Teleportation

[kirottu]

I would teleport myself to girls locker room and to Obsidian HQ at the same time. Then the two of me would meet and talk how great it was to be thrown out from those places. Then they would battle to the death.

You should shout "THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!" at eachother and swordfight.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I have always thought I look like hot Christopher Lambert. With sugar. Mmmmm... Hot sugar.

[blue]

would you allow yourself to be teleported?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Absolutely.

 

What's more, I'd do it as often as possible, exponentially teleporting copies of myself into the brainpans of celebrities, mystics and four-legged strangers. Decades later, after communing with all living creatures, I'd complete my ascension by returning all copies to the portal of self-contemplation.

 

 

malkovich malkovich?? malkovich malkovich malkovich, malkovich malkovich, malkovich malkovichmalkovich!!!!!!

[Deraldin]

Hypothetically, I'd say yes, because one, I don't believe in a soul and two, if the duplicate thought it was you, and acted like you, what's the difference. Even you wouldn't know you weren't you, except for the cold fact on paper. For me it's just a 'queasiness/fear' factor, not a moral one.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

It has nothing to do with a soul. Imagine someone made a clone of you. Why would you expect to have conscious control over that clone? So when you die in the teleportation process, you yourself no longer exist, but rather your clone. Now your clone is a perfect replica of you, so to every other 3rd party observer, it looks and acts just like you. And it probably would. But the fact of the matter would still be that YOUR consciousness has been killed.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

But would it really make all that much of a difference to you? If the clone that is created on the other end is biologically you and has all your memories and such, then what would be the difference between you going there yourself and having a clone created there and the real you disposed of? The clone is for all intents and purposes you except when as some of the others here have done, is add in the existance of a soul. The clone thinks it is you and you are no longer there to know that you are the real you.

 

I don't think I explained that as clearly as I could have. Understand what I'm trying to get at here?

[LostStraw]

But would it really make all that much of a difference to you? If the clone that is created on the other end is biologically you and has all your memories and such, then what would be the difference between you going there yourself and having a clone created there and the real you disposed of? The clone is for all intents and purposes you except when as some of the others here have done, is add in the existance of a soul. The clone thinks it is you and you are no longer there to know that you are the real you.

 

I don't think I explained that as clearly as I could have. Understand what I'm trying to get at here?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

The clone may share your memories but is not you. The clone is created on the other end, at that very moment you're still standing in the teleporter waiting to be vaporized.

 

From the perspective of you yourself, you haven't been transported at all. From the perspective of you the clone, you have. But that's two completely different perspectives, meaning that it's two different people -- even if at that moment in time they are similar in every way.

 

You die, someone just like you lives on in your place. From an observing 3rd party though, nothing will have changed.

Edited September 13, 2006 by LostStraw

[mkreku]

I believe the consciousness is nothing more than atoms and molecules sitting in a certain enery level at just that time, and that our conscience (and our bodies) are forever changing and evolving (or aging). There is no soul, there is no mind, there is nothing beyond the organic machine we call a body. Therefore the clone teleporter would make an exact copy of you in one moment, and a tiny moment thereafter the exact copy of you would appear in another part of the world, while the first you would disappear (probably to provide material for the next traveller appearing in your pod). Since every molecule in our body has been exchaned several times in our lifetime by natural means, teleporting through cloning has no effect on what we call "you" (the person you). We are not static ever, the cloning teleportation would simply copy us to another part of the world and change our molecules faster than the natural way could ever do. We would remain exactly the same though (in person), except for being made of all new molecules and atoms.

[alanschu]

But would it really make all that much of a difference to you? If the clone that is created on the other end is biologically you and has all your memories and such, then what would be the difference between you going there yourself and having a clone created there and the real you disposed of? The clone is for all intents and purposes you except when as some of the others here have done, is add in the existance of a soul. The clone thinks it is you and you are no longer there to know that you are the real you.

 

I don't think I explained that as clearly as I could have. Understand what I'm trying to get at here?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I think so.

 

Look at it this way. If I cloned you, would you expect that you'd also have conscious control over your clone?

 

EDIT: I guess this applies to mkreku as well.

Edited September 13, 2006 by alanschu

[metadigital]

The concept of teleportation is rather simple. The teleportee steps into a machine in the source location, whereupon his body is scanned on sub-atomic level. This blueprint of the user's body is then transmitted into the target location, where similar machine uses that information to create an exact replica of the user. Both the original and the replica are scanned again, to make sure that they indeed are identical, after which the replica is released and the original is disintegrated.

 

The destruction of the original is necessary because it is undesirable to have several versions of the same person running free causing who knows what havoc in the world, and most importantly because for the original no teleportation took place. He would still be in the source location and think that the machine didn't work. Only if this point of view disappears from the world can the rest of us point at the replica and say that he was succesfully teleported.

 

For the sake of the argument, we assume that the teleporter is perfectly reliable and does indeed create a replica of the user which is identical with the original to the smallest sub-atomic particle. For all intents and purposes such replica is the same as the original; it will do, say and think exactly the same things the original would. Oh, and we also assume, rather against common sense, that the scanning process does not harm the user. Knowing all this, would you allow yourself to be teleported?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The concept might be simple, but the technology is completely impractical for as long inot the future as we can peer. To obtain the necessary resolution to map each subatomic particle, you would need a lens larger than an AU; not to mention how much power you'd need to record the particles ... and you'd have to do it instantaneously, owing to Heisenberg's uncertainty (because all the subatomic particles would be a different place in the next instant: sort of like Zeno's Arrow Paradox).

 

Assuming that these major issues were solved, I wouldn't be too keen to destroy this body, just in case there were some "unrecorded" part, i.e., not necessarily a "soul", but any part of the universe that our science hasn't modelled and measured yet (e.g. what about the higher dimensional aspects of the super-strings that may make up all matter?).

 

So. No. And I won't ever have to worry about it, anyway.

[LostStraw]

I believe the consciousness is nothing more than atoms and molecules sitting in a certain enery level at just that time, and that our conscience (and our bodies) are forever changing and evolving (or aging). There is no soul, there is no mind, there is nothing beyond the organic machine we call a body. Therefore the clone teleporter would make an exact copy of you in one moment, and a tiny moment thereafter the exact copy of you would appear in another part of the world, while the first you would disappear (probably to provide material for the next traveller appearing in your pod). Since every molecule in our body has been exchaned several times in our lifetime by natural means, teleporting through cloning has no effect on what we call "you" (the person you). We are not static ever, the cloning teleportation would simply copy us to another part of the world and change our molecules faster than the natural way could ever do. We would remain exactly the same though (in person), except for being made of all new molecules and atoms.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

My argument has nothing to do with the soul. It's simply the clone is self aware -- as are you before you get vaporized. While you are still alive you feel nothing the clone feels, sense nothing the clone senses, see anything the clone sees. You are entirely two separate individuals. I just don't see how one can claim a separate individual as themselves.

 

As I said before though, a third party observer wouldn't notice a difference. The clone wouldn't notice a difference either as from his/her perspective they were transported succesfully. The only person who would notice would be the one about to be turned into recyclable materials.

[Balthamael]

I would use this. I understand why many of you say that the user is killed in this process, but I don't think such a position is even coherent.

 

You see, it all comes down to how 'self' should be defined. If 'self' is the sum of the particular particles that make our bodies, and none other, then indeed the user is killed and someone else is created to take his place. But such a claim would be utterly nonsensical. It is not possible to tell one proton apart of another. They all look the same. And even if it somehow made a difference that we used different particles to create the replica, there still remains the problem that a human body constantly changes material with its environment. It is estimated that it takes seven years for each and every atom of human body to be changed. It is gradual process as opposed to instantaneous, but the principle is the same. If it matters what atoms are used to re-assemble your body, then you didn't survive past your seventh birthday.

 

Those of you who would use the Star Trek teleporter, but not mine, should also consider this question. What if, instead of turning your body into energy and transmitting it into destination, I disintegrated you, collected each and every atom and particleinto a cardboard box, and carried it wherever you wanted to go. This is the same thing, right? I mean, you are just as dead while you are transmitted as energy wave, right? Okay, I have you now in the destination and I find out that I have misplaced one carbon atom. Is it okay that I simply replace it with whatever carbon atom I can find. What about two atoms? Three? How many atoms can I change before you begin to consider yourself dead?

 

Clearly, all attempts to define onself to the sum of particles that make us are hopeless. We are more akin to symphonies than bricks. Then, I can only say that what makes me myself are my thoughts and memories. There is nothing else that is me, is there? And because my thoughts and memories do remain, so do I. So, yes, I do think that the person who comes out in the destination is the same who went in in the source location. For those who question whether person's soul, whatever that is, survives the process, I have no good answer to give. I am a materialist. For me, nothing exists that I cannot observe. But since the soul, if it exists, is supposedly something immaterial, I see no reason why it wouldn't be transmitted along with the blueprint of your body.

 

Someone made the point that because the original and replica must co-exist for a short while, their experiences diverge at that point and they essentially are two different people. That is true, I guess, but I do not think few seconds spent into a dark, silent chamber matter much. If it does, I guess we can render the user unconscious, or something.

 

All of this is, naturally, pure speculation. This kind of machine is, as Metadigital pointed out, quite impossible to build, no matter how advanced technology we have in the future.

[Blank]

Balthy, think of it as a copy. The copy is not the original. It is a copy. The copy cannot be the original, no matter what you do to it. In this case, you are destroying the original, which is a separate entity, and replacing it with a copy. Are you okay with you (the original) ceasing to exist, and the copy (that is not you, but an elaborate impersonation) taking your place?

 

I think I see where you are coming from, I just disagree I guess. It'd be a matter of personal preference anyway if it ever existed.

Edited September 13, 2006 by Blank

[Balthamael]

Yes, I am fine with that. Matter replacement hasn't bothered me during all my life, so it shouldn't bother me now when it is proposed that all the particles I consist of should be replaced at once. That, essentially is what is proposed. I can see from whence the problem arises. It is the illusion of subject, that there is something there that thinks our thoughts and remembers our memories that is apart of those thoughts and memories. But there is nothing like that, is there? I can't point it, I can't observe it, I can't define it, it doesn't exist. Consciousness is the object of thinking, not the subject doing the thinking. Thoughts and memories do survive, and therefore, so do I.

[alanschu]

You see, it all comes down to how 'self' should be defined. If 'self' is the sum of the particular particles that make our bodies, and none other, then indeed the user is killed and someone else is created to take his place. But such a claim would be utterly nonsensical. It is not possible to tell one proton apart of another. They all look the same. And even if it somehow made a difference that we used different particles to create the replica, there still remains the problem that a human body constantly changes material with its environment. It is estimated that it takes seven years for each and every atom of human body to be changed. It is gradual process as opposed to instantaneous, but the principle is the same. If it matters what atoms are used to re-assemble your body, then you didn't survive past your seventh birthday.

 

So what exactly would you (as in your consciousness, as in what you perceive, and all that jazz) if the original host wasn't destroyed? Because essentially all your teleporter does is clone you.

 

Let's look at it this way. Say I clone you. You have a few minutes of recognizing that your clone is at whatever destination you wanted. I then said you had to be vapourized. Would you be content with this?

[Balthamael]

^I wouldn't. But then, that replica wouldn't be me anymore. Our experiences diverged in quite a radical manner. Now we have two different people, and I would expect neither to give up their existence without a fight. Disintegration of the original is an essential part of the process. Without it, no teleportation is happening. It must be done there and then. No delays.

[Musopticon?]

But that's not really teleportation. More like transporting a clone.

 

You could have just asked "Do you want to be vaporised?" in the poll.

[alanschu]

^I wouldn't. But then, that replica wouldn't be me anymore. Our experiences diverged in quite a radical manner. Now we have two different people, and I would expect neither to give up their existence without a fight. Disintegration of the original is an essential part of the process. Without it, no teleportation is happening. It must be done there and then. No delays.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Why no delays?

 

The reason why people introduce a delay is because it demonstrates the problem. You are destroying the molecules of the original person.

 

 

Besides, it wouldn't be possible to do it without a delay. There's going to be an instant where both of you exist (when it verifies that the genetic code is correct). Nothing can be done instantaneously.

 

And even if it was, your "teleportation" still isn't teleportation. It's simply copying and destroying the original.

[Blank]

Mus? wins teh internets.

[Deraldin]

^I wouldn't. But then, that replica wouldn't be me anymore. Our experiences diverged in quite a radical manner. Now we have two different people, and I would expect neither to give up their existence without a fight. Disintegration of the original is an essential part of the process. Without it, no teleportation is happening. It must be done there and then. No delays.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Why no delays?

 

The reason why people introduce a delay is because it demonstrates the problem. You are destroying the molecules of the original person.

 

 

Besides, it wouldn't be possible to do it without a delay. There's going to be an instant where both of you exist (when it verifies that the genetic code is correct). Nothing can be done instantaneously.

 

And even if it was, your "teleportation" still isn't teleportation. It's simply copying and destroying the original.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Why must there be a delay before the original is removed from the picture after the clone is created? It must have the genetic code in order to be able to recreate the person on the other end right?

 

The arguement is all about semantics anyway. Whether or not an exact copy of you is or is not you, if you no longer exist. Whether or not the example machine is actually "teleporting" or just recreating on the other side and so on.

 

Just to clarify something here. The problem lies in the co-existance of two beings that share the same genetic make-up and memories/behaviour etc and then having to kill the original right? Would you have a problem with a teleporter like those demonstrated on Star Trek? How about the stargate from the various Stargate shows/movie? If one was to disintergrate the original, gather up all the atoms that composed him/her and then transported them to the destination somehow and reconstructed the individual from his original atoms would that make any difference to you?

[alanschu]

Why must there be a delay before the original is removed from the picture after the clone is created? It must have the genetic code in order to be able to recreate the person on the other end right?

 

Because it's going to take time to validate the genetic code. Even if it's very quick, it's still going to take time to verify the teleportation worked. While this validation went on, you'd have to keep the original, just in case the validation fails.

 

Just to clarify something here. The problem lies in the co-existance of two beings that share the same genetic make-up and memories/behaviour etc and then having to kill the original right? Would you have a problem with a teleporter like those demonstrated on Star Trek? How about the stargate from the various Stargate shows/movie? If one was to disintergrate the original, gather up all the atoms that composed him/her and then transported them to the destination somehow and reconstructed the individual from his original atoms would that make any difference to you? 

 

If my consciousness remained intact, yes. Unfortunately, you can't really prove that it would. I'd be more convinced that the "Star Trek" way would work rather than this reconstruction way.

 

 

To be honest I think this thread has presented quite a paradox, and demonstrates (at least now) the impossibility of teleportation (which is something I didn't think prior to this thread).

Edited September 14, 2006 by alanschu

[LostStraw]

With the Trek teleporter, life is not being created and life is not being destroyed -- it is simply being moved around.

 

The system proposed in this thread creates a life and takes one. Even if there was no delay or coexistance of the beings, it's still what the system is doing. I would use the ST style teleporters.

Edited September 14, 2006 by LostStraw

[mkreku]

The thing everyone seems to be hung up upon is that YOU can exist in two different places at the same time. If the machine copied you, destroyed the original and made a clone somewhere else a few seconds later, you seem to be fine with it, because then you were never two entities.

 

If the machine copied you, made a clone somewhere else and THEN destroyed you, you don't seem to be fine with it, because then, for a split second, there's one "you" and one clone (even if they're exactly the same for that split second).

 

But the effect is the same! At one split second, you and the clone are exactly the same (in the case of the copying teleporter). The only thing that would differ would be the material (atoms and molecules) making up your body. But since our bodies constantly renew themselves and each and every atom in our bodies are only there for a loan for a relatively short time, this makes no difference. If the machine had a significant delay between the destruction of the first you and the creation of the second you, the entities would become different physical persons, because the atoms would have time to change their states.

[alanschu]

The effect is not the same. People aren't concerned simply because there are two people, but the fact that this situation allows for two people has illustrated a flaw in the system. That the copied person is not the same as the person that was copied.

 

 

Lets look at it from a different perspective.

 

You clearly are looking through your own eyes right now, correct? So upon copying yourself for "teleportation," why would you expect yourself to be seeing through the eyes of the clone?

 

It sounds like it might make sense, but the fact that this implementation could allow for two copies of mkreku to exist (if they didn't bother killing the original entity), serves as a paradox.

 

The mkreku that you are now, that enjoys Gothic, feels the wind on his face, and whatnot, gets eradicated in this "teleportation" process. There is no reason to think that you (as in your consciousness) would carry over to the other mkreku. You would no longer be able to enjoy Gothic, feel the wind on your face, and whatnot. Because you would be dead. The new mkreku that was created would still be able to do all these actions, but the consciousness will not be the "you" that is currently looking through your eyes right now.

 

It can't be. Because the fact that this concept could allow for two mkrekus, means that if in fact your consciousness does carry over, you'd not just be seeing through the eyes of the original mkreku, but also the new, teleported mkreku.

 

The caveat is that, this "new" mkreku will still look and act like you just the same, and it would essentially be no different to a third party observer. But it would have to be a new consciousness, since it's technically a new life created. The mere fact that it is possible to have two mkreku's means that there has to be a new consciousness. I don't think it's a stretch of the imagination to assume that if someone cloned you perfectly, the consciousness that you are now would still be in the original, and the clone would take on its own (that would be exactly like yours, but since you're not seeing through your clone's eyes, but rather your own eyes, it couldn't be the same consciousness).

 

 

I don't see how this paradox is solved if you eradicate the original before making the copy. It's still the same situation as if the clone and the original existed at the same time. It's just that the sequence of events is different.

 

 

To reiterate, here's the two sequences that may occur.

 

Sequence one:

 

Person A is cloned into Clone A during Teleportation.

Even for a small time, Person A and Clone A exist at the same time. For all intents and purposes, the consciousness of Person A and Clone A are different (otherwise the same consciousness would be controlling two separate entities...and that's just ****ed up).

Person A is eradicated since we couldn't have a copy.

 

Sequence two

 

Person A is eradicated

Clone A is created from the gene sequence that was obtained from Person A prior to eradication.

 

In both cases, you still have Person A being eradicated, and a new life in Clone A created at the teleported distance. There is no reason for Clone A to take on the consciousness of Person A, since for all intents and purposes the end result is identical. Person A is destroyed, Clone A is created.

[Tigranes]

At the same time, we are free to speculate on the effect of such a technology were it to become viable; as such:

 

alanschu, your point appears to be that in the moment of separation / cloning, there are two bodies but only one conscience; and that upon the destruction of the first body that conscience is eradicated and what is left is a clone, which, presuming that it is not a 'vegetable' and retains cognitive processes and so forth... what conscience has it been given? Does the copying of the physical also copy some sort of link in a dualist sense that means not only the creation of a second body but of a second conscience?

 

And if it does, that conscience would be like a "Save As" function on the computer.. that from that point forth there would be two consciences, though they 'share' the past. If this were to be the case the argument that the original conscience has been killed becomes tenuous. If the conscience was, in fact, 'copied', then there would be absolutely no difference between you prior teleportation adn you after teleportation save a semantic fact of copying.

 

I agree with you that no matter what happens, there is the destruction of a body and a conscience; the question is whether, due to the links of memory, cognitive process and so forth, a complete creation of a conscience - in other words, the artificial creation of a mind - is possible. The body itself? Hell, we do implants and stuff all the time.

[Balthamael]

The mkreku that you are now, that enjoys Gothic, feels the wind on his face, and whatnot, gets eradicated in this "teleportation" process.  There is no reason to think that you (as in your consciousness) would carry over to the other mkreku.  You would no longer be able to enjoy Gothic, feel the wind on your face, and whatnot.  Because you would be dead.  The new mkreku that was created would still be able to do all these actions, but the consciousness will not be the "you" that is currently looking through your eyes right now.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Tell me, you aren't afraid to go to sleep at night, aret you? Yet you lose consciousness for a while. How do you know that the "you" that awakes is the same "you" that went to sleep? Maybe "you" die each night, to be born anew every morning. Does this question bother you? It should. Or, to take more extreme example, during a bypass surgery the patient is technically dead for a short while. The consciousness that awakes after the surgery, is it the same consciousness that existed before the surgery? If your answer to this is "yes", then answer me this. If, during the short period while the bypass surgery patient is dead, his body is scanned, disintegrated, and re-assembled, would he still be the same patient? And, if instead of using the same matter to re-assemble his body, we used some other atoms? Would he still be the same patient?

 

My answer to all those questions is yes. Nothing else seems to make sense to me. We don't think that someone who has lost their consciousness is a different person when they wake up. For a dead patient on the surgery table, it makes no difference if their body is disintegrated and re-assembled in between. They would still be just as dead, and they would still be soon revived.

 

The problem you have with all this, I understand where it comes from. We think self as a separate entity of our thoughts, and memories, something that "controls our consciousness", to borrow your own term. But it isn't, really. It is a product of those thoughts and memories.

[Kaftan Barlast]

Our consciousness or mind as we know it, consists of electric and chemical currents in the brain. When we sleep, they operate on a different level but they do not shut down. So your sleep argument is a completely faulty one, created by your misconception of what consciousness is.

Edited September 14, 2006 by Kaftan Barlast

[Diamond]

*Balthamael steps into the teleporter* beep beep fzzzzzt

 

"Uhmm, Balthamael, we have transported you already, why are you still here? Must be something wrong with the desintegrator. Anyway you are already there, we have to desintegrate you."

 

"Why?"

 

"Well, your consciousness is already there, reconstructed on a sub-atomic level, so you are alive, no need to worry."

 

"Ah, OK, that makes sense."

 

fzzzzzt *Balthamael becomes a handful of dust on the floor*