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"It's also important to vary your stimuli. I always look for new things to shock the system. Just as you make muscles grow by shocking them, you make the mind grow by shocking it."
- Bart Kosko
 |
| Telepresence Bulldozer | ||
| A bulldozer on the Moon that is operated remotely by a driver on Earth. |
We can see the future of telepresence in the following scenes from a documentary described in the novel:
| "Meet Rachel Lief," Lunan said. "Ms. Lief is a bulldozer driver." Lunan paused for effect. "As you see, Ms. Lief doesn't look like your typical tractor driver..."
"But then," Lunan said, "not every bulldozer operator works on the Moon." The cameras followed the trim woman into another room, where there was a replica of a large tractor. It was surrounded by TV screens. One screen showed an astronaut sitting in the driver's seat, staring impatiently into the screen. A bleak, nearly colorless pit showed over his left shoulder. "About time you got here," the astronaut said. "We were busy," Rachel sat down in the driver's seat and took hold of the controls. "I relieve you..." The bulldozer moved through the lunar strip mine... "As you can see... this is no easy job. It takes over a second for the signal to get to the Moon, and over a second for the information to get back to her. It takes a lot of computer power to work this trick, but it's worth it. Meet Colonel Robert Boyd, commander of Moon Base." "Colonel Boyd, does it help to have Earth-based machine operators?" "Sure. It costs a lot to keep people on the Moon. Now it's like I have four or five times as many people up here, and I don't have to find air for them or feed them." |
| Technovelgy from Oath of Fealty,
by Jerry Pournelle (w/L. Niven). Published by Timescape in 1981 Additional resources -
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Oath of Fealty
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and Technology by Jerry Pournelle (w/L. Niven)
Tech news articles related to Oath of Fealty
Tech news articles related to works by Jerry Pournelle (w/L. Niven)
Telepresence Bulldozer-related
news articles:
- Robotic Lunar 'MoonDigger' Bulldozers Planned By NASA
- Robotic Bulldozer Force Doubles In Israel
- Regolith Excavation Challenge Yields Prize Money
- NASA Project M Robot Avatar On Moon
- Moon Express Lunar Robot Mining: Shine On, Harvest Moon
- Lunatix Lunar Rover Will Accept YOUR Commands!
- Armano Remote Control Excavator
- Changesite Mineral To Be Mined On Moon By China
- REALLY Remote Control Excavators
- Students Vie For Lunar Regolith Mining Robot Prize
| SETI Suggests Prospecting The Solar System Without Landing |
| Cislunar Space And The Space Lanes of Golden Age Science Fiction |
| NASA Moonbase Update |
| The Solar Oberth Slingshot |
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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...'
