"The Fly" and the Essence of Self

Science fiction as I understand it is when you answer a “what-if” question and follow it through its consequences on society. In The Fly, the question asked is “What if human beings can teleport?” The answer explored in the movie is that while at its best the technology is convenient, the invariables associated with the technology are too dangerous to consider. In short, you never know if something will come out on the other side, or, if it does, what. But there is a much greater issue at hand with transportation not addressed in the movie. It all boils down to the fact that your body technically dies. To understand this, one must look at the hypothetical physics behind teleportation.

The standard science fiction teleportation device consists of two parts, the entrance portal and the exit portal. When a subject enters the entrance portal, every single atom in there body is identified and their information is sent to the exit portal. The exit portal, using the information sent by the entrance portal, constructs matter by rearranging the atoms in that area. The matter itself is not sent, only the information on how to replicate it with existing substances on the other end. It is like a matter fax machine. However, unlike a fax machine, the original is destroyed in the process. Yup, completely disintegrated. Technically, your body dies in the entrance portal, and a completely new body reappears on the other side. I have been careful to say that it is your body that dies, because I do not believe that you, your self, dies. This is where my roommate and I disagree. We got into a heated debate on whether or not “you” die, what “you” is, and if would use the transporter.

I understand that your body does not actually teleport from one space to another. That point is clear. My roommate thinks that because your body disintegrates, you die. That is on the supposition that your body is the essence of you. If transportation works like it theoretically should, your consciousness, your thoughts, your memory, your personality—everything, is transported. It is the concept of a thing that make it a thing, not its physical properties. Physical properties (the only thing truly lost in the disintegration process of transportation) change all the time: skin cells die off and are replaced. The hair you have now is not the same hair you had two years ago. If you look back at old photos of yourself, you could say “My hair was longer/shorter then.” In reality, your hair did not exist back then, it was a completely different set of molecules, but it is essentially still “your hair.”

Let’s dissect this even further; say your arms got cut off and were replaced. You’d still be you. Now what if they replaced them with exact DNA replicas of your old arms? You’d still be you. Now, what if they replaced more than just your arms? What if they replaced every single part of your body? It’s a more extreme case, but the same thing. Furthermore, what if they did this instantaneously, with all your new body parts constructed elsewhere while your old ones disintegrated in the blink of an eye? You’d still be you. That is exactly what transportation would do.

My roommate insists that transportation is death and that he wouldn’t want to die. Death is as death does. As we understand it in our day and age, death is loss. It’s separation, mourning, emptiness, a change in others’ lives. These are the reasons we don’t want to die. If these don’t occur, why would it matter if you “died” in the transportation process? If someone were to say that they were going to cut off your arm, but it was going to be replaced right away with an exact copy, you wouldn’t feel an ounce of pain, there wouldn’t be permanent scars, and that neither you nor anybody else could even remember the event, what would be the problem? Technically, you have a completely new arm, but what does that mean if there’s no change? This is why I don’t have a problem with “dying” during the transportation process.

"The Pit" is Shit

Wow. I truly did not like Quatermass and the Pit. What made it so bad was that it started out so promising. I was truly intrigued for the first half of the movie. When it didn’t pan out how I wanted, it left me betrayed and depressed. And it wasn’t solely the fact that it had a different ending than I expected; it was the fact that it could have been about something that it completely was not. I foresaw a cutting edge theory about the origin of species through spermatozoa and instead got some half-assed conspiracy about cricket aliens and the Devil.

The movie started out with the discovery of primitive primate skulls. Obviously, the movie would explore the origin of humans. Science versus military, progressive theories, and mysteries of the universe were paths down which I was about to embark. Then, they discovered a space ship! Sweet!, I thought, They’re going to bring up the idea of spermatozoa! Would this old film suggest, way before it was accepted as a plausible theory, the idea that human beings were a extraterrestrial species that found its way to Earth? It seemed so. The primate skulls found in the same underground resting place as a spaceship could mean either that human being were once aliens finding refuge on Earth or that we were brought here by some alien species. As the movie slowly developed, it took a slow turn away from a better ending. It turned into a spooky mystery film about a town plagued by weird alien ghosts. Odd, but still promising. Then, the scientists found giant crickets in the crystals and the whole thing went to hell. Sometime between the unnecessarily long underground windstorms and the poorly constructed cricket alien army dream, I lost interest in and hope for the film. The film even seemed to give up on itself, replacing intriguing scenarios and dialogue with goofy effects and poor editing. By the time the giant devil cricket cloud was destroyed by a crane, I was far past the state of apathy, itching to bolt the theater. Not only did I dislike the film, I was mad at it for starting out like it was going to be something better. It had potential and did not succeed. I felt like a football coach watching his talented group of athletes lose game after game to turnovers and inconsistency. I felt like a father watching his son become a high school drop out instead of a hard-working student. I was very disappointed in this film.

What's Timeless About "Body Snatchers"?

One thing I like about watching old movies is thinking about what they would do to remake them for a newer audience. This thought arises because Invasion of the Body Snatchers was, upon creation, a frightening movie but has since veered far from the genre of horror. The way in which the film was shot has since become cliché and commonplace, techniques used by parody films. With zooms to close-ups, action-stopping screams, and daunting music, it was hard not to laugh at moments that were supposed to be scary. We have seen all these techniques so many times that the original films have lost their magic. This is probably why old movies, like this one for example, have suffered so many remakes and adaptations. The formula is still good, but the means through which to deliver it is outdated and needs to change in face of a new crowd.

However, despite the loss of the surface layer horror, one thing about Invasion of the Body Snatchers still remains frightening. The horror element comes not from the mysterious aliens, but rather the loss of one’s own identity. Your identity is as important to you as life itself for without it, you do not exist. Invasion shows that identity is not physical; it is not appearance, not your voice, not even your mannerisms. Those can all be reproduced to a certain extent—and apparently perfectly so in the diegetic world of Invasion. Reproducing these physical properties—even to the smallest detail—does not replicate your identity. “I don’t know what to call it,” says one character of her uncle’s replication, “it’s just not him.” It is terrifying to lose your identity, or for those around you to do so. Despite the cinematic techniques losing their ability to scare a modern audience, the idea of losing one’s identity resonates deeply enough to frighten a timeless audience.