The Economist (US), August 19th, 1989
Towards the 3D fax
Solid geometry
PHILOSOPHERS are fond of asking what would happen if you faxed people instead of bits of paper. Suppose you could "scan" a person's body atom by atom, store the information, destroy the original body, and transmit the information to another machine. Suppose the receiving machine could reassemble atoms according to the transmitted pattern. Would you have faxed the person or just a copy? If the "copy" had all your memories (including, presumably, the belief that he was you) and if he was the only claimant to your identity, some would say that you yourself ha...
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