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Theme Changer

 Topic: The Teleporter and Our Identity

 (Read 11796 times)
  • 12 3 Next page « Previous thread | Next thread »
  • The Teleporter and Our Identity
     OP - August 10, 2011, 05:16 PM
    It's year 2211, and scientists have finally invented a teleportation device.
    When you step into the teleporter, it scans your body to the last quark. It then painlessly destroys it, simultaneously recreating it in the destination portal from the material stored there.

    Would you step inside the teleporter?
    Would you consider it a suicide?
    Why?
    Have you heard the good news? There is no God!
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #1 - August 10, 2011, 05:23 PM
    Yeah I've always wondered about it. Would it be really ME? Well, I guess so.

    But why not? If every quark remains the same, and the procedure is painless, then why wouldn't that me? (ie assuming there is no or minimal risk to it, obviously).


    Youtube
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #2 - August 10, 2011, 05:26 PM
    No.
    No.
    I don't trust teleportations
    Religion is organized superstition
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #3 - August 10, 2011, 05:26 PM
    No, I'd consider it suicide, I think.  Its a complex one though - I don't like the thoughts of being destroyed and another me being recreated even if it is identical down to every quark.
    "Befriend them not, Oh murtads, and give them neither parrot nor bunny."  - happymurtad's advice on trolls.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #4 - August 10, 2011, 05:33 PM
    Reminds me of the movie "The Prestige".
    Formerly known as Iblis
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #5 - August 10, 2011, 05:35 PM
    Quote
    No, I'd consider it suicide, I think.  Its a complex one though - I don't like the thoughts of being destroyed and another me being recreated even if it is identical down to every quark.


    Cool, cool.

    Remember Cheetah from 15 years ago? What happened to her? You don't look like her now, and don't hold the same views. You don't even have a single cell in your body from that Cheetah. That Cheetah transformed, slowly, losing and gaining atoms, changing form.
    Have you heard the good news? There is no God!
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #6 - August 10, 2011, 05:36 PM
    I know but that wasn't voluntary.  I didn't step into a machine and order it to destroy and recreate me in the same instant. 
    "Befriend them not, Oh murtads, and give them neither parrot nor bunny."  - happymurtad's advice on trolls.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #7 - August 10, 2011, 06:06 PM
    Quote from: Jesus Christ on August 10, 2011, 05:33 PM
    Reminds me of the movie "The Prestige".

    +1, one of my fav   yes


    Youtube
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #8 - August 10, 2011, 06:09 PM
    Quote from: Cheetah on August 10, 2011, 05:36 PM
    I know but that wasn't voluntary.  I didn't step into a machine and order it to destroy and recreate me in the same instant.  


    Well yes, but it's debatable whether this teleportation is a suicide. Is this process that much different from what we all undergo over time? To live is to change, all the time. Neither our form nor composition stays the same over the years. Our awareness also isn't continuous, as we lose consciousness every night. Stuff from 10 years ago was effectively destroyed, gradually, through change. In this teleporter, its only the speed of destruction that's amplified, and it preserves our form elsewhere.

    I think it's interesting to think of people as events. Kind of like orchestral performance, which changes with time.
    Have you heard the good news? There is no God!
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #9 - August 10, 2011, 06:29 PM
    All right, sexy worm, you win this one.   Afro  I can't logically defend my position, but I still think if I was asked to step into the machine all your logical points would make no difference, I would still balk at the idea.
    "Befriend them not, Oh murtads, and give them neither parrot nor bunny."  - happymurtad's advice on trolls.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #10 - August 10, 2011, 06:38 PM
    Quote from: Stuff on August 10, 2011, 05:16 PM

    Would you step inside the teleporter?
    Would you consider it a suicide?
    Why?



    Yes. If its proven to be successfully reliable I would jump at the chance.
    No
    Because its transport, we're being rebuilt, if you were brought up with the transport you wouldn't think twice about getting in, I love star trek, people probably had similar issues with getting into planes.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #11 - August 10, 2011, 07:27 PM
    Quote from: Stuff on August 10, 2011, 06:09 PM

     Our awareness also isn't continuous, as we lose consciousness every night.



    I agree that psychological continuity is not necessary for keeping keeping one's life. But I think the issue with the teleporter is whether life is able to have gaps. 
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #12 - August 10, 2011, 08:11 PM
    Only if it can be proven that what a person is, the 'self' is identical to the physical components of that person can this not be suicide. I have yet to see such a proof.
    At evening, casual flocks of pigeons make
    Ambiguous undulations as they sink,
    Downward to darkness, on extended wings. - Stevens
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #13 - August 10, 2011, 08:13 PM
    Quote from: crazyislam on August 10, 2011, 06:06 PM
    +1, one of my fav   yes


    +2

    One of my fav films too. I was going to say how it reminds me of the prestige!

    I don't want to give the plot away so I won't say anything. Even though i really want to say what happens!!!!! AHHH  lipsrsealed
    "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom." - Viktor E. Frankl

    'Life is just the extreme expression of complex chemistry' - Neil deGrasse Tyson
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #14 - August 10, 2011, 08:17 PM
    Quote from: z10 on August 10, 2011, 08:11 PM
    Only if it can be proven that what a person is, the 'self' is identical to the physical components of that person can this not be suicide. I have yet to see such a proof.


    ^+1

    Can the neural pathways formed throughout ones life be reconstructed to detail?
    "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom." - Viktor E. Frankl

    'Life is just the extreme expression of complex chemistry' - Neil deGrasse Tyson
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #15 - August 10, 2011, 09:34 PM
    Quote
    Can the neural pathways formed throughout ones life be reconstructed to detail? 



    i think this should be theoretically possible. whether our concious make up is more than just quarks, leptons, bosons etc. is another question - and one we are much less clear about i think
    ''we are morally and philisophically in the best position to win the league'' - Arsene Wenger
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #16 - August 10, 2011, 09:58 PM
    Quote from: z10 on August 10, 2011, 08:11 PM
    Only if it can be proven that what a person is, the 'self' is identical to the physical components of that person can this not be suicide. I have yet to see such a proof.


    Not identical to, but contingent on. Things like brain injuries impairing mental function, and the fact that we can influence experience by tinkering with the brain...seem to support that notion.

    Quote
    Can the neural pathways formed throughout ones life be reconstructed to detail?


    Theoretically, sure. Practically it might never be the case, but who knows. Can't tell what kind of tech we'll have 200 years from now.

    Have you heard the good news? There is no God!
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #17 - August 10, 2011, 10:01 PM
    What I always hated about Philosophy:
    Even turning the most nonsensical and/or entertaining of questions into muddied semantic drawn-out garbage that doesn't even make the initial concept any more likely or implausible.

    Here: Puppies!
     wooferz

  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #18 - August 10, 2011, 10:13 PM
    Quote from: mighty_cats on August 10, 2011, 10:01 PM
    What I always hated about Philosophy:
    Even turning the most nonsensical and/or entertaining of questions into muddied semantic drawn-out garbage that doesn't even make the initial concept any more likely or implausible.


    +1

    lol


    Formerly known as Iblis
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #19 - August 10, 2011, 10:13 PM
    Quote from: mighty_cats on August 10, 2011, 10:01 PM
    What I always hated about Philosophy:
    Even turning the most nonsensical and/or entertaining of questions into muddied semantic drawn-out garbage that doesn't even make the initial concept any more likely or implausible.

    Here: Puppies!
     wooferz




     Cheesy Cheesy  +1

    I would totally step in it, and not consider it a suicide, just a means of transportation. 

    If I step into a car, am I not taking a risk?  I know its not the same process as being broken down in a telporter, but stepping into a car, getting smashed up in an accident, waking up with brain damage, would I not also be different to how I was if one thing was slightly off with my rebuilt form on the other side?

    I am truly gutted that teleportation, flying cars and mini pizzas that expand in a microwave are not likely to be part of my lifetime.  Cry
    Inhale the good shit, exhale the bullshit.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #20 - August 10, 2011, 10:27 PM
    Step into it to be teleported to where?  wacko
    "The greatest general is not the one who can take the most cities or spill the most blood. The greatest general is the one who can take Heaven and Earth without waging the battle." ~ Sun Tzu

  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #21 - August 10, 2011, 10:29 PM
    But its not YOU that comes out the other end.  And I'm not talking from some wanky philosophy angle either - the machine destroys you on the spot, then recreates a replica of you somewhere else.  It has your memories, personality, and everything else, but you are dead.
    "Befriend them not, Oh murtads, and give them neither parrot nor bunny."  - happymurtad's advice on trolls.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #22 - August 10, 2011, 10:30 PM
    Quote from: Maya on August 10, 2011, 10:27 PM
    Step into it to be teleported to where?  wacko


    Presumably into another transporter.
    I don't think theoretical science could account for anything beyond that just yet.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #23 - August 10, 2011, 10:32 PM
    Quote from: BerberElla on August 10, 2011, 10:13 PM
    I am truly gutted that teleportation, flying cars and mini pizzas that expand in a microwave are not likely to be part of my lifetime.

    Indeed.

    I would not consider the teleporter to be suicide, because you would (hopefully) be using it with the expectation that you will come out the other side unscathed. Accidents happen, but accidents aren't suicide.

    Cryopreservation of humans is actually plausible, which essentially consists of dying and then being brought back to life. If the time came when the technology was sufficiently safe and someone wanted to be frozen for a period of time and then revived, would that be viewed as suicide?
    The only thing we have to fear is fear itself
    - 32nd United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #24 - August 10, 2011, 10:32 PM
    Quote from: Cheetah on August 10, 2011, 10:29 PM
    But its not YOU that comes out the other end.  And I'm not talking from some wanky philosophy angle either - the machine destroys you on the spot, then recreates a replica of you somewhere else.


    But what exactly is that based on?
    So the idea that the molecules themselves are moved at high speeds and reassembled somewhere else is out of the question?

    We dont even have one and yet you've determined how its going to work and its implications?
     Huh?
    I'd appreciate a copy of the instruction manual from the 'how to build a transporter' book that you've somehow gained access to.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #25 - August 10, 2011, 10:34 PM
    Quote from: Cheetah on August 10, 2011, 10:29 PM
    But its not YOU that comes out the other end.  And I'm not talking from some wanky philosophy angle either - the machine destroys you on the spot, then recreates a replica of you somewhere else.  It has your memories, personality, and everything else, but you are dead.


    yeah the concept itself isn't philosophy, it's a theoretically possible scientific proposal
    ''we are morally and philisophically in the best position to win the league'' - Arsene Wenger
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #26 - August 10, 2011, 10:35 PM
    No, its not out of the question, Mighty Cats.  Its just not the process that's described in the OP.  Your molecules aren't moved anywhere, you are just scanned, destroyed and simultaneously replicated with new molecules somewhere else.  

    Its suicide guys, don't do it.   Cry
    "Befriend them not, Oh murtads, and give them neither parrot nor bunny."  - happymurtad's advice on trolls.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #27 - August 10, 2011, 10:40 PM
    Quote from: Luthiel on August 10, 2011, 10:32 PM
    Cryopreservation of humans is actually plausible, which essentially consists of dying and then being brought back to life. If the time came when the technology was sufficiently safe and someone wanted to be frozen for a period of time and then revived, would that be viewed as suicide?


    Cheetah, whats your view on Cryogenics and brain transplants?
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #28 - August 10, 2011, 10:44 PM
    I wouldn't volunteer for either of those either. 
    "Befriend them not, Oh murtads, and give them neither parrot nor bunny."  - happymurtad's advice on trolls.
  • Re: The Teleporter and Our Identity
     Reply #29 - August 10, 2011, 10:45 PM
    I really do believe that "I" am the physical me. The molecules configured together right here right now. If the teleporter is using the same molecules, taking them apart and rebuilding them, then I do believe it's totally me on the other side. But if it's rebuilding me using different molecules then it's not me it's a copy of me on the other side.
    Formerly known as Iblis
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