this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2026
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A distinction between a teleporter and a transporter...
To teleport implies the original matter is instantly moved from one place to another so there would be no destruction and reconstituted copy. A wormhole would seem to be the only realistic way that could be achieved.
A transporter, well that means copy then kill. No one knows if the kill part is painful because noone survives it. I find it funny Riker's copy is actually the "original" and his lack of death is considered a transporter accident. Yet he is the one treated like the copy...
And all that said, barclay's experience in the transporter beam is more suggestive of a wormhole style device.
I don't know why I bothered to write all this out...
Iirc Thomas is not Will’s copy. Basically the transporter has a malfunction where Thomas and Will are both constituted on a transporter pad. So both are the “original” and also both are neither. In a sense, the William Thomas Riker who stepped onto that pad that day ceased to be, forked into two different lives.
I used to use this episode to talk about identity when I taught ethics back in the day. Both men carried on their lives under the belief that they were the same man who stepped onto a transporter pad on Nervala IV. Their experiences defined who they were, demonstrating that it’s more than biological material that makes any one of us us.
Now the deeper question is: since you can’t add matter to the universe, what’s missing to give life to two Rikers?
The energy that was used in the original teleportation. I didn’t think it was that deep, it used more energy to reconstitute more matter.
Sounds like trek had the technology to copy people. You would think if they are sending people out into the unknown to explore galaxies light years away they would just send a copy. Or at least keep a copy.
I wonder what earth piccard would be up to...
Just copy Data everywhere.
You know what, now that your mention it, wasn't the explanation that the signal was reflected back to the surface due to the ionising radiation of something, so the beam was kinda split or doubled. So my premise was wrong.
Yeah. They tried to split the beam to account for the radiation, half of it made it through, the other half mirrored back. I'm guessing the computer can extrapolate the remaining matter based off of data saved in the pattern buffer?
Either way, Thomas Riker was way under-utilized in Star Trek. I also love how "okay, sure" everyone is about this situation.
Someone needs to. At least you put thought into it.
A transporter is just Jason Statham in a suit. SCNR
To transport just means to move, so if anything the term "transporter" implies physically moving people rather than copying. The term "teleport" is the more ambiguous one...
The are other methods from Star Trek that could potentially be size as well.
Like "hey you actually travel through this other dimension where your physical form is undisturbed and no time passes in this dimension"
Which sounds ok, but "by the way it's kinda a hell-dimension and your consciousness gets tortured for a distance-relative time there but won't retain the memories after..."
Stop giving your time to corporations! W this, T that. They have played us for absolute fools, there is no need for economy class.
Seize the means of eldritchticity production comrade, don't believe any nonsense about colors. The trains are always on time under the F co-op too.
Oh dear lord. Yeah I could definitely see a variant where the hell dimension is just "work all the hours that it would have taken to traverse in normal space so that EvilCorp can generate profit for the pan-dimensional empire"
I’m glad you did.
Well, no, "transporter" means the first one, because that's how they're explained to work where they're called transporters.
They both got converted into energy, Thomas is just as much a copy as Will. Also, apparently your experience is constant across the process, as seen by Barclay grabbing someone out of the matter stream. Presumably someone would notice if it hurt...
Must do wonders for his self worth! 😄
Now I understand why such and such movie about magicians calls the trick "the transported man".
Isn't Tom just another copy? He came out of the pattern buffer the same as Will iirc.
no matter what, they were like 1000th generation of copies. "the original" died when riker stepped into the transporter for the first time. so discussing whether this one is 1001st, or 1002nd generation seems not that exciting...