it is, there are a variety of references to this sort of conveyance. See also references to FESS in A Warlock In Spite Of Himself (Christopher Stasheff) and to Black in The Changing Land (Roger Zelazny). As it happens, FESS also had retractable rubber pads to let it gallop noiselessly. Both of these are fantasy novels that make use of the special place that a robotic vehicle of "cold iron" has in worlds where organic magic works.
In case you feel the urge to actually see robotic carts and such wandering around the countryside, you might want to visit the Robot Vehicle Range in Albuquerque, NM.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Diamond Age
More Ideas
and Technology by Neal Stephenson
Tech news articles related to The Diamond Age
Tech news articles related to works by Neal Stephenson
Chevaline-related
news articles:
- R7 Ridable Robot
| CopterPack Is Robert Heinlein's 1954 Copter Harness |
| Las Vegas Tunnels To Have Autonomous Teslas |
| First Boring Passenger Station In Las Vegas |
| Tesla's 20,000 Superchargers |
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'... the lens displays would be useless without a wearable computer to do the graphics.'
'the registration number which the traffic control automatically photographed as she left the controlway...'
'It could maintain a steady six miles per hour...'
'Then they press one of these here thirteen buttons...'
'...without burning a single hydrocarbon molecule to injure the diseased atmosphere any further.'
'Bird-like robots now descended from the ceiling of the theatre...'
'The efficient robot waiter of the Sky Club had cleared away the remnants of an epicurean meal.'
'...in the tank the new body and the new mind and memory and life has taken almost instant form.'
