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Glossary of Science Fiction Ideas, Technology and Inventions

• dalke 11y ago
  "Acceleration couch" at http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=443 http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=443 is attributed to Niven's 'The Mote in God's Eye' (1974), but it exists in Heinlein's "Methuselah's Children" (1958); on p83 of my copy: > Ford struggled heavily out of the acceleration couch he was in. (This is as they are leaving Earth, accelerating towards the Sun, before they engage the star drive.) The site does let people send in comments, and indeed someone already commented at http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Content-Comments.asp?Bnum=443 http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Content-Comments.asp?Bnum=443 that Heinlein's "It's Great to be Back" (1947) is an earlier citation. However, that comment is from 2008, which makes it feel like the site is effectively dead. Personally, I prefer the effort of about 15 years ago to collect SF citations for the OED, at http://www.jessesword.com/sf/list http://www.jessesword.com/sf/list . That's specifically about words, not concepts, so it's not the same thing. But what I like about it is the curational decision to focus on terms which are used in more than one book, and to give a longer quote what uses the term.