Ah-hah, so the thot plickens… So what happens next? Will Nice Officer take Bunz’ report of a Stolen Scout Craft? or will the Mean Cop arrest her for Imitating a Bloodhound Without a (Dog) License? So eat a piece of cheese and wait with bated breath for the answers… probably to completely different questions…
Somebody ought to point out to Bunz that her hench-bot is a “Katz” model and not a “Doggz”. I don’t think our heroine has read his manual either. She keeps asking him to do technical stuff and his reaction is; “Do what? Who me?” As for the image of Bunz down on all fours with her schnozz literally on the pavement and her caboose in the air – well it almost made me snort my coffee. I just get this mental image of a cosplayer….
Well yes – “Positron” is an actual word (the opposite partner to the Electron) however “Positronic” seems a made up pseudo-word created by Mr. Asimov… (Leastways “positronic” isn’t in my dictionary)
So Um… perhaps Bunz meant “Positronic” but just couldn’t spell it… Or could it be that she meant something else? Though am somewhat tempted to do so, I am a li’l leery of correcting her spelling… She tends to get a tad peevish…
Don’t worry about it; it’s just me cracking wise over something that looks like a typo. Besides, if Dr. Asimov actually knew how to make “positronic brains” instead of just writing about them, he’d’a been making ’em, and positronic robots would be all over the place.
My [really really old] dictionary doesn’t have “positronic” either, but I see it as analogous to “electronic.” [I had to look up “analogous” too.]
I am a tad concerned about the reliability of my dictionary… It says that a Positron is: “a subatomic particle with the same mass as an electron and a numerically equal but positive charge.”
This is clearly Wrong!! a Positron & Electron have equal but opposite charges – however their Mass is radically different!! (the electron being nearly if not completely massless, while the Positron is the Oliver Hardy of the pair)…
The positron is the antiparticle to the electron, or the electron’s antimatter counterpart. The mass of an electron and a positron are equal, given as 1/1836th approx. of a proton. The electron electric charge is negative; that of a positron is positive.
Wikipedia has a pretty good article on the history and science of the positron and another on the electron; I consulted both to come up with this, ’cause I definitely don’t know everything there is to know.
Akk!! “You are Correct SIR!” I was thinking of the Proton an’ corn-fused it with the Positron… Makes me look a bit of a clown, doesn’t it??
But, my eyes aren’t as good as they used ta be – an’ them li’l buggers are so dad burn dinky, it’s gettin’ tougher ta tell one from another these days…
Katz has a “quasitronic brain” with “posatronic sensors” acording to Bunz who may be a bit confused.
(Oh cripes, not this guy again…)
Positronic is a word coined by Issac Asimov way back when in his Robot series. He was perfectly happy to let anybody use it too. All kinds of writers and TV/Movie people used it in Homage and everything was cool.
(Does he ever shut up?)
But then it was used in Star Trek to describe Data’s brain. Now as we all know Star Trek is currently owned by Paramount. Paramount is one of those entertainment conglomerate giants who try to trademark everything they ever mention. (TSR once tried to trademark the word “nazi” – true dish.) Anywho – they gots lots of corporate lawyers on retainer who have nothing better to do than try to shut down everybody who even remotely appears to be “stealing” stuff that they claim is theirs.
(and your freakin point is???)
Maybe Josh is coining his own term “posatronic” in order to dodge a potential lawsuit from the Corporate MAN who thinks they own everything.
Previously I wondered if Bunz and Katz could use our space technology to help themselves out of their fix. It was pointed out that theirs seems a much greater technology based society. Still the other day I watched part of a movie, I believe called “Battleship”. Really ancient technology came through to give the superior space invaders more than they expected from the US Navy’s last fight.
Harumpf! Sure. She went down – but she took a trio of three-legged Martian war-machine gits with her! And she wasn’t even a battleship – she was only a torpedo-ram!
(Funny how the concept of a flying or hovering Martian machine never occurred to a very Victorian H. G. Wells. 1953 Hollywood put them in the air and Spielberg put them back on their three feet in ’05.)
It was my recollection that the Thunder Child had taken out one Martian walking machine while two others parboiled it… Looking on Wikipedia, it relates that T.C. rammed one and hit another with a cannon shot before the third one fricassees T.C. with it’s heat ray…
There are many versions of War of the Worlds – though I think that H.G. Wells’ original book is the definitive source in this case…
Just my own impression – but when George Pal made the ’53 film version, having the Martian machines “stand” on 3 nearly invisible force rays, was just much easier to animate via stop motion, than a tripod walking machine… (As a kid, I was very disappointed with this choice!) Just a side-note, for aircraft aficionados, one of the niftier aspects of George Pal’s film is the cameo by the Northrop YB-49 Flying Wing!
To get back to the original question, I haven’t seen the Battleship flick in question (I did hear that it was a ripe Stinker) However, the issue of combining alien tech with ours will be a factor a bit later on in B&K’s own story… But think of it sort of like this: How would we merge our present day gizmos with Neolithic tech? The Neanderthals did make very fine stone blades – but what do you do with one? Duct tape it to the barrel of your Kolesnikov for a bayonet?? It’s Not a question of Apples an’ Oranges – it’s Rocks an’ Integrated Circuitry!
There’s a brief mention of Martians learning to fly in the book—something the humans figured out from their attempt in the aftermath.
Also, if memory serves me right again, none of the film or TV versions kept H. G. Wells’s multitentacled Martians—most made them vaguely (or precisely) humanoid. (Orson Welles’s version kept them, but, hey, that’s radio.)
Somewhere out there on YouTube, there’s a short bit of stop-motion animation of a Martian creature emerging from the cylinder, made by Ray Harryhausen, intended for his version of “The War of the Worlds”—unfortunately, Harryhausen didn’t make that movie. (*Very* unfortunately.)
She’s got a ticket ta ra-hi-hide…
She’s got a ticket ta rawd…
But the Bunny don’t… Eh? Whazzat??
Uh Huh… uh Huh… Sorry!!
Eh, I jus’ got this email from some Lawyers…
Guess I’d better not finish singin’ the lyric…
Ah-hah, so the thot plickens… So what happens next? Will Nice Officer take Bunz’ report of a Stolen Scout Craft? or will the Mean Cop arrest her for Imitating a Bloodhound Without a (Dog) License? So eat a piece of cheese and wait with bated breath for the answers… probably to completely different questions…
Somebody ought to point out to Bunz that her hench-bot is a “Katz” model and not a “Doggz”. I don’t think our heroine has read his manual either. She keeps asking him to do technical stuff and his reaction is; “Do what? Who me?” As for the image of Bunz down on all fours with her schnozz literally on the pavement and her caboose in the air – well it almost made me snort my coffee. I just get this mental image of a cosplayer….
It should be “positronic,” not “posatronic”…unless it’s supposed to be “posatronic.”
Eh?? What’s the difference? er, other than one is almost a real word, an the other one isn’t…
“Positron” is a real term for a real thing, “posatron” isn’t. But if it isn’t a real thing, it’s all flexible.
(“Real thing” may be an exaggeration—a great deal of this area of physics is speculative.)
Well yes – “Positron” is an actual word (the opposite partner to the Electron) however “Positronic” seems a made up pseudo-word created by Mr. Asimov… (Leastways “positronic” isn’t in my dictionary)
So Um… perhaps Bunz meant “Positronic” but just couldn’t spell it… Or could it be that she meant something else? Though am somewhat tempted to do so, I am a li’l leery of correcting her spelling… She tends to get a tad peevish…
Don’t worry about it; it’s just me cracking wise over something that looks like a typo. Besides, if Dr. Asimov actually knew how to make “positronic brains” instead of just writing about them, he’d’a been making ’em, and positronic robots would be all over the place.
My [really really old] dictionary doesn’t have “positronic” either, but I see it as analogous to “electronic.” [I had to look up “analogous” too.]
I am a tad concerned about the reliability of my dictionary… It says that a Positron is: “a subatomic particle with the same mass as an electron and a numerically equal but positive charge.”
This is clearly Wrong!! a Positron & Electron have equal but opposite charges – however their Mass is radically different!! (the electron being nearly if not completely massless, while the Positron is the Oliver Hardy of the pair)…
The positron is the antiparticle to the electron, or the electron’s antimatter counterpart. The mass of an electron and a positron are equal, given as 1/1836th approx. of a proton. The electron electric charge is negative; that of a positron is positive.
Wikipedia has a pretty good article on the history and science of the positron and another on the electron; I consulted both to come up with this, ’cause I definitely don’t know everything there is to know.
Akk!! “You are Correct SIR!” I was thinking of the Proton an’ corn-fused it with the Positron… Makes me look a bit of a clown, doesn’t it??
But, my eyes aren’t as good as they used ta be – an’ them li’l buggers are so dad burn dinky, it’s gettin’ tougher ta tell one from another these days…
Katz has a “quasitronic brain” with “posatronic sensors” acording to Bunz who may be a bit confused.
(Oh cripes, not this guy again…)
Positronic is a word coined by Issac Asimov way back when in his Robot series. He was perfectly happy to let anybody use it too. All kinds of writers and TV/Movie people used it in Homage and everything was cool.
(Does he ever shut up?)
But then it was used in Star Trek to describe Data’s brain. Now as we all know Star Trek is currently owned by Paramount. Paramount is one of those entertainment conglomerate giants who try to trademark everything they ever mention. (TSR once tried to trademark the word “nazi” – true dish.) Anywho – they gots lots of corporate lawyers on retainer who have nothing better to do than try to shut down everybody who even remotely appears to be “stealing” stuff that they claim is theirs.
(and your freakin point is???)
Maybe Josh is coining his own term “posatronic” in order to dodge a potential lawsuit from the Corporate MAN who thinks they own everything.
….and then maybe not. (Bunz does seem a bit short fused.)
Previously I wondered if Bunz and Katz could use our space technology to help themselves out of their fix. It was pointed out that theirs seems a much greater technology based society. Still the other day I watched part of a movie, I believe called “Battleship”. Really ancient technology came through to give the superior space invaders more than they expected from the US Navy’s last fight.
In the finest tradition of HMS Thunder Child.
NAVY – giving alien invaders a good fight since 1897!
Ahh… didn’t the Thunder Child end up as jus’ so many molten metal bits an’ pieces??
Harumpf! Sure. She went down – but she took a trio of three-legged Martian war-machine gits with her! And she wasn’t even a battleship – she was only a torpedo-ram!
(Funny how the concept of a flying or hovering Martian machine never occurred to a very Victorian H. G. Wells. 1953 Hollywood put them in the air and Spielberg put them back on their three feet in ’05.)
It was my recollection that the Thunder Child had taken out one Martian walking machine while two others parboiled it… Looking on Wikipedia, it relates that T.C. rammed one and hit another with a cannon shot before the third one fricassees T.C. with it’s heat ray…
There are many versions of War of the Worlds – though I think that H.G. Wells’ original book is the definitive source in this case…
Just my own impression – but when George Pal made the ’53 film version, having the Martian machines “stand” on 3 nearly invisible force rays, was just much easier to animate via stop motion, than a tripod walking machine… (As a kid, I was very disappointed with this choice!) Just a side-note, for aircraft aficionados, one of the niftier aspects of George Pal’s film is the cameo by the Northrop YB-49 Flying Wing!
To get back to the original question, I haven’t seen the Battleship flick in question (I did hear that it was a ripe Stinker) However, the issue of combining alien tech with ours will be a factor a bit later on in B&K’s own story… But think of it sort of like this: How would we merge our present day gizmos with Neolithic tech? The Neanderthals did make very fine stone blades – but what do you do with one? Duct tape it to the barrel of your Kolesnikov for a bayonet?? It’s Not a question of Apples an’ Oranges – it’s Rocks an’ Integrated Circuitry!
There’s a brief mention of Martians learning to fly in the book—something the humans figured out from their attempt in the aftermath.
Also, if memory serves me right again, none of the film or TV versions kept H. G. Wells’s multitentacled Martians—most made them vaguely (or precisely) humanoid. (Orson Welles’s version kept them, but, hey, that’s radio.)
Somewhere out there on YouTube, there’s a short bit of stop-motion animation of a Martian creature emerging from the cylinder, made by Ray Harryhausen, intended for his version of “The War of the Worlds”—unfortunately, Harryhausen didn’t make that movie. (*Very* unfortunately.)
And here is Harryhausen’s Martian test footage referenced by Robert Nowall below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XutWqtjjLuM
Or search Harrysausen martian. It sounds like a clip from one of those Leonard Nemoy narrated shows from the 70’s. (In Search Of)
I detect a little “Starchie” from ancient MAD in the EC era, here… 😉
Or – a ticket to ride DOWNTOWN!