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Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!BUTLER@MIT-DMS
From: BUTLER@MIT-DMS@sri-unix.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: The Transporter; why it can't do that
Message-ID: <3558@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 28-Jul-83 04:07:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.3558
Posted: Thu Jul 28 04:07:00 1983
Date-Received: Mon, 1-Aug-83 07:35:35 EDT
Lines: 32

If you were to use the recorded pattern of a man to reconstitute him
at a younger age, why would he "remember" anything that had happened
to him since that recording was made? None of those things happened
to him; as a result, he would be in the position of the main character
of a John Varley novel (The Barbie Murders, I think) in which the
central figure has paid to have a recording of his(her?) personality
made, in case he/she dies. S/he does die, and when the clone comes out
with the imprinted memories of its original, it does not know what
events led to its original's death. When the clone is murdered, its
successor is in the same boat, since it is given the same memories #2
was given. As a result, #3 knows that numbers 1 and 2 have been mur-
dered, but does not have their interpretations of events, which would
help #3 figure out what is happening.

Now, as I recall, those animated episodes had people being restored to
youth AND remembering things that never happened to the recorded version
of the character. Humph.

As regards Gene Roddenberry's attitude toward this use of the trans-
porter, it is all well and good to say "No, you cannot do that for
dramatic (or any other) reasons, but it is too late. The djinn is 
out of the bottle. If the transporter can record a man's pattern 
long enough to reassemble him on a planetary surface, there is no
reason that pattern could not be recorded permanently. The pattern
can't be too complex or gargatious in space requirements for the 
computer to handle, or the transporter wouldn't function in the first
place.

The problems resulting from the opening of this can of planaria are 
enough to drive a man to drink (or Reformed Sufiism).

--RL "verbosity is ITS own reward" Butler