Star Trek transporters and the internal observer

[Childs]

One thing that occurred to me is you can come at it from the other direction: a glitch causes both copies to survive, in which case you would essentially have proof it is a copying process, not a translation of an object from one place to another. And you'd also have a bunch of interesting legal problems to deal with.

This happened at least twice. Once in TOS (S01E04), where Kirk was covered with an ore and it caused two Kirks to come out of the transporter, one good and one bad. And it also happened in TNG (S06E24) with Riker. There was a second Riker living on a planet for 8 years because of a transporter malfunction. Riker 2 ended up being a semi reoccurring character...I remember him coming back at least once in another episode. I think he became an adventurer/pirate or something.

 

[CZroe]

transporter room is complete waste of space. you can basically transport anyone from anywhere to anywhere so why the need for a transporter room?

They made it clear that transporting without a transporter pad is not as safe and that a site to site transport is unsafe. They have needed things like pattern amplifiers to make certain transports without a transporter pad. Makes me wonder why they don't just transport a transporter pad first. If it needs the enormous energy of an antimatter warp core reactor then the transporters should go offline almost any time they have an issue with the warp core.

 

[dainthomas]

Have fun with the Uncertainty Principal.

Heisenberg Compensator. 😎

 

[It's Not Lupus]

So basically, it's the finale to The Pristige. 😱

Movie about magic with sci-fi twist :thumbsdown:

 

[ViRGE]

This happened at least twice. Once in TOS (S01E04), where Kirk was covered with an ore and it caused two Kirks to come out of the transporter, one good and one bad. And it also happened in TNG (S06E24) with Riker. There was a second Riker living on a planet for 8 years because of a transporter malfunction. Riker 2 ended up being a semi reoccurring character...I remember him coming back at least once in another episode. I think he became an adventurer/pirate or something.

Tom Riker. He posed as Will Riker and stole the Defiant on an episode of DS9.

 

[jagec]

Yes, I've always been with McCoy on this one.

Aldebaran's great, OK,
Algol's pretty neat,
Betelgeuse's pretty girls,
Will knock you off your feet.
They'll do anything you like,
Real fast and then real slow,
But if you have to take me apart to get me there,
Then I don't want to go.
Singing,
Take me apart, take me apart,
What a way to roam,
And if you have to take me apart to get me there,
I'd rather stay at home.

Sirius is paved with gold
So I've heard it said
By nuts who then go on to say
``See Tau before you're dead.''
I'll gladly take the high road
Or even take the low,
But if you have to take me apart to get me there,
Then I, for one, won't go.
Singing,
Take me apart, take me apart, You must be off your head,
And if you try to take me apart to get me there,
I'll stay right here in bed.

 

[SphinxnihpS]

Grab your bong and Doritos and ponder this....

In Star Trek the transporter functions by sequencing the atoms and molecules in your body into information. This information is transmitted to a remote location and reassembled as matter using energy.

Wouldn't the reassembled "you" actually be just a copy? Technically it's "you" but what of the essence of "you," your consciousness? Would the "you," your consciousness, be destroyed forever in the source location and a new consciousness created at the destination? Like creating a clone, the clone would be an exact copy of "you" but merely as a new consciousness with your memories. Your consciousness currently experiencing existence as you read this post would forever be lost and replaced by a new one with a copy of your memories.

And why wouldn't Star Fleet keep a copy of all officers on file in the computer and merely reconstitute the dead? Picard dies fighting the Borg? No biggie, just rematerialize him from a backup.

Ready for some serious dope?

Your body already does this every 6-9 months or so. Every atom in your body is a different one than last year with the exception of the enamel on your teeth.

 

[Ruptga]

Ready for some serious dope?

Your body already does this every 6-9 months or so. Every atom in your body is a different one than last year with the exception of the enamel on your teeth.

But but but the human mind is precious, ineffable, and immutable...

I think that's a bit of an overstatement though; different tissues replace cells at different rates, and iirc neurons never get replaced. I don't know how often (or if) cellular components inside living cells (like neurons) turn over on average, so maybe that's where your number came from.

 

[02ranger]

The reason I recall they gave is a higher level of safety.

You can only get so picky about a device they made for lacking budget for planet landings.

Also a greater energy cost if you don't use a transporter pad on one end or the other. It costs even less energy to go pad-to-pad. Safety was the biggest thing, though.

 

[Jeff7]

But but but the human mind is precious, ineffable, and immutable...

I think that's a bit of an overstatement though; different tissues replace cells at different rates, and iirc neurons never get replaced. I don't know how often (or if) cellular components inside living cells (like neurons) turn over on average, so maybe that's where your number came from.

And what about my precious soul?! 😀

Do those new atoms and molecules just tend to clump around a soul because of very good reasons?


:hmm:
If that's true, then maybe the only thing that is keeping someone's soul from plunging toward the center of Earth is the person's body. After someone dies, the soul, by way of its ethereal nature, plummets though the ground toward the core. There, the molten core of trapped souls is what creates Earth's magnetic field.



:hmm::hmm:
Brb.

 

[PlanetJosh]

If they could make perfect copies of the officers and all the ship's crew and keep them in storage then it wouldn't be as dramatic hearing a transporter technician say "I've lost him" during a transporter malfunction.

 

[SphinxnihpS]

But but but the human mind is precious, ineffable, and immutable...

I think that's a bit of an overstatement though; different tissues replace cells at different rates, and iirc neurons never get replaced. I don't know how often (or if) cellular components inside living cells (like neurons) turn over on average, so maybe that's where your number came from.

Every living cell in your body is constantly repairing itself. The skeleton is the slowest, thus the 6-9 month figure. The soft tissues, including the neurons are repaired significantly faster.

Your body is nothing more than the information your cells use to rebuild you. Without this continuous process, you are rotting meat.

 

[Ruptga]

Everything I'm finding says that neurons are not replaced in the way that basically every other type of cell is. Though new ones are occasionally made from stem cells and at least some of their organelles will be replaced from time to time, it's not true that every single cell in a body is replaced within a year. That doesn't mean we're made of ghosts, and there is still a lot of cellular turnover in most tissues so the larger point stands.