Replies

Thank you for sharing your insights, dearest sister in Christ!

To make it convincing, you would have to show how you would "disassemble a candle molecule by molecule," and then later reassemble it molecule by molecule back into its precisely identical original configuration. And then give a reason for why the candle resulting from this process would in any way BE the "original" candle. And these two things I believe you cannot do.

It makes for good science fiction.

For instance, teleportation happens routinely in Star Trek, i.e. "beam me up, Scotty."

And I recall an old sci-fi/horror movie where the "original" had to be killed so it would not duplicate the recreated copy.

And surely someone has filmed a horror/sci-fi flick that has the teleported copy zombified (alive but without a soul) - an evil copy of the original.

The latter would be closer to the "lit" v "non-lit" candle - or our breaking down rocks and rabbits if it were possible to teleport "life."

In my view that is the poison pill of teleportation and the key to the Rosen review.

Or to put it another way, in the case of the live rabbit - or man - the whole really is greater than the sum of its parts. The whole, reduced to its physical components, cannot be reconstituted.

" For instance, teleportation happens routinely in Star Trek, i.e. "beam me up, Scotty."

And I recall an old sci-fi/horror movie where the "original" had to be killed so it would not duplicate the recreated copy.

And surely someone has filmed a horror/sci-fi flick that has the teleported copy zombified (alive but without a soul) - an evil copy of the original."

Teleportation in Star Trek is a mechanical process, even though one of the supposed technical explanations related that it was akin to the Warp Drive.

As described through action in the series and the movies, the process disassembles an object and subsequently reassembles it, unavoidably involving exactly the question about "original" versus "recreation".

This, by the way, was always Doctor McCoy's objection to "beaming". He felt that he was leaving his soul behind. (Presumably, this should only happen on the first beaming occasion, right?)

Anyway, other methods of teleportation may not be entirely encumbered by this problem. So-called "natural" teleportation, as done by the X-Men, other comic-book superheroes, and Gully Foyle from Bester's "The Stars My Destination", seem to involve disappearing from one location and reappearing in another without aid from mechanical contrivances. It's more a matter of making the space between places disappear than of making an object disassemble itself and then reassemble itself.

So these characters should be able to retain their souls, if they have them to begin with.

A much more likely scenario to present us with this dilemma is the notion of assisted reincarnation. This would be a process of transferring thoughts and memories from one body into another. Presumably, the purpose would be to move from an unhealthy or aged body into a youthful and vibrantly healthy one. (Let me note at this point that it is unethical in the extreme to use an occupied body).

I got around this problem fictionally by gradually transferring memories from an older, failing brain into the growing new brain of a clone, slowly migrating the individual into its new location before a separate individual could come into awareness.

Whether this constitutes a transmigration of the soul is left as an exercise for the gentle reader to determine, as even the reincarnating individual was unable to discern any difference between his old state and his new one.

Another mental exercise to consider is that if someone, somehow, developed the ability to live for a very long time, or even become effectively immortal, he would still be plagued by doubts about the presence or absence of a soul.

And, of course, he would never learn about the rewards due him in his afterlife.