Transporters

[celestialteapot]

I was having a very random conversation with my brother about transporters. We both agreed that to be transported you're broken down and a copy created of you in a different location, whether or not it would be different I don't know (but if it made me taller, SIGN ME UP!).

Once thing we disagreed on though was whether or not you would have to be naked - my brother reckons that man made fabrics wouldn't be broken down properly so you'd either have to be naked to start when you got in the transporter or have to have a ready supply of clothes at the location.

What do you guys think? Would you have to be naked or would everything you're wearing be broken down, turned into electrical energy, transported and then reassembled elsewhere?

[Geekyfanboy]

Well if they are able to take a human being apart at the molecular level.. I would think they would be able to take apart a piece of clothing and recreate it.

I'm more concerned about being duplicated and the original being destroyed over and over again.

[Jen]

I believe everything I see on TV...so if they're wearing clothes...It would be doable.:D Just kidding.

I think that it would probably work like a modern scanner. It would scan and copy you just as you were, clothing, equipment and all.

I agree with Kenny with regards to being duplicated. The more you copy something the more it breaks down. I'd be pixelated by the third transport.

[Feathers]

If you're breaking stuff down by molecule then I don't see why fabric should be a limitation. As far as I see it the whole lot could be transported. I know the Terminator people would disagree but that's my view.

Can't say I fancy being first to try it out though.

[Meds]

What about items you are carrying? I always had an issue when someone is carrying someone else or touching them during transport. If you are broken down and then put back together then whats to stop both of you becoming one (like Tuvix or even worse The Fly).

[Feathers]

To my mind, if you accept the principal of molecular transportation then you also have to accept the ability of the system to correctly recreate the molecules in the correct relationship with one another.

Without the latter, the former is a non-starter.

[wraith1701]

I read a story once that involved a look at the darker implications of transporter technology.  In the story the transporter would scan and recreate an 'exact' duplicate of the transportee at a remote location.  The law was that the original copy had to be destroyed, so that there wouldn't be multiples of the same person all over the place.  Complications arose when a glitch caused one 'original' to remain conscious during the procedure.  He wasn't too keen on being destroyed to 'balance the equation'. 
It was later made into an episode of The Outer Limits; some of you may have seen it.  I think I would be kind of like Barclay or dr McCoy; a little trepadatious about being transported.

[X]

What about items you are carrying? I always had an issue when someone is carrying someone else or touching them during transport. If you are broken down and then put back together then whats to stop both of you becoming one (like Tuvix or even worse The Fly).

That would be the Heisenberg compensator. A bit of technobable they created to address the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Which I never would have learned of if not for star trek.

[RickPeete]

I love the idea of transporters but until we can make cars that don't break down after a few years and computers that cannot be corrupted by viruses, I am definitely not going to be an 'early adopter' of the technology.  lol

I am not certain I agree that a 'copy' is being made at all.  I always saw it as taking the original person, breaking down their essence to the molecular level, transporting those molecules, and the reassembling them exactly.  If this is true, then there is no copy to speak of.

If I have this wrong, then we are talking about a sophisticated copier machine bundled with the technology to transport matter rather than a molecular disassembler bundled with the matter transport capability.

This was one of the reasons I did not 'buy' the TOS episode where the Captain was duplicated with two distinct personalities.  I do not believe that the transporter would have ability to isolate certain aspects of a person's personality and reassemble those parts separately (even in a transporter accident).  In fact, I think it is even 'pushing it' that the transporter could identify illnesses and microbes and remove them upon reassembly (transport filtering).  How would it do that?  If you had cancer, would your cancerous cells be considered unhealthy things to be removed?  How would you recover from the lack of body mass resulting from 'not' restoring certain cells during a transport?

[wraith1701]

I am not certain I agree that a 'copy' is being made at all.  I always saw it as taking the original person, breaking down their essence to the molecular level, transporting those molecules, and the reassembling them exactly.  If this is true, then there is no copy to speak of.

Yeah; that's the way I understand it work in Trek as well.  The example I cited was just an alternate look at transporter technology in sci-fi.

Quick theoretical question-  During the few nano-seconds between dematerialization and rematerialization, while a subject is converted into a stream of energy, is the subject still alive?

[X]

I am not certain I agree that a 'copy' is being made at all.  I always saw it as taking the original person, breaking down their essence to the molecular level, transporting those molecules, and the reassembling them exactly.  If this is true, then there is no copy to speak of.

Yeah; that's the way I understand it work in Trek as well.  The example I cited was just an alternate look at transporter technology in sci-fi.

Quick theoretical question-  During the few nano-seconds between dematerialization and rematerialization, while a subject is converted into a stream of energy, is the subject still alive?

Yes, they are technically an energy based lifeform. Remeber the episode with Barclay interacting with something mid transport?

[Geekyfanboy]

I am not certain I agree that a 'copy' is being made at all.  I always saw it as taking the original person, breaking down their essence to the molecular level, transporting those molecules, and the reassembling them exactly.  If this is true, then there is no copy to speak of.

You are correct.. in Star Trek that is how transporters work.. but I read or saw a tech show that stated if we were to have real transporters the only way they could work is to duplicate the item and destroy the original. Like in the Outer Limit episode.

[wraith1701]

I am not certain I agree that a 'copy' is being made at all.  I always saw it as taking the original person, breaking down their essence to the molecular level, transporting those molecules, and the reassembling them exactly.  If this is true, then there is no copy to speak of.

Yeah; that's the way I understand it work in Trek as well.  The example I cited was just an alternate look at transporter technology in sci-fi.

Quick theoretical question-  During the few nano-seconds between dematerialization and rematerialization, while a subject is converted into a stream of energy, is the subject still alive?

Yes, they are technically an energy based lifeform. Remeber the episode with Barclay interacting with something mid transport?

Yeah; that was a cool episode.  He wasn't fully dematerialized though, was he?  He was able to interact with/grab the people trapped in the stream.  Is that possible while fully dematerialized?  Also, was Scotty still alive while he was trapped in the pattern buffer in the episode "Relics"?  

[RickPeete]

I would think that while dematerialized, you would still be considered alive since there are many instances of energy-based lifeforms in the Trek universe -- the Organaisn would be a prime example.  The Q Continuum would be another.  Another would be the TNG episode where they entered that string cloud and the entity took the form of "Clara" and was interacting with one of children of the crew.

There was one TNG episode where Picard was merged with an energy being and they both were transported as pure energy into an enery cloud in space.  Picard was able to return to the Enterprise and be rematerialized using a pattern that was still in the buffers.

But it must be some kind of stasis sustaining field as well since Scotty did not sense the passage of time while he was being shunted through the diagnostic pattern buffers.

[sheldor]

I was having a very random conversation with my brother about transporters. We both agreed that to be transported you're broken down and a copy created of you in a different location, whether or not it would be different I don't know (but if it made me taller, SIGN ME UP!).

Once thing we disagreed on though was whether or not you would have to be naked - my brother reckons that man made fabrics wouldn't be broken down properly so you'd either have to be naked to start when you got in the transporter or have to have a ready supply of clothes at the location.

What do you guys think? Would you have to be naked or would everything you're wearing be broken down, turned into electrical energy, transported and then reassembled elsewhere?

Interesting question.  If a device can scatter our molecules and reassemble them, I would think clothing would not be much of an issue.  Can you imagine what kind of fun hackers would have with a transporter ?

It was a number of years ago but PBS did a special called "The Science Of Star Trek" and covered things like phasers, warp travel, holodecks and transporter.