*spacy

Adding video to channels (Spacy) - requested by ant.

Damnit, I watched this right before going to bed. Nice knowing you world!

Is this guy talking like Kirk just to keep the theme going?

The biggest trouble with transporters is they were a cost-cutting measure on a science fiction TV show so the production company didn't have to do a bunch of effects shots with shuttlecraft every episode.

So what he's saying is that my bed is the same as the ending of "The Prestige"?

I'm reminded of this old gem:

http://videosift.com/video/To-Be-John-Weldon

The first time this will probably come into consideration in the real world is consciousness uploading. It's not far fetched that we will eventually have the technology to take a snapshot of all of the atoms in our bodies and simulate that arrangement on a computer of some sort.

It would be exactly like your consciousness if it's simulated with 100% accuracy. And again, who can say that we'll never get to that point? But when your biological self dies, will you really be immortal if the original consciousness is destroyed?

That idea always bothered me.
If the transporter doesn't really transport YOU, but instead only creates a perfect copy of you at the destination and destroys the original, you're dead and a copy has taken your place.
Your consciousness is a function of a complex, ongoing chemical reaction. It IS totally measureable with a powerful and detailed enough MRI. A copy of that is simply a copy. Your consciousness does not transfer from one to the other any more than consciousness is shared by twins.
As to the 'break in consciousness' when sleeping or unconscious, I think it's a misnomer. Your brain continues to work in those situations, only your perception of it is blocked. The chemical reactions that are 'you' continue to occur without a break, you continue to emit brain waves, and your neurons continue to fire. If the chemical reactions in your brain stop, you're dead, not asleep.

Except that you can't know all the properties of those atoms all at once. The Uncertainty Principle shows there is a fundamental limit to what we can know about particles. An exact replication would be impossible.

There have been many things in history that have been thought to have been impossible. Neil deGrasse Tyson's presentation on "The God of the Gaps" is a great video addressing that line of thought.

However, that point may not even matter. My hypothesis is that our neurons don't operate all the way down to a sub-atomic or electron-spin level of granularity. There's plenty of complexity at the molecular and cellular scales. We're likely chemical and physical reactions like Newtboy says.

question for Trekkers:
There have been a few episodes where the transporter messed up and there were copies - which means it is possible to create a clone army - so why haven't there been any episodes with a clone army? Is there a "Directive" forbidding this in intergalactic law? Even if so, a "bad guy" could still break the law and do it.
The Federation aren't the only ones with transporter technology, right?

Not really. We, just like everything else, are waves in space that moves and deforms. We cant be "transported" (and not change) unless everything else (all of space) is transported at the same time.

Or look at it this way: you cant displace one part of space with a copy of another part of the same space and hope to keep space intact. Not even on Discworld.

*related=http://videosift.com/video/One-Minute-Time-Machine

One-Minute Time Machine has been added as a related post - related requested by blutruth.

Wait, so after I beam from one place to another I'm considered to be dead? I calmly set my phaser to "Vaporize Silly Motherfuckers" (yes, I added a new setting) and proceed to kill the guy who just told me this. Now you see that? That's dead.

Good point. I'm not aware of any clone armies at all. Probably more likely to do with budget and technical challenges than anything else.
TNG at least is very much focused on the human condition, and just uses a sci-fi theme to explore it. So I guess when it comes to cloning, they were able to explain individuality, past choices, regrets, missed opportunities etc easily enough with just one clone instead of many.

Disturbing Star Trek: The Motion Picture Transporter Malfunc has been added as a related post - related requested by notarobot on that post.