I just read an interesting article about the digital house of the future. This quote from the article, “You wake up in the morning and use the bathroom, your toilet takes a quick health check-up and emails the results to your doctor.” reminds me of a science fiction short story I read a long time ago.
As I recall it was an exposition on “modern life” including much of what’s described in the article I quoted above. What caught my eye was the bit about emailing the doctor. In the story I recall the scene was that the kids, and dad, were grumbling about the tiny portions they got for their meals. Portions that were under the control of the “machines” that ran the house.
Well, you can probably guess what’s coming … one day mom got her regular food, and then more and then even more! Yes, the “machine” knew she was eating for two long before any one else, and so increased her food rations. And there was much merriment and celebrating (and of course the reader was left to ponder what life might be like in the future).
Anyway, just thought I’d share this memory. It was likely brought on because I’ve been re-reading some Bradbury today (the Veldt is more chilling than ever). Iwould love to know the name of the story I just described; I don’t think it was by Bradbury, but it could have been I guess.
Worth noting, I couldn’t find any dead tree Bradbury stories in the house. No problem, I’ll just buy a couple for my Kindle. Hah! Turns out Bradbury was against e-books, so the only available versions are PDF files. Weird that one of the leading science fiction writers of all time was against the use of a relatively mundane 21st century technology.