# Little Known Nifty Ideas From Science Fiction and Fantasy **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 18, 2011, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797 "2011-02-18T08:55:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/21 "2011-02-18T18:38:05Z")
> [@Meurglys](#): > > _Where Were You Last Pluterday_ was fun; kind of wish I had kept my copy, now that I’ve been reminded of it… Philip Jose Farmer did something a bit similar in his Dayworld books. > > Slow Glass made the (science) [news](http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090309105026.htm) a couple of years ago but I haven’t head anything more since then. I totally loved the Dayworld books. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/22 "2011-02-18T19:06:00Z")
In [_Sixth Column,_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth_Column) Heinlein posited a hitherto-undiscovered set of physical forces (magneto-gravitic and electro-gravitic) that can be used to put up buildings unassisted. It can also be used to make a racially selective death ray. Classic Golden Age phlebotinum! ---
**Author:** ![misling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3ab097/32.png) [@misling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misling)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/23 "2011-02-18T19:16:14Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Along the lines of a special gift for the privileged is a character in a book (or possibly story) from Poul Anderson, whose title I can’t remember. He had a mutation that gave him the equivalent of two brains. The scene that sticks with me is that he’s in a meeting and he’s using one brain to follow along and the other brain to read a book. That’s the superpower I’ve always wanted! I’m fairly sure that’s Heinlein - Revolt in 2100. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/24 "2011-02-18T19:20:14Z")
Zelazny has about twenty awesome ideas in _Creatures of Light and Darkness_; maybe my favorite is the description of duels between time-travelers: first there are the two facing off against each other, then they flicker and it’s a fight between two sets of twins; then they flicker again, and again, and it’s 19 versions of Set vs. 21 of the Iron General; then again and again with the numbers increasing geometrically. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/25 "2011-02-18T19:37:36Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > In [_Sixth Column,_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth_Column) Heinlein posited a hitherto-undiscovered set of physical forces (magneto-gravitic and electro-gravitic) that can be used to put up buildings unassisted. It can also be used to make a racially selective death ray. Classic Golden Age phlebotinum! the “Ledbetter Effect”, I loved that book! ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/26 "2011-02-18T19:47:08Z")
In the novelization of _Star Trek: The Motion Picture_, Kirk is part of a pilot project to replace traditional communicators with _sensceivers_, implants which allow one to have a communicator-like conversation with someone without need of a device. In effect, it created two-way, closed-circuit aural telepathy. But IIRC, Kirk hated it because it resulted in making you look like you were standing around talking to yourself. Needless to say, it’s what I think of whenever I see some Bluetoother talking to no one. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/27 "2011-02-18T19:55:55Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > There are plenty of these. The problem is that what one person sees as a nifty idea, worthy of contemplation and cherishing, may not move most other people. It’s highly subjective. And it’s important to realize that the fact that idea is well-known may have nothing to do either with its inherent niftiness, whether it would be widespread or not. > That said, one of the niftiest ideas is Hal Clement’s description of a new sense. “new senses” show up in many science fiction works, but they’re generally either something not terrifically difficult to grasp (infrared vision) or simply not described at all (read Kuttner and Moore’s “The Proud Robot”). > > But Hal Clement, in his 1946 short story “Uncommon Sense” describes just such an unusual method of perception in great detail. It works in a very unlikely situation – creatures living on a very cold world with almost perfect vacuum – but it makes perfect scientific and logical sense. Molecules boiling off or outgassing from anything in this situation travel in straight lines, because the mean free path is huge. Creatures on this world have “pinhole cameras” in place of eyes – big spherical organs with a hole at one side and a sensitive “retina” at the other. Only the retina isn’t sensitive to photons. It’s an olfactory organ, like what you have in your nose. The creature “sees” odors as images, because they travel, like photons, in straight lines, and when restricted by a pinhole aperture the “paint” an image of the emitter on the “retina”. It’s imaging by particles – atoms, ions, and molecules – rather than photons. And, of course, it makes images of things giving off lots of such volatile particles, which are likely to be either food or threats, and generally not images of things like rocks. If life evolved in such circumstances, such a sense seems like a real possibility. (Unlike the currently-considerred possibility of radio communication, as in another thread. Radio communicatiojn might be reasonable for life in some very specific situations, but seems improbable in a world like ours.) The sense does seem reasonable and feasible as described, I just don’t have any idea how it would manifest itself. I suppose you are saying that because the odors travel in a straight line they provide data about position and shape of their emitter. But unlike light, odor manifests itself in areas that have nothing to do with shape … armpit,s for example, would register as “brighter” or “bigger” or something like it on the human body, with genitals and butts likewise magnified. Interesting to think about, as you say. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/28 "2011-02-18T20:13:10Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Wow. I’m amazed that anyone knows that novel. I happened to pick it up cheap a few months ago and was intrigued by the idea, but I had never heard of it. > > The central idea behind **The Carpet Makers** by Andreas Eschbach is fascinating – thousands of planets whose sole economy is based upon making carpets out of human hair, that are all purchased by the Galactic Emperor. But no one knows why, or what they are used for. Sounds like a metaphor for a demand economy. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/29 "2011-02-18T20:39:51Z")
Quoth **Simplicio** : > [@](#): > > I read a short story a long time ago, I think it was by Stephen King. But anyways, scientists come up with a way to genetically engineer cats so that they stay adorable kittens for their entire lifetimes. People buy them for the cuteness factor. > > But it turns out that cats learn much faster when they’re kittens, so that they can learn skills like hunting and such when they’re young and then use those skills when they mature. For the eternal-kittens, though, they never stop learning at an accelerated rate. So as the story goes on, the kitten in question becomes more and more intelligent, eventually setting up traps for the dog and his owners. Interestingly, the domestication process pretty much _was_ a process of breeding wildcats (and wolves) so they stayed perpetually kittens (puppies). But for the most part, it seems to have had the opposite effect: Most domesticated animals are dumber than their wild equivalent. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/30 "2011-02-18T20:42:29Z")
> [@Evil\_Captor](#): > > Sounds like a metaphor for a demand economy. Not a metaphor. The answer, when it comes, blows the reader away. It’s logical, astonishing, and horrifying all at once. Then the next chapter ups the ante… If there’s a metaphor, it’s that power corrupts. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/31 "2011-02-18T20:59:29Z")
> [@misling](#): > > I’m fairly sure that’s Heinlein - Revolt in 2100. In Heinlein’s “Beyond This Horizon” one of the (equivalent of) Senators can read a book and pay full attention to the meeting. I don’t recall that from “Revolt”. The famous “two-brain” story is Van Vogt’s “Null-A” I think (I haven’t read that one though) - so the same “reading a book and listening to a discussion” bit might be in there. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/32 "2011-02-18T21:00:29Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > I read a short story a long time ago, I think it was by Stephen King. But anyways, scientists come up with a way to genetically engineer cats so that they stay adorable kittens for their entire lifetimes. People buy them for the cuteness factor. > > But it turns out that cats learn much faster when they’re kittens, so that they can learn skills like hunting and such when they’re young and then use those skills when they mature. For the eternal-kittens, though, they never stop learning at an accelerated rate. So as the story goes on, the kitten in question becomes more and more intelligent, eventually setting up traps for the dog and his owners. I think that’s “Fluffy” and “Snowball” by Jeff Kooistra (from Analog in 1996). ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/33 "2011-02-18T21:14:58Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Interestingly, the domestication process pretty much _was_ a process of breeding wildcats (and wolves) so they stayed perpetually kittens (puppies). But for the most part, it seems to have had the opposite effect: Most domesticated animals are dumber than their wild equivalent. I’d say that this is because humans tend to bond and take care of the cuter animals, cuteness being both looks and behavior. Intelligence, however, can be the opposite of cute. Intelligence in a working animal (sheepherding dog, or mousing cat) is usually a positive trait. > [@Andy\_L](#): > > I think that’s “Fluffy” and “Snowball” by Jeff Kooistra (from Analog in 1996). That sounds about right. I remember reading those stories, and one of the cats enjoyed toasted marshmallows so much that he learned how to toast his own. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/34 "2011-02-18T21:21:40Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > I think that’s “Fluffy” and “Snowball” by Jeff Kooistra (from Analog in 1996). Unless it is by King in which case it’s likely “The Cat from Hell” [The Cat from Hell - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cat_from_Hell) (note: ugh!) ---
**Author:** ![fighting\_ignorant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ac8455/32.png) [@fighting\_ignorant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fighting_ignorant)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/35 "2011-02-18T22:13:43Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Not a metaphor. The answer, when it comes, blows the reader away. It’s logical, astonishing, and horrifying all at once. Then the next chapter ups the ante… > > If there’s a metaphor, it’s that power corrupts. Ok now I’m eager to know the answer but frankly not planning to read the book. Spoil it for me? Thanks!! ---
**Author:** ![AClockworkMelon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aclockworkmelon/32/10803_2.png) [@AClockworkMelon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AClockworkMelon)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/36 "2011-02-18T22:32:10Z")
> [@fighting\_ignorant](#): > > Ok now I’m eager to know the answer but frankly not planning to read the book. Spoil it for me? Thanks!! Same here! ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/37 "2011-02-18T22:42:45Z")
Me too. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/38 "2011-02-18T22:53:50Z")
Me four. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/39 "2011-02-18T23:14:36Z")
In the L. Sprague De Camp short story _Hyperpiliosity_, a mutating virus (influenza) causes latent DNA to activate, & most of Humanity grows a thick pelt of fur. Note thaty this was written late 40s-early 50s. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2011, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797/40 "2011-02-19T00:47:52Z")
> [@fighting\_ignorant](#): > > Ok now I’m eager to know the answer but frankly not planning to read the book. Spoil it for me? Thanks!! [Spoiler]To set this up, you need to know the first chapter. It lays out the culture of the carpet makers on one planet. They are a family. One man does the weaving, his wife and any daughters provide the hair for the carpet, and his son (and there is only one) is taught the trade to take over. They create just one or two of these carpets in a lifetime. In the opening chapter (which was published as a short story), a son rebels against the tradition. The father kills the son (who is in his teens) when his wife gives birth to a second. The details are slowly revealed. About two-thirds in the novel, we’re shown the story of a man, kept prisoner in a chair, his eyes forced open like Alex in **A Clockwork Orange** as he watches his planet being striped of all life and covered with the carpets. The final revelation is that the man was the leader of his world, a part of the Galactic empire, who made a pointed remark about the Emperor’s bald head. The entire system was set up to exact the Emperor’s revenge for the remark. The final chapter echoes the first. Carpet making has been discontinued, but one carpet maker won’t quit. He’s the boy born in the first chapter, and he must continue to weave the carpet so that his brother didn’t die for nothing.[/spoiler] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-known-nifty-ideas-from-science-fiction-and-fantasy/571797.md?page=3)