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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
 |
| Shere | ||
| Destroys cells so that memory cannot be deduced from the cells of the person even in death. |
In the far future world of the novel, it is possible to probe the cells of a dead person and retrieve a substantial amount of information, including emotions, thoughts, and beliefs. People who are in danger of being captured by their enemies use a special drug that causes these traces to be unreadable.
| An Ixian probe can raid the mind even of a dead person," Geasa explained. "Shere is a drug that protects you from the probe. Your cells will be totally dead before the drug effect is gone. |
| Technovelgy from Heretics of Dune,
by Frank Herbert. Published by Putnam in 1984 Additional resources -
|
It does seem hard to believe that it would be possible to probe your cells after you are dead, and retrieve anything like thoughts. However, research done on planaria and other simple organisms suggests that, since particular kinds of training (like finding their way through mazes, or resistance to being photophobic) have an effect on the tissues of the animal, it may be possible to deduce something about the organism's training or experiences from the cadaver.
More information on this topic is available in the entry for RNA Shots, from A World Out of Time by Larry Niven.
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'Clothes are no longer made from dead fibers of fixed color and texture that can approximate only crudely to the vagrant human figure...'
'Books were just a commodity that had to be produced, like jam or bootlaces.'
'...it rears and spreads its fan. It can pick one man out of a crowd.'
'...a new plastic with the characteristics of an avian eggshell.'
'It was a pushpot, which could not possibly be called a jet plane because it could not possibly fly. Only it did.'
'She wouldn't stop until Antar had told her everything he knew about whatever it was that she was playing with on her screen.'
'Does thinking you're the last sane man on the face of the Earth make you crazy?'
