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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!ihnp4!alberta!andrew
From: andrew@alberta.UUCP (Andrew Folkins)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: re: zippy-clone machines
Message-ID: <488@alberta.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 13-May-85 21:25:48 EDT
Article-I.D.: alberta.488
Posted: Mon May 13 21:25:48 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 15-May-85 01:17:02 EDT
References: <120@uw-june.UUCP> <16000003@hpfclm.UUCP>
Reply-To: andrew@alberta.UUCP (Andrew Folkins)
Organization: U. of Alberta, Edmonton, AB
Lines: 27
Summary: 

In article <16000003@hpfclm.UUCP> don@hpfclm.UUCP (don) writes:
>I've always thought that the transporter operates according to the laws of
>physics.  It transforms matter into energy and from energy back into matter.
>Therefore it would be impossible to clone someone from a clump of dirt unless
>the atomic composition of the dirt is the same as that of the person being 
>cloned, . . . 

Why is that?  Matter and energy are freely interchangeable, once a given
atom has been converted into energy you can, with the appropriate
technology, convert it back into any other atom.  There is no way to 
retain the individual identity of the atoms once they have been converted
into energy. All you can hope is that you have 100% efficient coversion
(if you don't, a transporter is a very fast way to lose weight). This
implies that the transporter beam consists of more than just the energy,
it also has to contain information on how to reconstruct what is being
transported. 
 
I still have a bad feeling about transportation by matter-energy conversion, 
it seems to me that the person who comes out the other end is not the
same one who went in.  He is only a copy, and the original person (his 
soul, id, whatever you what to call it) is destroyed. (Do you think you
could survive being converted into energy?)
 
--
 
Andrew Folkins                 Why doesn't Kirk ever say "Beam me
ihnp4!alberta!andrew           down, Scotty"?