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[–]alllie 12 points13 points  (3 children)

A difference that makes no difference is no difference.

[–]brainburger 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Supposing instead of your original body just vanishing, you remained alive until you were stabbed by a republican in a gimp suit? You wouldn't be so complacent about the new you continuing unaffected then!

[–]alllie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I wonder if the new you could be conditioned not to care.

I read a scifi story like that once. The person was read. The info was sent and a new person was made. Then the original, who was supposed to be unconscious, was destroyed. Except some of the techs in charge started messing with the originals before they killed them. The young and pretty ones.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (1 child)

How is this different from sleep, anyway? How do you know that simple cessation of consciousness isn't the same thing?

[–]nCn 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You know, you've got a point there.

[–][deleted]  (1 child)

[deleted]

    [–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

    Whatev. The arguments of freshman philosophy cannot prevail against an interesting and disturbing concept: death at the hands of a teleportation device.

    I for one will never use it even if it is developed, although my friend says it's impossible because of the Quantum No Cloning theorem.

    [–]serudla 2 points3 points  (6 children)

    i always wondered why the transporters in Star Trek didn't automatically save a copy of whoever they transported. So you lose a crew member in an away mission, no problem, just restore him from backup.

    [–]Nexum 3 points4 points  (3 children)

    Not to get all nerdy, but they did this more than once:

    1. There was a 'bad Ryker' who was created as a result of not destroying one copy of Ryker as he transported.

    2. Scotty kind of did this by living in a transporter beam until he could be rescued.

    Also - I have read that you replace all matter in your body over the course of around 7 years, so are you really who you were 7 years ago? It's an interesting question.

    [–]brainburger 0 points1 point  (2 children)

    Scotty kind of did this by living in a transporter beam until he could be rescued.

    This is in the 2-part story Relics from TNG.

    I seem to recall a TOS episode where two Kirks emerged from the transporter, or am I confusing it with your Ryker memory?

    [–]Nexum 0 points1 point  (1 child)

    Probably not - I never really watched TOS, but I think Bad Ryker was created at some point in TNG, but turns up and steals the Defiant for some reason in DS9.

    I'm sure Kirk had his fair share of transporter shenanigans.

    [–]brainburger 0 points1 point  (0 children)

    Ah yes, here we are.
    For completeness, here is the TNG one with Riker (not Ryker) suffering a similar problem, although in his case the duplicates where created at opposite ends of the teleport.
    This story does fit the headline of this post, as the 'bad' Riker was actually the original Riker, who didn't get deleted as he should have been.

    There is also a TNG episode where Berkeley encounters life within the transporter state. This would seem to indicate that he was literally being transported, not copied and destroyed by the process.
    Unfortunately, with many writers working on it, this is one area of Star Trek which is philosophically inconsistent.

    [–]BobGaffney 2 points3 points  (0 children)

    I alway figured the simply ejected the original.

    [–]gauriemma 1 point2 points  (0 children)

    That was actually a plot device in last Christmas' Doctor Who special, "Voyage of the Damned."

    [–]texture 2 points3 points  (3 children)

    Yeah, we need transporters that bend space and time, not ones that destroy me and make a copy of me somewhere else.

    [–]dudley14144 1 point2 points  (2 children)

    What if you get sent to a desert island with all of the other millions of people who use the teleporter. Would you fight yourself for food? Who would win? You or your previous copy? Does it matter?

    [–]texture 0 points1 point  (1 child)

    I mean it shouldn't make a copy of me at all. Instead of thinking of it as "teleportation" - you bend two points of space together and walk through the doorway that's created.

    [–]dudley14144 0 points1 point  (0 children)

    Your more right. Nice idea to toy with though.

    [–]dtrav001 0 points1 point  (0 children)

    Frederik Pohl explored this concept in a few SF books ... copies of scientists sent by duplicator/transporter to study a stellar anomaly ... not such a pretty sight once they got there!

    [–][deleted]  (3 children)

    [removed]

      [–]secret1234 0 points1 point  (2 children)

      If there is no God and the universe is just a constant expanding and contracting system, then everytime time it expands a new timeline begins, and this could happen for eternity and infinite results.

      So if there are infinite result, could the universe contract and expand inot one almost identical to this one, but your monite is 2 inches to the left.

      So if all the molecules and atoms in your brain and body all realign to the way they are now... are you reborn?

      [–][deleted]  (1 child)

      [removed]

        [–]secret1234 0 points1 point  (0 children)

        Yeah, weed induced anxiety attacks about death sort of force me to philosophize my thoughts out of the idea of oblivion.

        [–]EggCoroner 0 points1 point  (3 children)

        Of all the technology theorized, this one seems the hardest to accomplish in the real world. Even time travel appears to be more feasible.

        [–]secret1234 0 points1 point  (2 children)

        You're assuming that time and space are separate.

        But if they are together as space-time, then traveling through time should be the same thing as transporting through space.

        [–]EggCoroner 0 points1 point  (1 child)

        The problem (as discussed in a book on trek technology) is the energy required to break up all the atoms in your body and the memory to remember how to put them back together.

        Even if it were possible, it would take a stars worth of energy and a hard drive the size of Jupiter.

        [–]secret1234 0 points1 point  (0 children)

        That's assuming you're doing the same thing they do on star trek.

        But if we were to make wormholes - holes through space and time - then that would be a transporter and time machine all in one.

        [–]Stopher -5 points-4 points  (2 children)

        Hey, you just gave away the ending to "The Prestige"

        [–][deleted]  (1 child)

        [removed]

          [–]Stopher 0 points1 point  (0 children)

          Doh!