# All the Talk Of The Market (ATOM!): Curious anachronisms **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 16, 2014, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633 "2014-09-16T06:54:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/1 "2014-09-16T06:54:33Z")
(Disclaimer: In spite of the long-winded setup, this thread is not about the Heinlein novel, but I need to discourse on it to some extent in order to provide context.) I’m sure there are many here who have read _The End Of Eternity_ by Robert Heinlein. It’s essentially a time-travel story in which “Eternity” is all the future from about 2800 CE to some point millions of centuries in the future, up and down which certain people, called “Eternals”, have the privilege of traveling at will. Near the end of the story, one of the characters–I forget why–has to travel back before the earliest point of Eternity to a point in the 1920s, effectively stranding himself in the past. He’s expecting the arrival of another Eternal and is supposed to advertise his presence so the newcomer will be able to contact him. So he takes out a small display ad in a newspaper: _ **A** LL **T** ALK **O** F THE **M** ARKET_ the idea being that only another visitor from the future will understand the word “atom”, though it does seem curious for Heinlein to suggest that this would work at a time when the foundations of nuclear physics had already been laid down by Rutherford, Bohr, and many others. Whatever, it doesn’t matter. I only bring it up because it’s slightly reminiscent of something I just discovered in my 1960 World Book, in the “Transportation” article: [Peak Oil!](https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5572/15231949216_e19f35ac1d_o_d.jpg) Of course, it is true that M. King Hubbert propounded the peak oil idea in 1956, but I’ll bet many more people in the 1920s knew what an atom was, than knew about peak oil. The idea of peak oil was probably known to some of Hubbert’s fellow petroleum engineers, but hardly anyone else. What’s more, Peak Oil is rather odd as the name of an oil company, even a fictitious one in an encyclopedia illustration. You don’t go drilling for oil on mountaintops, do you? So there it is, peak oil being mentioned in a general encyclopedia, at least as early as 1960. Obviously, this is just a striking coincidence, even if I did check the list of contributors to make sure that Hubbert’s name wasn’t included in it. What similar “anachronisms” have you noticed in old pictures, books, or other material? ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/2 "2014-09-16T07:19:17Z")
_The End of Eternity_ is by Isaac Asimov. That is all. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/3 "2014-09-16T07:20:50Z")
That ain’t a Heinlein novel. Wikipedia seems to think it’s by [Isaac Asimov](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_End_of_Eternity). ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/4 "2014-09-16T12:05:49Z")
Guys, don’t you get it? **Spectre** is a stranded Eternal. In his version of Reality, Heinlein wrote _The End of Eternity_ and the robot stories too. BTW, in the novel, the A T O M was superposed over a drawing of a mushroom cloud, a full decade before the first atom bomb. That was what Harlan noticed in the newspaper. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/5 "2014-09-16T12:45:37Z")
O my Og! Shakespeare was a stranded Eternal! In _Romeo and Juliet_ he writes: > [@](#): > > O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you. > She is the fairies’ midwife, and she comes > In shape no bigger than an agate-stone > On the fore-finger of an alderman, > Drawn with a team of little **atomies** > Athwart men’s noses as they lie asleep; Act I, Scene IV A tip of the hat to Robert Ripley, Believe it or Not… ---
**Author:** ![Flywheel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Flywheel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flywheel)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/6 "2014-09-16T13:04:09Z")
NM ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/7 "2014-09-16T17:50:59Z")
Asimov, yes! Mea culpa, but can we please now consider this side issue dealt with? ---
**Author:** ![BobArrgh](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobarrgh/32/2881_2.png) [@BobArrgh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobArrgh)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/8 "2014-09-16T19:50:06Z")
I haven’t read the book, but “Peak” could have been the name of the person who started an oil-drilling company. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/9 "2014-09-16T21:22:01Z")
> [@BobArrgh](#): > > I haven’t read the book, but “Peak” could have been the name of the person who started an oil-drilling company. Perhaps he also invented several popular garden or farm implements, among them Peak’s Pike. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/10 "2014-09-16T23:32:05Z")
> [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](#): > > Perhaps he also invented several popular garden or farm implements, among them Peak’s Pike. Also, many people don’t know that the former long-time _el presidente_ of Cuba was a lubricants engineer before becoming a revolutionary. Ever wonder why we call it Castro oil? ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2014, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/11 "2014-09-16T23:37:30Z")
> [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](#): > > …What similar “anachronisms” have you noticed in old pictures, books, or other material? One very famous “anachronism” is the [Credit Card](http://www.thesimpledollar.com/a-fascinating-look-at-edward-bellamy-inventor-of-the-credit-card/) in Edward Bellamy’s _Looking Backward: 2000-1887_, an 1888 SF novel. What he describes is more of a stored value card than a true “credit” card in the modern sense, but he predicts a cashless society. ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2014, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/12 "2014-09-17T03:45:33Z")
> [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](#): > > What’s more, Peak Oil is rather odd as the name of an oil company, even a fictitious one in an encyclopedia illustration. You don’t go drilling for oil on mountaintops, do you? Explain this then: [http://www.peakauto.com/products/motor-oil/](http://www.peakauto.com/products/motor-oil/) I think I have a bottle of PEAK 5W-30 in my garage somewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2014, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/13 "2014-09-17T04:50:37Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > BTW, in the novel, the A T O M was superposed over a drawing of a mushroom cloud, a full decade before the first atom bomb. That was what Harlan noticed in the newspaper. I did forget about the mushroom cloud picture, so the episode in the story makes more sense now. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2014, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/14 "2014-09-17T04:52:26Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > Explain this then: [http://www.peakauto.com/products/motor-oil/](http://www.peakauto.com/products/motor-oil/) > I think I have a bottle of PEAK 5W-30 in my garage somewhere. I suppose it’s the same as “Acme”, which is almost the same thing. Obviously then “Peak Oil” isn’t such a bizarre name after all. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [September 17, 2014, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/15 "2014-09-17T12:32:52Z")
In reading an old Bloom County collection, I saw one of the characters referred to as a “Dilbert” in a strip that was published prior to the onset of Scott Adams’s “Dilbert” comic strip. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/16 "2014-09-18T05:02:23Z")
I can see where Dilbert has likely been a male given name for a long time, albeit a rare one and (for the bearer) an unfortunate one. It must be a variant of Delbert, which is more common (but that’s still not saying much). ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2014, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-the-talk-of-the-market-atom-curious-anachronisms/698633/17 "2014-09-18T15:56:00Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > In reading an old Bloom County collection, I saw one of the characters referred to as a “Dilbert” in a strip that was published prior to the onset of Scott Adams’s “Dilbert” comic strip. From [Scott Adams’ blog FAQ](http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/03/most_frequently.html): > [@](#): > > 1. How did Dilbert get his name? > > I developed Dilbert as a doodle during my corporate years. He had no name, but my coworkers thought he needed one. So I had a “Name the Nerd” contest on my cubicle whiteboard. My boss at the time, Mike Goodwin, wrote down “Dilbert,” and I closed the contest. We had a winner. > > After I submitted Dilbert for syndication, Mike sheepishly told me that he realized why Dilbert seemed such a good name for a comic. He was looking through his Dad’s old military artifacts and realized he had seen a Dilbert comic before. Since WWII, a comic called Dilbert had been used by military pilots in the context of telling them what not to do. A “Dilbert” was synonymous with a pilot who was being an idiot. It was too late for me to turn back at that point. I kept the name Dilbert, and I never heard from the family of the original artist. Obviously they are aware of my version of Dilbert. I appreciate that they evidently decided to not make it an issue.