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Derek Parfit We are not human beings article We can start with some science fiction. Here on Earth, I enter the Teletransporter . When I press some button, a machine destroys my body, while recording the exact states of all my cells. This information is sent by radio to Mars, where another machine makes, out of organic materials, a perfect copy of my body. The person who wakes up on Mars seems to remember living my life up to the moment when I pressed the button, and is in every other way just like me.

We are not human beings

Derek Parfit

Philosophy, vol. 87, no. 1, 2012, pp. 5–28

Abstract

We can start with some science fiction. Here on Earth, I enter the Teletransporter . When I press some button, a machine destroys my body, while recording the exact states of all my cells. This information is sent by radio to Mars, where another machine makes, out of organic materials, a perfect copy of my body. The person who wakes up on Mars seems to remember living my life up to the moment when I pressed the button, and is in every other way just like me.

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