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Adzel And Technic Civiization
In the much later Terran Empire period, Chunderban Desai, High Commissioner of the Virgilian System, visits Prosser Tatiana Thane at the University of Nova Roma. When he returns to his office, the phone informs him that he has had an emergency call. He had not left a number where he could be reached. Thus, Desai does not have a mobile phone.
However, less than two decades later in another part of the Terran Empire, Dominic Flandry uses a "pocket phone." See:
An SF Prediction
So was the technology of mobile phones developed over a thousand years later in the Technic History than on Earth Real?
2 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
This relative lack of mobile phones is one of the few signs of "datedness" to be found in Anderson's Technic History stories. Not that any sensible person can really fault him for not thinking of such a device--no writer can think of everything. Still, it would have been better if he had.
I think I first came across the concept of mobile phones in the pocket computers used by the characters in Niven/Pournelle's THE MOTE IN GOD'S EYE.
Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I had another thought. Most times in the Technic stories, it's arguable that the use of mobile phones by the characters were not necessary. Except in cases where, when Commissioner Desai was visiting Prosser Thane, it would have made more sense for him to have received that emergency call at her apartment thru a cell phone.
Sean
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