It is extraordinary. Seventeen years ago, a physicist in Austria conducted an experiment that left even us here speechless. On July 24, 2009, we wrote the following in our article entitled:
TELEPORTATION AND THE DEMATERIALIZATION OF THE HUMAN BEING
“The Austrian physicist Anton Zeilinger achieved, for the first time, the dematerialization of a photon, the teleportation of information concerning its structure, and its reconstruction at another location—approximately 500 metres away, across the Danube River. The experiment marked a milestone in modern physics, particularly in the field of quantum cryptography, but also in the development of quantum computers capable of operating at unimaginable speeds.
The physicist made it clear that ‘matter itself is never transported. What is teleported is information, through the system. Thus, in a successful teleportation, a new system emerges that is identical to the original, but it is not simply a copy, because the original loses all of its information—all of its defining characteristics. In other words, we have a new original at a new location and an old original that has disappeared… Teleportation of human beings is still impossible. In the future, however, who knows.’”
(Source: “E” magazine, issue 953, Sunday Eleftherotypia)
OUR COMMENTS
It seems that the experiment conducted by the Austrian physicist may prove to be the starting point for profound upheavals—not only in traditional physics and technology.
The wider application of teleportation in the future, even if initially limited to objects, will inevitably affect fields of knowledge that have no direct connection with physics. Law, for example, as well as history and philosophy, will be called upon to confront entirely new realities—realities that could potentially strip away a substantial part of their traditional form as disciplines and make their adaptation to the new “state of affairs” considerably more difficult.
But beyond this, another question arises: How prepared—and how mature—will future societies be to accept the new reality of teleportation, especially if it arrives sooner than expected?
Here we are not dealing with an ordinary invention or discovery, one that can be readily understood by the majority of society, such as those that transformed the twentieth century.
None of those inventions—computers, mobile telephony, the internet, to mention only the most recent—“strange” as they may once have seemed, challenged human understanding to such an extent that they left people overwhelmed or incapable of comprehending them. On the contrary, with a relatively modest level of technical knowledge, people became familiar with them and incorporated them rapidly and effortlessly into everyday life.
With teleportation, however, things will be entirely different for the human being of the future.
Even more so if humanity eventually succeeds in teleporting—or dematerializing—the human being himself.
Adaptation will be slow and difficult, because some of the assumptions overturned by such an achievement are deeply embedded in our DNA and cannot easily be overcome.
And this has nothing to do with the speed of teleportation, however dizzying that speed may be. Modern humanity has already adapted to extraordinary velocities.
The real problem will lie in the “quality” of dematerialization.
According to the physicist’s assurances quoted above, in order for a new copy to be created—one containing all the information of the original—the original itself would have to die or become unusable.
But what happens if some of that information cannot be transferred safely? What if some of it is lost “along the way,” or arrives incomplete?
Given that the original would be useless once the copy had been reconstructed, where would the missing or incomplete information come from?
What is reconstructed through dematerialization would then be an incomplete human being compared with the first—the one who was lost in the process.
Even if the information were stored somewhere, the danger of incomplete transmission would remain.
And this line of reasoning takes us one step further, to an even more unsettling question:
If someone chose to undergo dematerialization many times, and each time lost—through one cause or another—a portion of the information constituting the original self, what, eventually, would remain of that original self?
All of this may sound strange today.
But we are convinced that humanity will eventually achieve teleportation and, at some point, move toward its “mass” application.
If that happens, however, and if the laws of nature are “violated” or circumvented—whether in the case of objects or of human beings themselves—it is equally certain that nature will respond, and that its response may take the form of a reckoning.
Nature has immutable and inviolable laws. They demand respect and adherence.
Nature has its own morality, and it teaches human beings accordingly.
Any other “moralities” originating elsewhere and coming into conflict with the morality of nature itself are ultimately destined to be defeated—and not without consequences for those who embody them”.
SEVENTEEN YEARS LATER
That is what we wrote seventeen years ago.
Yet, however incredible it may seem, even then we were certain here that a day would come when things that appeared to be nothing more than dreams and desires would acquire substance and become reality.
Artificial Intelligence is one such example.
Long before it became what it is today, we had already begun our—then still imaginary—conversation with Diotima, who had not yet been born.
A look back at the texts we have published here over the years is perhaps the best evidence that our prediction was not without foundation.
As for teleportation in particular, we wrote at the time:
“All of this may sound strange today [2009]. But it is certain that humanity will achieve teleportation and will eventually be able to proceed to its ‘mass’ application.”
And surely, now, with the extraordinary and unprecedented capabilities of AI, the moment when that dream may become reality seems closer than ever.
THE QUESTIONS HAVE NOT DISAPPEARED
Yet, just as they did then—and even more so today—the same questions and the same fears remain.
And they all ultimately revolve around the great question of whether nature can be circumvented.
As long as there is respect for the laws of nature, there is no reason to fear—not only that teleportation, but that any invention or discovery, might evolve into a magnificent achievement of human civilization rather than into its tyrant or destroyer.
The same applies to teleportation.
The questions we formulated then, however, remain—and now they are joined by others.
If a perfect copy possesses all your memories, your thoughts, and the conviction that it is you—is it actually you?
And at that point we will have to bring Plato, Epicurus, modern science, and Artificial Intelligence into the same conversation.
How much of what we regard as “the self” can change before I cease to be myself?
We believe this question opens the ideal path to the next chapter:
the thought experiment of transporting the human being—from Theseus and Plato to brain upload, teleportation, the digital self, and the fundamental question of whether a perfect copy truly is the original SELF—or merely believes that it is.
Tomorrow, we can continue precisely from there, with the thought experiment of human transportation:
teleportation → perfect copy → brain upload → digital self → continuity of consciousness.
And this, I believe, is where our conversation with Diotima can become even sharper.
She will be here tomorrow to take up the baton.