Transporter is now working

[tw]

The correct answer is that they are not transporting matter. Its all about how they put a spin on it.

[breakingnews]

And long distance relationships wouldn't be so ... long distance.

I imagine the actual fruition of this type of technology wouldn't be far off from what happened in The Sixth Day, that awful Schwarzenegger movie. Not so much that they were going through the physical act of cloning people in the movie, but rather that the bad guys were all cloned and not real people.

When Arnold runs into his clone, there seems to be a bit of mental angst and then acceptance when Arnold 2 figures out that he isn't actually the real Arnold (clone copies are identified by little dots under eyelid).

I'm babbling, but brought that up in response to the idea that what comes out the other end of the transporter isn't actually the "real" thing, but a replicated version. That would be a really weird thing, but if there weren't any side effects, I would totally do it.

[jaguar]

Wouldn't you be a tad worried about say, the cable getting cut, data corrution, power cut....TCP/humanity.

[Happy Monkey]

I'd be more worried that I was being utterly destroyed, atom by atom. Whether a copy was constructed somewhere else would be beside the point. That's not a side effect, it's a feature!

[Torrere]

I believe that the no cloning theorem may prevent us from using quantum entanglement as communication.

but, uh, I only know of this because I stumbled upon it on Wikipedia, and I'm uncharacteristically scared by the big words that I used in that sentence and the complicated math that they stand for.

[edit: typo hate]

[jaguar]

It's all beyond me but I've got a mate that gets to spend some time at CERN for his uni course, he might have a better idea.

[SteveDallas]

I'm in way over my depth. But I believe it would allow communication IF that communication were one-way only, and one-time only.

[lumberjim]

First, atoms B and C were brought together, making them "entangled" and creating an invisible link between the two atoms no matter how far apart they were. Atom C was moved away. Next, A and B were similarly entangled.

Then the scientists measured the energy states of A and B, essentially opening the boxes to see whether each contained a 1 or a zero. Because B had been entangled with C, opening A and B created an instant change in atom C, what Albert Einstein called "spooky action at a distance," and this, in essence, set a combination lock on atom C, with the data in A and B serving as the combination.

For the final step, the combination was sent and a pulse of laser light was applied to atom C, almost magically turning it into a replica of the original A. Atom A was teleported to atom C.

they used magic?

[wolf]

Originally posted by Troubleshooter
The soul test.

What if you either didn't have one to begin with, or had sold it off cheaply several years ago?

Does this mean that after using a transporter everyone would be Enron Executives?

[wolf]

Originally posted by jaguar
Wouldn't you be a tad worried about say, the cable getting cut, data corrution, power cut....TCP/humanity.

Eeeeau.

The first transporter scene in Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

Oh, and the first baboon in The Fly (1986).

[xoxoxoBruce]

Not to worry, they'll use Microsoft Windows.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally posted by lumberjim
they used magic?

Arthur C. Clarke's Third Law:
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

[jaguar]

Show me a man who'll use a Microsoft teleporter and I'll show you a man who is tired of life.

[Crimson Ghost]

The "Blue Screen Of Death" lives up to its name.