Marx-Man wrote:
I thought about this, and then I think of my paranoia with Start Trek's Teleportation theory. To get us on the same page, teleportation to me is wikipedia's "...encoding the photons and atoms of one object, transmit the information to another place, and create the original object in the new location...." In Star Trek, the original object vanishes, and then the object or perfect copy appears in another location. Let's pretend that the Star Trek version was invented, and you were asked to try it out for free. Teleport from your hometown to a Photoshop Convention in Boston. They say it doesn't hurt and the experience will be like that of an elevator ride. Would you go on it? Or do you die..... only to be replaced by an exact copy of yourself in Boston with all your experiences, thoughts and character? To this 'clone' the trip was an elevator ride, and a pleasant way to get from one city to another..... but to you, you no longer exist.... you are dead. Or does your soul travel into this carbon copy, allowing you go through hundreds of teleportations without truly being replaced.
So that boggles my mind.... you couldn't 'poll' the people walking off teleporters if their soul is intact, because they could just be carbon copies who don't realize they had just been born. I think if I got on a teleporter, the lights would go out, and I would never make it to Boston.