Question regarding "The Jaunt"

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Rrty

Well-Known Member
Jun 4, 2007
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Haven't read the story in a while -- will hope to read it again soon -- but I was thinking about the premise, and a thought came to mind.

In the story, if I recall, some criminals used the technology to get rid of someone by putting him into the transportation device and then not bringing him back. It's bad enough to go through it fully conscious, but to stay in the vortex (or whatever) forever...can't even think about that. The criminals who did this I believe were executed.

However, because of the dark side of human nature, I was wondering how people might view the technology. Could it be used as a device of punishment? What if those fictional criminals were given an eye-for-eye sentence and placed in the jaunt forever as well? If the story were real, do you think some of the worst examples of humanity would deserve to be placed in it? I don't think I could ever do that, no matter who we are talking about. But I can imagine some might feel differently.
 

Walter Oobleck

keeps coming back...or going, and going, and going
Mar 6, 2013
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you might be interested in Alfred Bester's, The Stars My Destination, original title, Tiger! Tiger! from the Blake poem. Scott recommended it, too. Not the Giant, the other Scott. Booya. I've read it a number of times. characters jaunte from place to place w/just a thought...nightmare theatre--a special place, "an early attempt to shock schizophrenics back into the objective world by rendering the phantasy world into which they were withdrawing uninhabitable." named after Jaunte, who under threat of death, jaunted seventy feet...this from the story. Charles Fort Jaunte. Gully (the giant in one place) Foyle (the largest and most irritating bookshop in London)...the amoral hero of the story. Pinocchio had a nose that grew long. Gully has tattoos visible when he can't control his emotions.

There is a kind of prologue in the story that should keep you curious. You could probably read it in a few minutes standing in a library aisle...and then jaunte out of there when the library policeman approaches. Been hearing much about our "broken justice system" on the radio of late. nothing in the way of an answer...just that it is broken. part of that broke part is the no punishment, at all, for crimes that should be punished. illegals released though they have committed murder...murderers released after eight years. that's the part the quality doesn't want us to know about. but i get the sense that our "broken justice system"....the answer to that...is to not have prisons. i've heard no other answer.
 
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Pucker

We all have it coming, kid
May 9, 2010
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It's an intriguing idea: Sentencing people to "forever."

I'm not sure I like it. Personally, I have no working concept of eternity. Infinity is something that does not resonate with me the way it does with people of certain faith. As such, I would hesitate to "punish" someone with something that I did not understand myself. Of course, you could say the same thing about a death sentence. I've seen people die and I think I understand -- at least in the abstract -- what death is. But what if I'm wrong and those people of certain faith are right?

It's a dangerous undertaking, this business of deciding who deserves what in an uncertain world.

Heavy lies the crown, and all that.
 
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