Date: Mon, 3 Apr 1995 10:56:46 -0500
From: ropella-ge-glen <ropella-AT-lvs-emh.lvs.loral.com>
Subject: Re: human body transformation


> From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim-AT-panix.com>
> 
> Star Trek's transporter always seemed like death to me, although it would 
> be difficult to analyze. If B is a re-creation of A elsewhere, B may or 
> may not survive of course; there are always bugs in the machinery, always 
> quantum loss. So it would never be exact, and could in fact never be. 
> 
> If we consider a simple mechanism, say a yoyo, and we map it by a 
> computer at X and reconstruct it at Y, then destroy X, it's clear that 
> something is lost, eliminated. But why would this be any different for a 
> transporter?
> 
> Alan

Pardon me for interrupting; but, I couldn't help but overhear this.

Why is it "clear that something is lost?"  The yo-yo's identity
may not be time or space dependent.  The identity could be re-instantiated
without suffering any losses at all.

Unless you're claiming that the "bugs in the machinery," which cause
a difference between yo-yo X and yo-yo Y, are detrimental to the yo-yo's
identity.  But, if that's the case, then we could follow the logic all
the way down to the level of, say, "Anything that changes at all with 
time suffers a *loss* of identity from one instant to the next."  This
would take us to a strict, mathematical, defn of identity; but, it wouldn't
be what we normally think of when we refer to "personhood" or identity
in that context.

For example, it would be ludicrous to claim, "I am not me," expecting the
truth of the statement to hinge on the fact that the statement took time
to say and, thus, the person making the claim has changed in the time
between the "I" and the "me" in the claim, which is what using the 
mathematical defn of identity would imply.

-- 
glen e. ropella  &&  ropella-AT-lvs-emh.lvs.loral.com


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