ATDTDA (2): 'World-System' (33.24)

[Monte Davis]

Otto quotes:

>  "If such a thing is ever produced (.) it will mean the end 
> of the world, not just 'as we know it' but as anyone knows 
> it...

I have a blurred memory of a 1950s science fiction story about a new hand
weapon of MagicTech power -- enabling one person, say, to destroy an
advancing armored force or air flotilla -- which is used to overthrow a
tyrannical government.

For 95% of its length the story seems a sunny libertarian fantasy
extrapolated from the US Western notion of the six-gun as "the great
equalizer." Then, just at the end, it begins to occur to a few of the
characters that such power may be incompatible with *any* government at all
-- possibly any society at all...