Transporting, a la Star Trek, has always fascinated me. The idea of beaming from the ship to the surface seems so much simpler than sending a powered capsule.
Some have suggested there were dangers to transporting, but the stars of Star Trek never turned into raccoons or other incomplete beings, so it must be safe. The Heisenberg compensators took care of everything. *
Recently, I wished Scotty had brought his transporter to a hotel where I attended a conference.
I checked in at the front lobby (main floor) and then walked up a ramp to the elevators. My room was on the second floor, and I was confused because it seemed like the ramp had already taken me to the second floor, but no.
Others waiting at the elevator explained that you had to press the down-button to go to the second floor. We took their advice, selected DOWN outside, and pressed TWO inside. Zip, we arrived at the second floor.
We got back to the conference on the main floor by pressing ONE in the elevator and being deposited at the top of the ramp. So the top of the ramp was ONE. Later, when we returned to our rooms, we stood at the elevator at the top of the ramp and pushed UP for our room.
You think this makes sense, huh?
Not so much. We went to the top of the building and then back down to the second floor.
On our next attempt to go to our second-floor rooms, we spotted an elevator at the bottom of the ramp. With no line. We got in. It didn’t go up at all. Just down.
Later, I got in the main elevator alone. A friendly woman stood in front of the floor buttons and asked, “What floor?”
“I don’t even know anymore.”
That’s when I wished Scotty had joined our conference.
*The fictional Heisenberg compensators solve quantum uncertainty through exact tracking of particles. It answers the problem of technical impossibility in real-world physics. When Mike Okuda, a technical consultant, was asked by Time magazine how the compensators work, he answered, “It works very well, thank you.”