(March 14, 2015 at 8:44 pm)Jenny A Wrote: This reminds me of an old argument. In Star Trek a transporter reduces people to atoms on the ship and reassembles them from atoms on a planet or elsewhere. The question is, were they really transported, or did the transporter kill one person on the ship and create an identical person on the planet. I'd argue the later. It's not immortality, just rebirth of a duplicate. And I'd no more step into the transporter room than allow myself to be killed to create a clone of myself.
There was an episode of the re-booted Outer Limits (mid 90s as I recall) that explored that idea more fully.
Interstellar travel is done via perfectly duplicating a person elsewhere and destroying the original that 'stayed home'.
It was a pretty chilling thing to contemplate.
The granting of a pardon is an imputation of guilt, and the acceptance a confession of it.
