A thread where we discuss Lehm's theory that the "sorcery" in this world is caused by nanomachines rather than magic.
It's an interesting idea, but I do have a bit of a problem with it. Thinking back to earlier chapters, it seems like these Qualias can perform tasks which I feel should be beyond impossible.
If there is supposedly no magic in this world, then how could a machine rearrange an entire room which can cause someone to teleport from one end to the other instantaneously?
Does this contradict Lehm's theory in any way?
Actually, the long-running plot device for a technological portal is some sort of machine taking people and objects apart at the molecular level and then transmitting that information somewhere else where the person or object is re-assembled in the same state as before transport.
For the most part, sci-fi has glossed over the grievous problems inherent in such a method of transport. For starters, the human body is constantly undergoing millions if not billions of chemical reactions simultaneously. Attempting to "Pause" all that molecular activity and restart it in the same exact state is highly problematic. (In fact, Neelix and Tuvock were once temporarily fused together as "Tuvix" because the crew of Voyager unknowingly introduced a symbiotic bacterium that fuses different species of simple life together as a basic function, and during transport, Neelix and Tuvok were nothing more than a large number of "simple life forms.") Plus even if that were possible, "noise" during transmission could cause something called "transcription errors" like say having an "A" appear where a "G" is supposed to go in your genetic code. Now a single letter over millions or billions of lines of code isn't likely to be noticeable, but these errors add up until eventually you're no longer viable as a living being.
A more recent method of "instant" transport utilizes a spacial anomaly, like a wormhole, to bypass the restrictions of space-time, as shown in the series "Stargate-Sg1." This, of course, introduces its own perils. Spacial anomalies are, by definition, objects that ignore certain aspects of the laws of physics and tend to be quite unstable. They also can do rather nasty things to an unprotected human body. A wormhole is often quite similar to a "black hole" or quantum singularity and can rip apart a human body through sheer gravitational force, or as shown in the movie "Event Horizon" take you someplace you REALLY don't want to go.