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"It is change ... that is the dominant factor in society today... the world as it will be. This means that ... every man must take on a science fictional way of thinking.""
- Isaac Asimov
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| Dropshaft | ||
| An elevator shaft with no elevator - the "lift" is from gravity or suppressed inertia. |
As far as I know, the first use of this term, although the idea had been sketched out earlier (see below).
| The Pyrotic let the dropshaft lower him, and he found the lifescoot some time later. |
| Technovelgy from Deeper Than the Darkness,
by Harlan Ellison. Published by Infinity Science Fiction in 1957 Additional resources -
|
See the entry for drop shaft from Galactic Patrol (1937) by Doc Smith. Smith has all the words, but doesn't create the phrase.
Compare to bounce tube from Robert Heinlein's 1956 juvenile Double Star.
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More Ideas
and Technology from Deeper Than the Darkness
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Tech news articles related to works by Harlan Ellison
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'Compounds devised by the biochemists for the rapid building of bone...'
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'It is about the size and shape of a kitchen stool, gyro-stabilized...'
'The greatest problem of all was the elimination of the human element of braking together with its inevitable time lag.'
'Across the ancient sea floor a dozen tall, blue-sailed Martian sand ships floated, like blue smoke.'
'Power could be compressed thus into an inch-square cube of what looked like blue-white ice'
