Would you go through the transporter?

Metrion Cascade · Post by **Metrion Cascade** » 2004-09-22 02:14pm

Of the various opinions on how transporters work, I've yet to see one which denies that they take you apart and put you back together somewhere else.

So...if you were stuck in some situation where you'd die unless you were beamed up, and you had the means (say, a really strong electromagnet) to block the transporter, would you allow a ship to rescue you via transporter? Would you consider it death? Would you care? Let's assume you've got an open comm channel with the ship and there's nothing going on that would turn you into two copies of yourself or a puddle of sludge or send you to an alternate universe or back in time or involve giant worms biting you or anything.

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2004-09-22 02:15pm

what do i care? given the choice between dying and possibly being placed in a moral dilemma, i'll pick the dilemma any day. plus i think it'd be kinda neat to see what a transporter is like, but that's just me.

Tsyroc · Post by **Tsyroc** » 2004-09-22 02:21pm

I voted no but I guess if it really came down to it I wouldn't be able to tell the difference between myself pre-transportation and after. It probably doesn't seem any different than being sedated for surgery and then waking up afterwards except that it's much quicker.

Objections to being torn appart and being reassembled on sub-molecular level with the same bits-n-pieces doesn't seem too bad, but that doesn't explain the few times there have been duplicates created via transporter accidents. It tends to make me think that transporters don't work exactly the way that they claim.

I'd much rather be teleported in a fashion where I stay whole throughout the process and maybe space/time is folded around me and I'm sent through some diminsional thingamabob.

I think there was even a TNG episode where some terrorists were using some sort of transporter that worked along those lines. The supposed problem being some sort of radiation exposure inherant in that type of transporter.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-09-22 02:29pm

Between the choice of being ripped apart permenantly, and being ripped up and put together again...I'll take the transporter.

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2004-09-22 02:37pm

Transporter. Staying in one piece is no fun if you're dead.
As long as I'm reassembled correctly...

Metrion Cascade · Post by **Metrion Cascade** » 2004-09-22 02:39pm

I voted "chicken out and let them insta-clone me." Nice Mac quotes, Praxis. Unfortunately one of the dumbest, shittiest, most wishy-washy, possibly psychotic contractors I ever worked with (I'm not certain he was even planning to build the project he had me work on) was a Mac user.

Post by **fgalkin** » 2004-09-22 02:54pm

Between death and insta-cloning, I choose insta-cloning.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

Bob the Gunslinger · Post by **Bob the Gunslinger** » 2004-09-22 03:05pm

Well, since I'd be dying anyway, either way, I would not let them transport me unless the death otherwise would be too painful... or if I hadn't yet had children. If I have no children, well, my clone can carry on my genetic lineage. He wouldn't have my soul (in my opinion), but he would have my mind--meaning that he would know that he has a different soul. I imagine he would speak well of me at my funeral.

This means my transporter clone may have a hard time with many legal processes, such as if my marriage binds it to my wife, or if it gets any of my property, or if he is even legally an adult. Will he feel close ties to my family? Yeah, I would think that they'd treat him like he was my son or something... or like me, although that might be disturbing.

He'll have to seek legal and spiritual advice for a lot of issues, however. Like, if I were jewish, would he have to get an honorary circumcision on the eighth day after transport? If I was Catholic, could he confess my last sins? Does he have original sin?
Knowing me, he would make everyone sick of "I am man not born of woman" jokes.

Me... I'd be dead either way, so I would need a good reason to bring a clone into this kind of confusion and cause all my loved ones to have to mourn me twice. (Or however often my clones get transported.)

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2004-09-22 03:08pm

It's death eithr way, but the transporter is likely to be less painful and I'll live on in some form.

Darth Garden Gnome · Post by **Darth Garden Gnome** » 2004-09-22 03:56pm

RedImperator wrote:It's death eithr way, but the transporter is likely to be less painful and I'll live on in some form.

Really, I think it just "saves" your consiousness and puts it into a new body. So no harm, no foul. The obvious choice is to be beamed up. I wouldn't make a big deal out of being transported for certain reasons; though, considering the mishaps the transporters have caused with Starfleet crews in the past, I would use it sparringly.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-09-22 04:10pm

I'd rather not be killed, so no.

Crazedwraith · Post by **Crazedwraith** » 2004-09-22 04:16pm

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:I'd rather not be killed, so no.

You die if you dont transport not if you do.

Rihannsu Science Officer · Post by **Rihannsu Science Officer** » 2004-09-22 04:16pm

I'd do it. Hardly anybody in the galaxy has a problem with it, what's it matter if I'm actually the 2000th clone of myself if there aren't 1999 other guys competing for my identity?

Rogue 9 · Post by **Rogue 9** » 2004-09-22 04:17pm

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:I'd rather not be killed, so no.

If you don't do it, you'll be killed anyway, and permanently, remember?

JME2 · Post by **JME2** » 2004-09-22 05:47pm

Eh, I'm still haunted somewhat by the accident sequence from The Motion Picture.

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2004-09-22 05:50pm

JME2 wrote:Eh, I'm still haunted somewhat by the accident sequence from The Motion Picture.

The OP wrote: there's nothing going on that would turn you into two copies of yourself or a puddle of sludge or send you to an alternate universe or back in time or involve giant worms biting you or anything.

Apparently the transporter is working groovy for a change.

JME2 · Post by **JME2** » 2004-09-22 05:58pm

Batman wrote:
JME2 wrote:Eh, I'm still haunted somewhat by the accident sequence from The Motion Picture.

The OP wrote: there's nothing going on that would turn you into two copies of yourself or a puddle of sludge or send you to an alternate universe or back in time or involve giant worms biting you or anything.
Apparently the transporter is working groovy for a change.

Well how can you and the JLA put up with it, hmm?

Batman · Post by **Batman** » 2004-09-22 06:06pm

JME2 wrote: Well how can you and the JLA put up with it, hmm?

Ah, that's teleporters. Completely different technology, much safer.

I just wish we could do something about the 'feels like being in a concrete mixer' part...

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2004-09-22 06:51pm

Transporter doesn't kill you. You stay awake during the whole process, even when you are contained within the system waiting for transport to start on the other end.

The Silence and I · Post by **The Silence and I** » 2004-09-22 08:25pm

I'd do it even if I wasn't in danger

That piece of technology rocks! I would never forgive myself if I had the chance to be transported trek style and refused (but hey, I'm an engineer and a geek

)
So it malfunctions every what? One in a million? If that? Seriously, episodes only cover the interesting events, and only a sparse few have transporter incidents, and very very few involve actual harm.

Post by **Gandalf** » 2004-09-22 09:31pm

I'd take the transporter. How often does that chance come along?

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2004-09-22 09:52pm

The transporter has such serious reliability issues that I would attempt to wait until the problems were largely fixed before undergoing transportation.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-09-22 10:32pm

JME2 wrote:Eh, I'm still haunted somewhat by the accident sequence from The Motion Picture.

That's not haunting. What's haunting is that DS9 episode where the guy is killing all of Kira's old friends. You know, he uses some kind of field to disrupt the transport so that one lady materializes as a burnt, fried, smoking, twisted body...
*shiver*

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2004-09-22 10:33pm

Metrion Cascade wrote:I voted "chicken out and let them insta-clone me." Nice Mac quotes, Praxis. Unfortunately one of the dumbest, shittiest, most wishy-washy, possibly psychotic contractors I ever worked with (I'm not certain he was even planning to build the project he had me work on) was a Mac user.

Well, using a Mac isn't an absolute guarantee of intelligence. lol.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2004-09-22 11:44pm

Rogue 9 wrote:
Spanky The Dolphin wrote:I'd rather not be killed, so no.
If you don't do it, you'll be killed anyway, and permanently, remember?

Either way it's fucking permanent.