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"This category [science fiction] excludes rocket ships that make U-turns, serpent men of Neptune that lust after human maidens, and stories by authors who flunked their Boy Scout merit badge tests in descriptive astronomy."
- Robert Heinlein
 |
| Scrith | ||
| The material used to build Ringworld; has remarkable tensile strength |
In this excerpt from the novel, Louis Wu is discussing a puzzling discovery.
| "Our telescopes cannot find further details." "So you haven't really learned much." "I would say that we have learned a good deal. One puzzling point. The ring apparently stops on the close order of 40 percent of neutrinos." |
| Technovelgy from Ringworld,
by Larry Niven. Published by Ballantine in 1970 Additional resources -
|
Scrith has another interesting property, revealed when a spaceship plowed a furrow in the scrith forming the foundation of the Ringworld:
The flat, grayish, translucent material beneath the ship was terribly slippery...
"...Watch out when you get down. The surface is almost frictionless."
His feet shot out from under him the moment they touched ground. He landed hard on his gluteus maximi.
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Ringworld
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and Technology by Larry Niven
Tech news articles related to Ringworld
Tech news articles related to works by Larry Niven
| 'Mooncrete' Lunar Regolith Concrete (LRC) |
| Harvard Metamaterials Change Structure Instantly |
| Nano-Chainmail 2D Mechanically Interlocked Polymer |
| Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick |
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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...'
