Naked Science Forum
On the Lighter Side => New Theories => Topic started by: xana43 on 28/08/2008 03:59:44
-
I've been thinking about transportation or about portals and things like that, because, what if your late for a meeting, what if you forgot something at your friends house that your urgently need. Well, there is possibly a way (so I've thought) to transport yourself from one place to another. Now, it would take several minutes, but it's for the best. Now, if your DNA is made of different particles, or your atoms (it would be better with your atoms). So what would happen is the machine would bio-scan your atoms or molecules. Then it would x-ray scan your organs for there molecules. Then, it would send the atom scan to the machine your getting sent to, the machine would find those exact atoms, the build then in the Right place and TADA!!!!! you've been molecularly transported.
-
Transporters of the type portrayed in the likes of Star Trek I think are pure fantasy.
-
I've been thinking about transportation or about portals and things like that, because, what if your late for a meeting, what if you forgot something at your friends house that your urgently need. Well, there is possibly a way (so I've thought) to transport yourself from one place to another. Now, it would take several minutes, but it's for the best. Now, if your DNA is made of different particles, or your atoms (it would be better with your atoms). So what would happen is the machine would bio-scan your atoms or molecules. Then it would x-ray scan your organs for there molecules. Then, it would send the atom scan to the machine your getting sent to, the machine would find those exact atoms, the build then in the Right place and TADA!!!!! you've been molecularly transported.
You are talking about a Clone, here. Why bother to destroy the original? Which one would be 'you'?
-
There's another potential problem with this. copied from here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_characters_from_The_Hitchhiker%27s_Guide_to_the_Galaxy#Lintilla
Lintilla
Lintilla is a rather unfortunate woman who has (as of Fit the Eleventh) been cloned 578,000,000,000 times due to an accident at a Brantisvogan escort agency. While creating six clones of a wonderfully talented and attractive woman named Lintilla (at the same time another machine was creating five hundred lonely business executives, in order to keep the laws of supply and demand operating profitably), the machine got stuck in a loop and malfunctioned in such a way that it got halfway through completing each new Lintilla before it had finished the previous one. This meant that it was for a very long while impossible to turn the machine off without committing murder, despite lawyers' best efforts to argue about what murder actually was, including trying to redefine it, repronounce it, and respell it in the hope that no-one would notice.
Arthur Dent encounters three of her on the planet of Brontitall, and takes a liking to (at least) one of them. He kills one of three male anti-clones, all called Allitnil (Lintilla backwards), sent by the cloning company to get her to "agree to cease to be" (although the other two of her "consummate" this legal agreement with their respective anti-clones). When Arthur leaves Zaphod, Ford, and Zarniwoop stranded with the Ruler of the Universe and his cat (at the conclusion of the second radio series), he takes one of the Lintillas with him aboard the Heart of Gold.
All Lintillas were played by the same actress: Rula Lenska. Lintilla (and her clones) appeared only in the final three episodes of the second radio series. Rula Lenska did return to the fourth and fifth radio series - she was first an uncredited "Update Voice" for the Hitchhiker's Guide itself and then played the Voice of the Bird (the new version of the Guide introduced in Mostly Harmless). Zaphod noted in the new series that the new book has the same voice as "those Lintilla chicks." The footnotes of the published scripts make the connection, confirming that the bird is actually an amalgam of the Lintilla clones, the solution alluded to in the second series. Lintilla and her clones (of which at the end there are now more than 800,000,000,000 - "800 thousand million") do make a re-appearance of sorts on the Heart of Gold in an alternate ending to the final episode (which can only be heard on CD).
-
The process of finding out the information needed to make an exact copy of you would need to use quantum entanglement. This process would distroy the original you so cloning would not be the problem. Quantum entanglement is needed to overcome the Heisenburg uncertainty principle. Measuring particles is a tricky business.
The problem would come when you had to transmit the data from a whole human body. You would need to transmit information on 10000000000000000000000000000 atoms. The best transmitter in the world can only transmit 5.6 billion bits a second. This is three times faster than the fastest home broardband. Assuming that each atom can be transmitted in one bit which is vastly underestimated, it would take 10000000000000 years to download all the information on one human.
This is about 4,000 times the age of the universe.
Sorry to rain on your parade. Transportation of matter has been done experimentally but only tiny particles not a whole human.
Look at the work of Prof. Anton Zeilinger,Innsbruck uni. Austria.1997.
-
www.newstatesman.com/200510170013
Try this.
-
Re scanning each atom: Do a rough calculation of the number of atoms in a typical human body, then work out from that, the scanning frequency you'd need, baring in mind that during the scanning period a lot of those atoms will have changed due to cell decay and re-birth, then work out the bandwidth you'd need to transmit the resulting info in a reasonable time period.
If you then think it's still feasible, I'd be interested in seeing your numbers.
-
Surely this "The best transmitter in the world can only transmit 5.6 billion bits a second. This is three times faster than the fastest home broardband." doesn't add up.
I'm sure that my ISP tranmsmits to more than 3 subscribers (though sometimes it doesn't seem that way).
-
Optical fibre transmission speeds of 90Gb/s were made some years ago and you can always use multiple fibres. I doubt that this is the limiting factor as much as the processing to gather and assemble the data.
What is more interesting than the practicalities (or impracticalities) of Star Trek type transporters is the philosophical implications alluded to by others. If it is possible to record all the data and instantaneous "configuration" of a person to enable this data to be sent to some other place where the person can be constructed, then it would seem that it may not be essential to disassemble the person being sent. If you had this process done to you there would be an original "you" and a copied "you". The copied "you" would wake as though you had been transported, but the unfortunate original "you" would have to be dispensed with if there was not to be a "Lintilla" problem. It need not be a clean wiggling disappearance as on Star Trek. There might have to be some men in white coats that quietly dispose of you (original you) by whatever, of course, humane means were at their disposal. But not many would volunteer for this mode of transport would they? No wonder Scottie never liked them.
But really why not? You have not ceased to exist but continued at a different point in space. It is really that once we have copied in this way it is distasteful to think of one version being killed, but would this matter ethically? Is it really different from going asleep on a train in one place and waking in another? (Of course without the "disposal" problem). There need be no suffering if one could perceive of a powerful anaesthetic that could be used to, perhaps, pause conciousness. Could you think of simply moving as a rapid instantaneous destruction and recreation in a slightly different place?
-
Why spend so much time discussing the 'Science' behind topics which are based on fiction? Would we spend so much time discussing Witchcraft or Voodoo? Star Trek is really great fun but the ideas in it usually originated from 'Really-Non-scientists' and should really be treated as such. Hitch Hiker is a much more sophisticated scene and doesn't for one second purport to talk 'Real Science'. Its scenarios are totally tongue in cheek; no one would discuss their practicality - that's satire - not escapism. It may be that Star Trek special effects are so good that people suspend disbelief permanently rather than just for the purpose of the plot.
People who want to make Star Trek 'real' have missed the real point of Science (and, for that matter, Science Fiction).
Let's have a discussion of flying on broomsticks and turning people into frogs instead. Or perhaps that would be 'ridiculous'?
-
It is not the science, which is not close to anything practical and may never be, that is interesting but the philosophical implications that are interesting, at least to me. It is also something that is discussed at length in a book by Professor Roger Penrose so I feel I am not alone in thinking that the subject of discussion has merit. I suppose it could be debated that this is not strictly a science subject but such interpretation would be a little pedantic.
The quality of the science in Star Trek varies from poor to laughable. I remember an episode where they claimed to be in a geostationary orbit over the north pole!
-
Discussing the overall idea is fair enough and I guess Penrose feels that he needs to address the idea as it is of general interest (and it will sell books) but the quasi practical / engineering issues which have been discussed on this thread only help to preserve the myth (which it is, I think you will agree).
Was I just being a grumpy old sod?
I just get the idea that the Science which attracts so many people is, in fact, not Science at all.
-
I know what you mean, and I agree that it would be wrong to give scientific credence to a lot of bo**ocks, but sometimes it is things like this that can stimulate the mind. I don't think Penrose wrote what he did to sell his book. Well, maybe a bit! But he had clearly thought about it quite a bit.
There are quite a few whacky ideas put forward for discussion. This is more amusing than trying to argue with people who still think the earth is flat (or if not exactly this, an equivalent "belief" with some pseudo-scientific justification). How many of these people have said "Oh yes, you are right"?
Also, I am sure you will agree, Star Trek has inspired more young people to take an interest in science than demonstrations of Hooke's law.
-
I have had to deal with many young students who thought they wanted to do A Level Physics as a result of the Non-Science they picked up from the telly. The flimsy Science which they get at GCSE doesn't help either. The fact seem to be that very few young people actually understand what Science is about at all. If they can't be bothered with Hooke's Law (or even be excited by it) then they won't be serious about their appreciation of the difference between Star Trek Science and the real stuff.
The rigour of Science is carefully ignored by Politicians and even by many Educationists in the attempt to cause 'changes' and to gain power and influence. How do the poor kids stand a chance of deciding whether or not they really are interested in Science? Many of them never actually see it.
-
Well said sophiecentaur. It's a sad fact that most people only seek the superficial sensationalist aspects of entertainment science and cannot see the very real and profound mysteries yet to be understood. What possible greater challenge can there be than to try to understand the universe, it's origins and it's destiny?
People who wish to tackle science have to be brave - their ego may not be able to cope when confronted by everything.
-
What possible greater challenge can there be than to try to understand the universe, it's origins and it's destiny?
You don't need to go that far to find challenge and delight. Just try some simple mechanical experiments and find how they follow simple, logical, theory and simple Maths. Try growing crystals and explaining why they are the shapes they are, in terms of the molecules. Even start studying the little brown insects in your back yard.
Everyone is chuffed to death about the LHC (which is why there was funding in the first place ; it's an ill wind) but I'm sure the public will expect flashy results with glossy pictures to appear some time on the afternoon of switch-on. In fact - just what do the public expect?
-
Heh - I've only just realised that
their ego may not be able to cope when confronted by everything
was pretty much the idea behind the Total Perspective Vortex in the radio version of the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy. This was supposed to be the ultimate means of punishment and worked by humiliating you beyond endurance by showing how irrelevant you were in the context of the entire universe. Oops [;D]
-
As someone who wanted to be a scientist from the age of five, I don't really remember what stimulated my interest. I probably liked the idea of wearing a white coat :-) Actually I think it was a fairly serious TV program using time lapse photography to study human behaviour. This would have been in the early 1950s. But later on it was the hoopy theoretical stuff that interested me more than the repetition of old experiments, with some notable exceptions like the Michelson-Morley experiment using microwaves or just the good old Young's double slit experiment. And I confess I did like science fiction and (I note I'm in good company here) especially HHG on radio, TV and the books (what a nerd eh?).
I take the point about being being given false expectations by TV pseudoscience, but I think most people can be excited and inspired without the necessity to believe that this stuff is real. I think we need more inspration for young people to study science; if it comes from SF, fine. They can get to see the beauty of how the world works for real later. I know very few scientists or engineers who don't like SF, which must say something.