Teleportation and its Implications for the Human Race

Teleportation and wormholes have had a large presence in American film and literature. Often, the outlets that incorporate these ideas are associated with space or time travel as well. These futuristic pieces seem to create the idea that these concepts are far from reality or will take centuries to develop. However, teleportation has been traced far beyond recent times. The New Testament and Quran both mentioned teleportation, especially in regards to large bodies of water. The idea that someone was able to teleport across water leaves an impression of holiness or advancing beyond the human race. In modern film, we now see a slight shift in the theme of instantaneous travel. Rather than being associated with religion, time travel is more connected to the human desire to explore the universe efficiently and safely.

The idea of teleportation brought about discussion on many phenomena such as quantum teleportation, multiple dimensions, and wormhole teleportation. Although these seem abstract, some scientific concepts suggest that they may actually be possible. According to previous research, quantum teleportation seems to be one of the most feasible of the teleportation techniques. Quantum teleportation involves making a duplicate copy of a quantum state in another location so that it would appear to travel instantly. Although the procedure for quantum teleportation is quite clear, there are still a few problems to be addressed before we can use this technique. These problems include making simultaneous measurements and destroying the original copy. In fact, this process has been demonstrated in scientific laboratories by teleporting single particles and photons. Scientist Eugene Polzik was even able to teleport an atomic system with 10¹² atoms half a meter away in 2006.

In addition, discussion of general relativity has led some to believe that teleportation via other dimensions is possible as well. As a result, they have conjectured that shadow matter may be able to exist in addition to normal matter in the hidden dimensions. This means that hidden dimensions may allow for the existence of parallel universes that one can teleport to by changing from normal to shadow matter. Einstein’s research in 1935 also gave way to the concept of wormholes. He found that general relativity has solutions involving curve space objects connecting different regions of space-time to each other, which are now called “wormholes”. Afterwards, other researchers investigated the stability of wormholes and found that they could be stable if converted into time machines by connecting one time to another in the same physical location. In addition, conservation laws suggest that an object of equal mass must pass through the opposite direction to avoid the wormhole exploding.

Although dimension and wormhole physics are still underdeveloped theories, experiments with quantum teleportation suggest that it is a very possible development. Although able to work on particles, scientists still have a lot of work before they are able to teleport humans. The biggest issues that need to be addressed before teleportation on humans can initiate are preserving human characteristics and keeping with conservation laws. Currently, they might seem impossible to overcome, but hopefully humans will be able to teleport in the upcoming centuries.

Sources:

“All About Teleportation” by John G. Cramer (2008) – published by Analog Science Fiction & Fact

- Shreya Punya