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"What has allowed so many Psychopathic Personalities to rise so high in corporations and government, is that they are so decisive. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reason that they cannot care what happens next."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
 |
| Super-Photon | ||
| Three photons in one. |
At this point in the novel, the Thessians struck with a beam of pure silvery light that tore a hundred feet of pure cosmium off the nose of our hero's ship? What is this incredible weapon?
| "...do you know what that weapon is, Morey?" "Got some readings on it with the Banderlog's instruments, and I think I do. Twin-ray is right," replied Morley. "Hmhm - so I think. It's a super-photon. What they do is use a field somewhat similar to the field we use in making cosmium, except that in theirs, instead of the photons lying side by side, they slide into one another, compounding. They evidently get three photons to go into one. Now, as we know, that size photon doesn't exist for the excellent reason that it can't in this space. Space closes in about it. Therefore they have a projected field to accompany it that tends to open out space - and they are using that, not the attractive ray, on us now. The result is that for a distnce not too great, the triple-ray exists in normal space - then goes into another. Now the question is how can we stop it? I have no idea - have you any?" "Yes, but my idea can't exist in this space either," grinned Morey. |
| From Invaders From The Infinite,
by John W. Campbell. Published by Experimental Publishing Co. in 1932 Additional resources -
|
The term "super-photon" is in common use in physics today, but I can't find an earlier reference to this term than Campbell's. The idea of that light can be treated as packets or discrete quanta of energy dates from Einstein's treatment of the photoelectric effect in 1905; I'm not sure when the word "photon" was created.
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'... the two pairs of waldoes in the screen followed in exact, simultaneous parallelism.'
'THE SPACE VESSEL was traveling swiftly… For over five thousand years they had Voyaged on and on.’
'They circled the vast audiences, dancing, twittering, chirping...'
'The sun-quilt was a patchwork of colors and materials on the inward side, but silvered on the outward side...'
'Jim, I saw them reduce four of my doctors and nurses into those little cubes!'
'Fats Jordan was hanging in the center of the Big Glass Balloon, hugging his guitar to his massive black belly above his purple shorts..'
'When confronted by hills, or rough terrain, it did not stop, but simply slowed until the task demanded equaled its steady power output.'
'... the brain is no longer subjected to the accustomed pull, and it expands slightly in all directions.'
