Is this the first depiction of an ecig in a movie?

[Shirtbloke]

Don't know if you remember the movie 2001:A Space Odyssey which came out in 1968 but it's my contention that it contains the first ever depiction of an ecig.


There's the scene about 14 minutes in when the space shuttle type craft is flying up to dock with the space station. The sole passenger is asleep in his seat and there's an object that he's let go of that is floating around in free fall. The stewardess enters the cabin and retrieves the object and tucks it into his pocket.


Now for years I thought, as most people probably did, that the object was a pen. But I recently re-watched the film and I've just become convinced that it's actually an ecig.


Here's the evidence:
1 - It's a bit on the fat side for a pen.
2 - It has a transparent red endpiece (mouthpiece) on it through which you can clearly see the chimney and the place where the coil is.
3 - It has 3 buttons on it - the top one is red and is clearly the fire button, and the other two below are clearly the up and down buttons for adjusting the voltage. Why would you need 3 buttons on a pen?


I always knew that Arthur C. Clarke was a visionary who predicted the future, but I never realised he was this good.

Am I right?

 

[K_Tech]

Sorry to bust your bubble, but that was a Parker Atomic Pen. It had a small on-board reactor that heated the solid ink to feed the nib.

 

[Shirtbloke]

Where does it say that? Is it in the novel rather than the film?

 

[r77r7r]

Google Image Result for http://www.davidszondy.com/atomic/penbw1.jpg

 

[Shirtbloke]

Interesting - but the pen in that image is not the pen in the film.

 

[somdcomputerguy]

This sort of related to the topic of 'space pens'.

How much did NASA invest in the development of a 'space-pen', while the Russian space agency simply decided to use a pencil?

 

[Shirtbloke]

NASA didn't spend anything on developing a space pen. They actually used a pen that had been developed to work underwater by Paul Fisher. They were pretty expensive as pens go, but not the millions that people think.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Pen

Edit - they actually cost $6 each.

 

[somdcomputerguy]

NASA didn't spend anything on developing a space pen. They actually used a pen that had been developed to work underwater by Paul Fisher.

Hmm. I wasn't aware of that. Thanks for clarifying.

 

[somdcomputerguy]

NASA didn't spend anything on developing a space pen. They actually used a pen that had been developed to work underwater by Paul Fisher.

Hmm. I wasn't aware of that. Thanks for clarifying.

 

[Shirtbloke]

Hmm. I wasn't aware of that. Thanks for clarifying.

It's a popular misconception.

 

[K_Tech]

Where does it say that? Is it in the novel rather than the film?

The Underview on 2001: How Was It Done?

This is one of the very few references I can find, besides a CAD sharing site that has a few files. I haven't read the book in years, I'll have to dig it out and take a look.

 

[Shirtbloke]

Actually I started rereading the book yesterday to look for the pen, and I'm up to the Jupiter mission and so far there's been no mention of it.

 

[bwh79]

How much did NASA invest in the development of a 'space-pen', while the Russian space agency simply decided to use a pencil?

It's not like the Russians were the only ones who thought of it. NASA was using pencils at first, too, but they decided that the flammable wood shavings and electrically-conductive graphite dust floating around in microgravity were a bad call with all that sensitive, space-age electronic equipment just lying around, as it were. So they made a conscious decision to use the pens, instead. Eventually, the Russians wised up and started using them, too.

 

[Shirtbloke]

I just finished reading the book and there's no mention of any pens, atomic or otherwise.

 

[Ou2mame]

Growing up at Nasa, I can say that they found so many ways to spend money elsewhere, the mythological space pen isn't anything lol

 

[Redhotchewy]

Kevin Spacy used one briefly on house of cards.

 

[Shirtbloke]

Dennis Waterman used a cigalike in an episode of New Tricks (UK TV show about elderly detectives) a couple of years ago - though he ended up throwing it in the bin.

 

[ReigntheGamer]

They two hosts of Dual Survival were given an e-cig as a "survival supply" recently during an episode on the Discovery Channel, turns out that if you mix the e-liquid and potassium permanganate you can start a fire with it.

 

[The Cloud Minder]

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I always knew that Arthur C. Clarke was a visionary who predicted the future, but I never realised he was this good.

Am I right?

Well actually, I don't recall that in the book, so Stanley Kubrick would be the visionary if you are right, not Clarke.

 

[Shirtbloke]

Well actually, I don't recall that in the book, so Stanley Kubrick would be the visionary if you are right, not Clarke.

Actually I'm just half way through reading 2010, the sequel, and Chandra locks himself away in the toilet on the Russian spacecraft and smokes a cigar - so definitely not Clarke.