[Flipside]

Death doesn't relieve pain and suffering, it merely follows it, that's an analogy we make to comfort ourselves.

We are already machines, we sense through electrical impulses that are decoded into 'feelings' by our brains, in very much the same way that computers send electrical impulses through sets of transistors to set up states within a computer. Abstract concepts are, by definition, abstract, there's no saying whether they can be calculated or emulated because it's never been tried, we aren't talking about someone sitting down and 'programming' you into a machine, we are talking about a transfer of conciousness, which is different, a machine does what its told, if you transfer over a human mind in every detail, then the machine will do what the mind tells it, think, feel, love, hate, dream and imagine, if the mind is complete, then it is no different to an organic machine, except not organic. If you put milk in a glass, is it different to milk in a porcelain mug? The container changes, the contents, however, remains the same.

As for the 'senseless blathering', you know, it's strange, but everyone had actually come to happy medium about the concept...

[General Battuta]

Yeah, I really want this thread to just die down so I can have some peace. I must've written a few thousand words by now!

I'm happy to leave Akalabeth and whoever with whatever opinion they like, so long as they recognize it's an opinion. Let's just go talk about FreeSpace or something. Hopefully we've all picked up some interesting information.

(Though debates like this tend to harden the existing perspectives of those involved rather than changing them...an interesting bit of science there.)

[The E]

Agreed. Let it die in peace, rather than continue to descend into flames.

[Flipside]

Concur and locked, I think the conversation was pretty healthy for the main part, but the last thing this little fire needs is petrol poured on it.

[Flipside]

Ok, unlocked in the hope that people have calmed down a bit and we can continue this conversation without some of the raised heckles it was displaying earlier

[Topgun]

Im not worried about an accident, Im worried that the one who got teleported is not me.
let me put it this way, I believe what you are saying, but I wouldn't take the chance.

No chance in it. 100% certainty the transporter kills you.

In that case, I would take the transporter. becuase the odds of the teleporter not killing me are better than the odds of me finding a shuttle in time. and even if the teleporter does kill me, at least my copy will get to go on and have a full life.

Yeah but we're arguing that it's agreed that the transporter 100% does kill you. It simply makes a copy of you at the other end which has no reason not to believe it's you apart from the fact that you were just transported. So the odds of finding a shuttle are higher. They are always going to be higher. Trillion to one chances are better than 100% certainty of death.

So would you still use the transporter? Cause from what he says, Trashman presumably wouldn't.

in that case I wouldn't use the transporter, unless *someone* needed me alive becuase I had vital information or something.
copy-me hasn't been created yet so I wouldn't be killing him if I didn't take the transporter.

[General Battuta]

Mate, if you think the transporter kills you, then you have already died a hundred times.

A transporter does nothing that does not happen to you every day. It just does it faster.

Either you accept that you die every day (which is fine, 'death' doesn't actually mean anything except 'irretrievable loss of information'), or you accept that the transporter doesn't 'kill you.

You are a model built of Lego bricks. Switching in new bricks for the old ones does nothing to change the structure of the model (as XKCD would put it.)

[Topgun]

Mate, if you think the transporter kills you, then you have already died a hundred times.

A transporter does nothing that does not happen to you every day. It just does it faster.

I don't, but I won't take the risk. what you say makes sense, but there is always a chance you are wrong.
I am about 65/35 split on the matter, not worth risking my life on.

[General Battuta]

Fair enough, I guess. We won't know for sure until we try it.

[Topgun]

unfortunately, even then we won't know.

[General Battuta]

Um, yes we will.

You're forgetting, again, that you're simply a copy of the individual you were some time ago, yet I doubt you'd say that you've died.

Unless people come out of a teleport limp and unresponsive, then there's simply no difference between teleportation and normal life, barring any horrible errors the teleportation process may induce (and those might kill you, but that's an engineering problem.)

If there is no empirically verifiable difference, whether by objective measure or by self-report, then no difference exists unless you introduce dualism, in which case your objection to the teleport is purely religious.

The fact that individuals can be resuscitated after complete cessation of neural activity indicates that humans can be rebooted purely from the wetware. If the wetware is preserved, the human is preserved.

[Flipside]

Basically, every cell in your body is replaced on a regular basis, this is doing the exact same thing, only much faster.

Science-wise, I'm not sure about the feasibility of teleportation in the first place, but if being taken apart and reassembled somehow took something away from us, then we are all empty, soul-less shells several times over.

[General Battuta]

I love you, man.

*hug*

[StarSlayer]

Basically, every cell in your body is replaced on a regular basis, this is doing the exact same thing, only much faster.

Science-wise, I'm not sure about the feasibility of teleportation in the first place, but if being taken apart and reassembled somehow took something away from us, then we are all empty, soul-less shells several times over.

Who says we aren't already?

[Topgun]

Then you don't understand what I mean.
I am not sure if the person "on the other side" is me. sure, he will have the exact same body and thought patterns, but will he have my POV? I think so, since he will just be a continuation of my brain, but I don't know for sure. just becuase copy-me is alive and acts just like me, doesn't mean he is me.
for that matter, I don't even know for sure if who I was yesterday is me today, or if I just have his memories.
I just don't know, I can't know.

Basically, every cell in your body is replaced on a regular basis, this is doing the exact same thing, only much faster.

Science-wise, I'm not sure about the feasibility of teleportation in the first place, but if being taken apart and reassembled somehow took something away from us, then we are all empty, soul-less shells several times over.

I know, which is why I believe consciousness exists in the processes of the brain cells (what the cells do) and not in the cells themselves.
again, though, I can't be sure.

[General Battuta]

Topgun, dude...we've covered this point already.

The person on your other side will have your POV.

You're a copy-me right now. You have your POV. You can rest easy, unless you decide that you really were a different person yesterday, in which case...why is it a problem?

If it happens to use every day, why are you worried about using a teleporter?

[Flipside]

I love you, man.

*hug*

I know, which is why I believe consciousness exists in the processes of the brain cells (what the cells do) and not in the cells themselves.
again, though, I can't be sure.

From what I understand, a vast majority of neural pathways are direct cause-effect links, billions upon billions of IF/THEN statements, as it were. Copying the neural pathways, and the contents of them, is way beyond the current scope of science, because you would have to copy every electrical impulse as well as the pathways themselves, if you are halfway through a thought at one end of a transportation, then that thought should continue un-abated at the other end, which is a pretty tall order.

I suppose the real test of Teleportation is that is should feel just like walking through a door, whether that level will ever be achieved is a whole other matter, but, purely from a theoretical point of view, the knowledge is there.

[Topgun]

But we don't know that. everything we can see says so, but we might be missing something, we don't know.
my life is a little too valuable to take the risk.
and yes, I know that if the transporter kills me, then chances are I am just a copy of who I was yesterday with a different POV. the difference is that it won't help me to think that I might not be the same person that I was yesterday, becuase in that case, it won't matter what I think, I still die. If I do it through the transpoter, then the chances are even worse.

[General Battuta]

Yeah, exactly, Flipside. If the brain is Turing-compatible (which I can't say for sure!) then emulating it is no problem. If it isn't, then brain uploading may hit an issue.

Neurons are, in general, digital. They are either firing, or not firing. However, their firing state is determined by analogue signals between neurons, including additive potentials on the post-synaptic regions of the neuron. Moreover, these analogue signals are to a degree transmitted between neurons as well, adding an analog component to what would otherwise be a purely digital network.

(This is part of why I got so peeved at Liberator; he clearly missed his neuroanatomy!)

The brain operates on a mix of digital and analog code. It's not particularly mysterious, just very, very complex.

then chances are I am just a copy of who I was yesterday with a different POV

Well, um, I hope you have the same POV. I certainly have the same POV I had yesterday.

We've defined POV as our continuous sense of identity. You are worried that a copy would not preserve such continuity, that you would end. Now you're worried that you yourself don't have a continuous sense of identity...but you do! It's what we defined 'POV' as in the first place.

See, if it happens to you every day, why are you worried about being a copy? Clearly there's nothing bad about it! It's the only way things have ever worked!

[Topgun]

then chances are I am just a copy of who I was yesterday with a different POV

Well, um, I hope you have the same POV.

See, if it happens to you every day, why are you worried about being a copy? Clearly there's nothing bad about it! It's the only way things have ever worked!

becuase...     I    D O N  'T     K N O W
this is ALL speculation, I am not going to take the risk when there is an alternative.
I believe that, after I go through the transporter, everything will be the same, same POV, same me, everything, just as if I walked though a door.
but I don't know for sure, and I don't think its worth the risk.