Level One Diagnostic: Transporter Issues, Redux

Every time anyone mentions the possible invention of a teleportation device, the same issues arise and they are never really resolved.

A primary issue is the "Information-based transporter dematerialization = Death" rule, as described in a recent article of mine:

(Excerpt from an earlier article of mine (not published here)):

Dematerializing in an information-transmitting transporter = Killing. Permanently. No resurrection, no nothing. Killing, as in final death.

The only exception to the dematerializing=death rule is if exactly the same physical material is physically beamed from origin to destination. Otherwise, what results is simply an exact copy of the original who only believes he is the original. The original, the instant he is dematerialized, is actually and permanently dead -- his consciousness permanently terminates when he is dematerializes, since consciousness is attached to the specific, exact physical matter which supports it.

The consciousness of the person at the destination who is assembled from information beamed from the origin has consciousness, but it is a different consciousness that merely believes (mistakenly) that it is the original consciousness.

As I said, the only exception is if the physical matter is actually beamed. Not mere information. Mere information is absolutely insufficient.

Think of the information-based transporter as a fax machine in which the original paper you trying to fax is destroyed by the fax machine. The fax may be successful, but what results at the other end is only a faxed copy -- not the original. (If you set it that it doesn't dematerialize (destroy) the individual at the origin, but merely scans him and sends the information to the destination point for assembly, the original remains -- just as in a real fax machine.)

So, if YOU step inside an information-based transporter, and YOU are dematerialized, then YOU die. Period. You die permanently -- you don't "wake up" at the destination point.

(End of Excerpt)

So, here's my problem: If someone were eventually to invent a real transporter, but one that only sends information from origin to destination, how can we possibly confirm that my conclusion above is true or not true?

We could try to ask the unlucky test subject after he rematerializes, but he wouldn't really know, because his consciousness would fool him into thinking that he was the original, when he was not! So how can we solve the problem of testing the truth of this conclusion?

One solution might be to merely scan the test subject, and not actually dematerialize him, and then send the information to the destination to materialize "him" at the destination, but what if that's not possible?