Another vote for 12 Monkeys and the original Andromeda Strain. If we're adding TV, what about the Star Trek first season ep "Miri" (OK I looked it up) when the kids are all ancient and eveyrone dies at puberty. (Boy were they messing with young minds!)
The description of THE SIGNAL (which I haven't seen) reminds me of the dangers in the spread of memes: infectious ideas that spread via normal channels of communication.
While the SF lobes in my brain want to think of this like a sort of computer virus but for people, memes in fact occur all the time in real life, frequently as the latest fad in fashion, business, or technology. And like biological viruses, they can be good or bad. The current financial crisis can be thought of as a kind of meme that infected investors, financiers, and bankers to take on more risk than any rational person could justify.
Another example is the song that keeps running through your mind (think of ANYTHING except "Gilligan's Island"... ANYTHING!). This has been used in a short story by Arthur C. Clarke (as a weapon against the Nazi's I dimly recall) and in Alfred Bester's THE DEMOLISHED MAN (to avoid mind reading police from pegging a murderer). Just recently I had "Gimme Shelter" by the Rolling Stones running though my mind to the point of distraction. (But if you have to have a song stuck in your head, that's not a bad one.)
Memes might be described as a kind of obsession for those of us that are so inclined. Or maybe some forms of addictions are meme-based instead of physiological.
It's worth noting that in Rabid, the source of the deadly armpit penis wasn't simple cosmetic surgery. The doctors were performing an experimental stem cell procedure! Seriously, it's in the dialogue.
@Frostbeard: Well yeah. They were creating special skin that was supposed to regrow any part of the body. But . . . it was basically plastic surgery and armpit penises.
@alphanumeric1971: Because the new piece of crap was so hilariously preposterous that it became awesome. Except for the fact that it was horribly boring, some of that dialog was priceless. I love when they discover that the virus is some kind of cheesy ROT13 code, and then it's nano-something, and then it's a von Neumann Probe, and then it's some other ridiculous thing like an invisible dinosaur truck.
you seem to have missed 28 Weeks where the 28 Days Virus jumps to France and blows away the population on the Europe/Asia/Africa continental convergence...Leaving the USA to get all smug about not living in the Same basket as the rest, and the Canadians to go all hypocondriac.
@matthewtoney: Not just post-apocalyptic. These elves are apparently involved in spreading the pandemic that destroys us all! Why don't those elves go off in their ships to that shiny place with Bilbo and leave us alone?
04/28/09
Its like Rabid except instead of a virus its a parasite, and the infected turn from laid back swinging singles into aggressive swinging singles.
04/28/09
04/27/09
04/28/09
04/27/09
While the SF lobes in my brain want to think of this like a sort of computer virus but for people, memes in fact occur all the time in real life, frequently as the latest fad in fashion, business, or technology. And like biological viruses, they can be good or bad. The current financial crisis can be thought of as a kind of meme that infected investors, financiers, and bankers to take on more risk than any rational person could justify.
Another example is the song that keeps running through your mind (think of ANYTHING except "Gilligan's Island"... ANYTHING!). This has been used in a short story by Arthur C. Clarke (as a weapon against the Nazi's I dimly recall) and in Alfred Bester's THE DEMOLISHED MAN (to avoid mind reading police from pegging a murderer). Just recently I had "Gimme Shelter" by the Rolling Stones running though my mind to the point of distraction. (But if you have to have a song stuck in your head, that's not a bad one.)
Memes might be described as a kind of obsession for those of us that are so inclined. Or maybe some forms of addictions are meme-based instead of physiological.
04/27/09
04/27/09
04/27/09
04/27/09
[www.imdb.com]
04/27/09
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04/28/09
04/27/09
Also, out of respect for the dead, perhaps a "recently departed" (two weeks ago) for Ms. Chambers would be appropriate.
04/27/09
04/28/09
04/27/09
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04/27/09
/re-reads list/
um...
04/27/09
12/16/08
12/15/08
[flickr.com]
12/15/08
12/15/08
12/15/08