This is the reason I don’t like materialization/dematerialization transporters. Not only do they have the risk of coordinate failure like in the meme, but also:
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The person on the other side isn’t guaranteed to be the same person when rematerialized. There’s the ontological argument that when you’re dematerialized, you die as your physical form is eliminated and that the person appearing on the other side is merely a clone of you, but not you.
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Alien interference or environmental contamination can mess up the person on rematerialization. Even small changes can alter the delicate brain chemistry we meatbags have.
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Being stuck in the ship’s memory buffer while it verifies an open teleporter slot can’t be very fun or comfortable.
This is why I only support non-dematerializing wormhole based travel where spacetime itself opens for you to enter. Less chance of mistakes.
The Transporter of Theseus
As most of the human cells die and get replaced within a few years, humans are already beings of Theseus.
Roughly every 7 years for most of the body, major organs tend to take longer, more like 10. Your brain replaces cells at a way slower rate, you’ll only Theseus your brain about 80% at best if you live a long healthy life.
Yeah, there is a wide spread in distribution. Some blood cells, skin epithelium and some gastric cells only live for a few days.
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