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" 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.

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".... Anyway, other methods of teleportation may not be entirely encumbered by this problem. So-called "natural" teleportation ... seem[s] 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.

"Natural teleportation" seemingly is a reference to wormholes — which are mathematical objects that have not yet been directly observed in nature as far as I know. I understand the folding of the spacetime "fabric" is mathematically tractible; but what the math describes has not yet been seen in physical reality.

In Star Trek, the "beam me up Scotty!" method of teleportation is probably physically unrealizable — that is, by means of Newtonian assumptions and methods. I don't know whether it's mathematically tractible.

But this was the pip:

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.

Really cute, NicknamedBob. Not that you believe in souls or the afterlife. You seem to suggest one moots the entire problem of afterlife if one can become immortal. [Science is probably working on it.] Then, one never has to face Judgment. All you have to do to evade Judgment is to never die. Plus you seem to assert that such an effectively immortal person would never have any awareness or confidence that he had a soul. Are you suggesting that a person has to die physically before he becomes aware that he has a soul??? [Reply in the affirmative would posit soul as a real entity (LOL! but then so would a reply in the negative); but the respondent couldn't know that for certain ('cause he's not dead yet, being virtually immortal.... Don't get whiplash here folks!)] So he dismisses the issue as irrelevant to him.

Plus on such a view it follows that if one cannot learn anything about "the rewards due him in an afterlife," one has no reason to alter his behavior in the here and now. Since he cannot (because he doesn't need to, being virtually immortal) see the measure of Justice, he might as well make himself his own measure.... And so he does.

Diagnosis: Total spiritual closure. Prognosis: Utter despair sooner or later. For as Francis Schaeffer starkly put it, the most rational thing a nihilist can do (given his worldview and presuppositions) is to commit suicide.

I'm trying to understand your thinking here. At this point, I'd have to say you seem to be rather attracted to the doctrines of atheism, a/k/a nihilism. Which is a kind of party trick....

If this picture isn't correct, then please correct it!

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.

That is the only way I can see the "whole" person being able to relocate, i.e. wormhole, folding or pinching space/time.

All of the other plot lines, yours and theirs, require a deconstruction of some sort - whether physical or not.

Beyond that it appears the conversation is becoming apples and oranges.

You are coming from the novelist/poet's side, evidently with a lot of scifi tagged to actual scientific theory (e.g. Star Gate.)

betty boop and I are coming from the math, science and philosophy side.