vilakins | Stuff

Crossposts: http://vilakins.livejournal.com/584487.html

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Stuff

I suppose I should post at some point, and this is it. So here's an assortment of things.

Birthday
My sister Jenni came up from Hamilton for the day (also to look at some French doors she saw on TradeMe) and we had lunch with Greg at the local Mexican (as in run by Mexicans) cafe where I was greeted with a hug as we haven't been there for a while. Jenni gave me a scarf she bought in Israel, and Greg's present hasn't arrived yet (this week, I hope): a new computer. We also went out for dinner at a local Malaysian place (run by Malays, yay) and we will be back. NUM!

Cats (and another birthday)
Ashley is now three if you go by her notional have-a-stab-at-it birthday of 1 May. All three enjoyed tuna in celebration. She's asleep on our bed now but earlier she was dong her squeaky "chase me" act for Sebastian and they were rocketing all over the house. I do love the sound of little scampering paws. Sebastian fits in really well, playing with both cats. I have yet to see actual snuggling but this may yet happen. There will be photos of all three when I have my own computer again.
I wish he'd learn to use the cat door though. It has a magnet to stop it being blown open by the wind and he thinks it won't open when he feels the resistance. I've tied it open when I'm here, but that means he's effectively locked in at night and when I'm out which means I have to keep buying litter.

Teleporting
I am glad to see that China Mieville is with me on teleporting/beaming killing the person and copying them. Not that I choose to believe this happens in Star Trek or Blake's 7.

I'm sure there were other things but I can't think of them now.

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Happy belated birthday and all that. :-)

Thanks! It would have been better if it hadn't been raining the whole day.

A belated Happy Birthday to you!

Re: teleportation, I haven't read anything by China Mieville but I'm curious if you're aware that there was a film made a few years back which, though deceptively non-SF at first glance, actually uses that concept as a major plot point? I guess I can't name it now as if you haven't seen it that would be a major spoiler... But perhaps you know it?

One about magic by any chance? :-) If it was that one, they were making copies; the original survived and the copies eventually... didn't.

Yup, that's the one. :-) Though my impression was that the copies survived, as they were teleported (i.e. "constructed") some distance away while the original stayed in place and was dispatched via (for the film) more traditional means. Although uncertainty about this point certainly added to the creepiness... In any case, it appeals to my morbid side to imagine that this is the essential technology behind any teleportation process - only that the refined versions that we see in SF have been upgraded with the additional feature of discreetly getting rid of the bodies... >:-)

I was trying to be discreet in case I had the wrong film and you hadn't seen it, but yes, the copies were living but deliberately killed. Very creepy. The question though is whether they're real copies, the same person IOW, or copies that just think they are.

With teleportation, the basic idea is reduction to energy (or component atoms) and either reassembly to matter or reproduction from information sent at the other end. Either way the original is destroyed, so no way would I try it out. I had Vila decide in one PWB story that he'd only do it if he'd die anyway so he had nothing to lose, but I've toyed with the idea (but not written it) that the long series of copies of copies allowed errors to creep in affecting Avon and Vila in season 4.

Sorry. I thought you meant that it was the "original" that survived the process, making it a different case. :P

Hm, not sure I follow you on the precise difference between "real" vs. "not real" copies?

I agree with you that reduction to energy would of necessity be killing the original, but if the process is based on sending information instead (as I mostly imagine it), then that needn't be the case, would it? It would depend on whether the initial process of "scanning" the individual to obtain that information could be done non-destructively, without harming him or her - and I don't see why that couldn't be the case, as we're already assuming some pretty amazing technology for the reassembly etc. In that case, you'd end up with the same result as in the film, with both the original and the copy coexisting. However, since I think few people would be willing to face the complications of having multiple copies of themselves running around at the same time, I think a mechanism for getting rid of the original would be added pretty quickly if the project wasn't abandoned in horror first... So... essentially I'm agreeing with you? I just don't think all teleportation in itself would necessitate killing of the original; only that a "commercial" version would? (If that makes any sense?)

I'm not sure that it would bother me that much though, at least not provided that the killing of my original self was instant and un-traumatic (not as in the film!), and provided the risk of dangerous malfunctions was no greater than for any alternative means of transportation, like say, driving a car. I suppose because I see my "self" as a product of the continuity of my memories? As long as the "copy" is exactly the same as the original, I don't see a breach in that continuity? I would still exist. I suppose from that POV, losing your memory would be a scarier prospect.

I'd read that! :-) If the process is information based, then perhaps it has "backups" from each teleportation saved somewhere. That would provide us with a legitimate (well, almost) means of getting our original S1/S2 heroes back when the S4 versions become too depressing...