Teleporters that don't replicate matter?

Well, for this story of mine, I kind of need a big, high-energy teleporter that could transport people instantaneously over large distances (maybe within about mile or so of the target destination). Problem is, as far as I know most thigns with teleporters have a tendency to zap people by turning them into particles and transporting them like that to teh location where they're 'rebuilt'.

Which means you're using information to reconstruct them. Which means you can create unlimited clones. This is the problem.

Any suggestions?

Wormholes seem like your best bet.

Some form of FTL hyperspace flight might also be a possibility.

What's the problem, exactly? Is it conservation of mass and energy you're worried about, or the idea of keeping the instructions to reconstructing someone saved somewhere where it can be used infinitely?

The second point.

I considered wormholes, I suppose those could work...

edited 6th Sep '11 12:16:05 PM by Eventua

I'd second the wormholes, then.

Too be honest, wormholes were going to be a plot-point anyway, so yeah. Thanks for the help.

Have a machine that hacks into reality itself, changing the concept of "here" to "there".

Like that.

...Except that's even easier to abuse then the matter-replicator teleporter. Just think about it.

Maybe the wormholes are as small as strings, letting long streams of particles run through them.

I've always had a problem with the whole "teleporter makes a duplicate" thing. Actually, it was more on how most people explain it. It makes sense up till the part where the say "Now your in two places, so we vaporize the original..." which is not something that would sit well with many people.

Wormhole/portal technology, reality warping, magic.

Those are pretty much all I've ever heard of that don't automatically lead the way to faultless replicas of anything, including living creatures - leading to the death of enterprise, economic collapse and functional immortality.

Most the explanations I've heard have you vaporised first, then reassembled elsewhere - usually after (for some unknown reason) beaming the resultant energy to the destination. I can understand transmitting the pattern as a signal to enable it to be replicated at the other end but the receiving end could probably just as well dematerialise however-many kilos of air and reassemble the resultant energy as per the received signal as try to intercept a fuckton of incoming energy and convert that.

The minute you have matter-energy-matter licked to the point that you can reassemble a complex organism and have a living organism at the end of the process, you've got the ability to tear up anything and reassemble it into anything you like. Sewerage Treatment Plants would be able to take household waste and produce platinum (and fresh water, I suppose). For that matter, you could have a toilet at home that does the same thing.

"Aldebaran's great, OK.

Algol's pretty neat.

Betelgeuse's pretty girls

Will sweep you off your feet.

They'll do any thing you like

Real fast and then real slow.

But if you've got to take me apart to get me there

Then I don't want to go.

Take me apart. Take me apart.

What a way to roam.

If you've got to take me apart to get me there,

I'd rather stay at home...."

(Douglas Adams, Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy.)

edited 6th Sep '11 10:27:47 PM by Wolf1066

Mine features a teleporter, but since my story leans toward to fantasy side, it isn't elaborated. I never understood the necessity of this whole "Telporters should duplicate the original copy." To me, teleport is...something that just can be done somehow.

i.e. "magic". It can have whatever arbitrary abilities you assign it, whatever side-effects or lack thereof you desire and you don't have to explain any more than "I want to be there and I'm there" and what restrictions it has if any.

The teleporters as described in Star Trek have glaring logic holes because they should be able to make duplicates of any living creature out of anything of which they have a surplus - much in the same way that their replicators can make anything from complex equipment to a three course meal.

If I were writing a story that involved teleportation, I'd be looking at means other than matter/energy conversion as well - so as not to wreck the universe.

I personally think that the Star Trek actually trying to explain how its transporters work has backfired to them spectacularly in form of a large logic hole. I'm no physicist, but that's a very horrible way to explain teleportation. Why couldn't they have just had a teleporter and not elaborate on it? I mean, it's not like anyone asked how people could teleport in Jumper.

Oh, and mine would be technically be a SF Fantasy.

edited 7th Sep '11 12:04:00 AM by dRoy

ST made things up as they went along with absolutely no thought to logical consequences of their "explanations". It wasn't until years after TOS finished that it occurred to the later writers that perfect matter replication was a side-effect of the teleporter technology and introduced the "replicators" - which only addressed half the obvious consequences of the technology as described.

They've come up with some downright silly stuff over the years... like saying that they can't teleport onto their own bridge (over-run by the villain of the week) - for which they presumably have highly detailed plans, accurate to a fraction of a millimetre - lest they accidentally try to materialise inside a bit of furniture, when they seem to have no difficulty teleporting people down to unknown and potentially hostile planets without once landing someone inside a tree or one of the locals.

Teleportation has enough stuff to complicate it (that pesky Conservation of Momentum, for a start, and let's not forget the dangers inherent in teleporting into a crowded or unknown area) without the ramifications of matter-energy mastery.

Even wormholes/portals would be problematic from the conservation of momentum aspect (emerge from the hole at entirely the wrong velocity and vector for the local terrain) - you'd almost need magic of some description just to get rid of the nastier side effects (or at least realign and accelerate/decelerate the person accordingly - which could be deadly in itself).

Exactly.

Writers, please, just don't try to explain teleportation. You WILL fail, and the chances are, your attempt will only make more logical loopholes that will make you look like an idiot.

I mean, goodness' shake, how many people actually question how teleporters, unless its set in very improbably period like before World War II, in sci-fi setting works?

edited 7th Sep '11 1:29:33 AM by dRoy

You could lampshade it: have some scientifically-minded character ask how the person manages to overcome Conservation of Momentum and not wind up a bloody smear on the local terrain and have the character say "buggered if I know, I just disappear in one place and appear in another with no recollection of the journey."

Let the fans try to work out how it works - and at least you'd get marks for being aware of the issue even if you don't come up with an explanation for it.

That'd work best with innate teleportation abilities or magic, obviously. A bit harder to get away with if the teleportation is artificially induced with technology - you'd expect someone, somewhere, knows how it works and how the problems are circumvented.

I actually did an Orwellian Retcon that eliminated all teleportation in my comics that wasn't explicitly magical because of all this. While my comics were quite obviously never meant to make sense scientifically, they were meant to be internally consistent, and the non-magic teleporters just completely messed everything up when looked at in detail.

That's an excellent point that is not often brought up regarding almost every kind of artificial technology. Maybe in that case, the inventor can drop a massive manual books on the inquirer's lap and tell him that the manual explains every thing?

I can well understand that.

Ouch, that's just plain evil. I like it. Very much.

The big advantage of innate teleportation ability - and possibly magical teleportation - over technology based teleportation is that you can limit all that stuff to the act of teleporting.

If you've got the technology to overcome Conservation of Momentum at a person-sized level for teleportation, you've got the technology to overcome it any time it might cause a problem anywhere else.

That tends to break the universe quite badly. In the same way that matter-energy teleportation breaks the universe.

What does a world where Conservation of Momentum can be "switched off at will" look like?

edited 7th Sep '11 1:59:18 AM by Wolf1066

Yup, just the way I like it. With all seriousness, though, that would be a more plausible way to handwave such technology.

Then again, some devoted/crazy/obssessive fans then might ask for the content of the said book...or worse, some fans who are experts in those kinds of field might actually publish the hypothetical manual, much to the creator's amusement.

Why is this a bad thing? As a genre author, Fan Wank is your friend. Embrace it. The problem is when they poke holes in your explanation, not when they try and create explanations for things in the work without them.

Heheheh.

Actually, serious question for the OP - do you really need teleporters in your work? I was able to get rid of them with no major plot changes on my part, and as far as "Applied Phlebotinum that opens up more problems then it's usually worth", the only thing to beat them is Time Travel.