|
A fictional device appearing in Larry Niven's Known Space novels. It can stimulate the pleasure center of the brain via electric induction at varying levels, even at a distance. Such a jolt of pleasure can be as totally disabling as a similar jolt of pain could be. More so, repeated use of the tasp at a low level can become addictive, allowing even greater control of the subject. Less malignantly, their use had become commonplace in parks on Earth, to give an unexpected shock to random passers-by, before their use was banned by the ARM.
In Ringworld, Nessus had a tasp surgically implanted into himself, to enable him to control the Kzin expeditionary Speaker-to-Animals (as Louis Wu was a wirehead at the time, addicted to electric current performing a similar function to the tasp through a device called a droud; in order to control Louis, Nessus could just control access to the droud and meter Louis's access to the current).
|
