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"The first thing that's wrong with being a science-fiction writer today is that the present has caught up with the future and surpassed it."
- Peter Watts
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| Bot | ||
| The first use of this contraction for "robot". |
As far as I know, this is the first use in science fiction for this very common contraction.
| You see, sir, i was killed a lot deader than you were, my whole body was destroyed, when they got my ship the only part of me that the ’bots were able to get into cold-sleep was my head, shoulders and a part of my spine... |
| Technovelgy from We All Died At Breakaway Station,
by Richard Meredith. Published by Amazing Stories in 1969 Additional resources -
|
Compare to the first use of the word robot from R.U.R. (1920) by Karel Capek.
Hard to believe, but this familiar contraction was so new that in 1977, Gregory Benford felt he needed to explain it in his story Homemaker:
The robot squats mutely.
‘Bot?’ Gerald asks. ‘
Slang for robot. You ask him.’
‘What's your name, little bot?’
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Tech news articles related to works by Richard Meredith
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| Vero Robotic Dog With Vacuum Cleaner Feet |
| Boy Makes Biomimetic Turtle Robot |
| Origin F1 Humanoid Robot's Facial Skin |
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'A broken circle with arrows pointing to a right-hand flow appeared in the chalf.'
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'Midges have many capabilities. To the untrained eye, they look like sparrows.'
'I made disks of my own voice to the number of five hundred very carefully chosen words.'
'His sensors out and working, and the whirring of the tape that sucked up sight and sound and shape and smell and form...'
'It sounds to me as though you had invented a kind of metal earthworm.'
