this post was submitted on 25 Jul 2023
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But what difference does that make? I wouldn't even notice.
You're right, instant painless death, then no regrets (I'm assuming you - like me - don't believe im afterlife, or souls, as startrek style teleporters are incompatible with those).
But I don't want to cease to exist just yet.
No afterlife, no souls - though I can see how it would be tricky for a believer. But I can't see teleporting as "ceasing to exist", simply because I consider my "self" and my consciousness to be identical to the structures in my brain. There is nothing else but the atoms that have come together in the specific combination to form my body, and those atoms are constantly being replaced by other atoms anyway. When using a transporter, the current combination of atoms is simply recreated at the other end to seamlessly continue its function and processes (assuming perfect copies of course), thus effectively "transporting" my consciousness.
PS: On the afterlife/soul issue, yes it'd be tricky - that's why I assumed you (like me) didn't follow that line of thought.
Assuming a soul inhabits the body would require either that the transporter technology had the hability to convert/rebuild souls - and in Riker's case to CREATE new souls, which would be the highest heresy - or that the souls would have to figure out where the transporter would materialize their body, and through supernatural powers, self-transport instantly there to reposses it. And in Riker's case, one of the bodies would be souless, and having no soul to get ethernal damnation or salvation, this copy would be free from God's blackmailing. I bet the writers didn't think of the consequences of that episode, if conservatives had understood that...