Transporters

[cellio]

This question stolen from browngirl (who got it from someone else):

Let's say I had access to a Star-Trek-style transporter. Limited range; can't use it for interplanetary travel. Can move me and anything I can carry, eg change of clothes. Each time I got zapped to a new location, it'd cost me twenty bucks. What would I do with it?

I don't know whether to laugh or cry about the following. My first reaction was: halachically, could I travel east immediately after Shabbat? :-) In other words, if it's not Shabbat any more where I am, but it will be where I'm going, is it permissible to use the transporter?

That question aside, I would use this device to visit the friends it's impractical for me to visit now. An evening with Lee and Barry in LA, or with Harold and Becky in DC? Sure, no problem. Pop in to Boston to visit folks there? Yup. Convention in Europe? No problem. Pop out some evening to, oh, Australia to watch sunrises over the Pacific? Sounds nifty. If the space station is in range, I'd love to go there and get a different perspective on our planet. And, yeah, Simchat Torah in Israel, at least once.

Sight-seeing -- in small, managable doses -- would probably be pretty high on the list. Such a device would also fundamentally change the nature of tourism in one way: when there's breaking news of something interesting happening in a distant place, there would suddenly be lots of people popping in to see for themselves. This would probably not be good overall; while some of us would go to see the perfect eclipse or a shuttle launch or whatever, lots of folks would go to gawk at disasters. Not my idea of entertainment. (Of course, the technology could also be used to deliver immediate aid.)

Comments

Travel and Shabbat (slightly off-topic)

[dagonell.livejournal.com]

I would have thought the Shabbat question would have been covered already. Can you fly east on an airplane after Shabbat? If you cross the IDL, it's Shabbat again. This has never been discussed? Actually your response brought up a different issue in my mind. What is Shabbat onboard a space station? With the right orbit, you could have a sunset every four hours. For that matter, what is Shabbat at the Antartic Research Base? Sunset is once every six months.

Re: Travel and Shabbat (slightly off-topic)

[cellio]

Well, the Shabbat question would depend on mechanics, in part. (Actually, goljerp, I would say forbidden and start with "boneh" ("building"), because the transporter involves reconstructing you.) With planes or cars, for example, the argument doesn't get very far because there's concensus on combustion engines being a problem (fire). Suppose you take that away? Some permit electricity (otherwise) and some don't, so you'd uncover the next layer of issues.

There is halacha on how to treat time -- other than Shabbat -- when crossing the date line. For example, how many nights do you light Chanukah candles?

The space station and Antartica have similar answers: you don't rely on local solar time when that's meaningless, but instead use an external point of reference, the time used by the "nearest Jewish community". So for Antartica that'd be some point in Australia or perhaps South America (depending on where you are); for the space station there are actually three opinions: your home city, the city of departure (e.g. Houston or Miami), or Jerusalem (arguably a planetary default).

Re: Travel and Shabbat (slightly off-topic)

[cellio]

Oh right -- and there is also halacha, though I don't know what it is, for the case where you're, say, on a cruise ship -- multi-day journey that crosses time zones and the date line. I don't know if anyone has considered faster forms of transportation; it's pretty much impossible for anyone relying on commercial airlines to begin a journey after Shabbat and arrive anywhere while it's still Shabbat. :-)

I suppose the question exists now for driving: if I wait until Shabbat just ends, hop in my car, and drive due east at a high rate of speed to visit friends for whom Shabbat has not yet ended, is that a problem?

Re: Travel and Shabbat (slightly off-topic)

[goljerp]

Hmm... I think you'd have to be travelling pretty quickly for this to be a problem, which makes it forbidden for reasons of Pikuah Ha Nefesh (to save a life) and the rabbinic ruling that you have to follow the laws of the land. (For those keeping track at home: remember that the end of shabbat is pegged essentially to seeing 3 stars in the sky; this is less finely granular than sunset is. As far as the beginning of Shabbat, I think that someone did consider what happens if you live in a valley and walk up so that the sun un-sets. Alas, I don't remember what the ruling was.)

Re: Travel and Shabbat (slightly off-topic)

[cellio]

I was assuming (without doing the math) that points far enough north or south would permit faster transitions (without violating local speed laws, which might not be present anyway). If you prefer, postulate a private jet ready to take off as soon as you spot the 3 stars and hop aboard.

Re: Travel and Shabbat (slightly off-topic)

[goljerp]

I was assuming (without doing the math) that points far enough north or south would permit faster transitions

Ah. I was assuming we were talking about places somewhere around our latitude.

There's probably an ideal latitude for this trick; if you go too far North then you run into the problems with midnight sun / no sun.