Introduction

Suppose you have always wanted to travel to Paris but could never afford the trip from New York. And suppose that now a new company, 15-Minute Travel, is offering to send you with their super-high-tech “transporter” machine. Here's how the transporter machine works. You step into a ­fancy-looking booth in New York and, once you are ready to go, you press a green button marked “Paris”. You are then scanned by a device that records the exact position, nature, and velocity of every subatomic particle in your body. This information – your “personal blueprint” – is then recorded on a zirconium microchip. At the same time, your body is disassembled, and the resulting subatomic particles are rearranged, so that they make up a small quantity of “transport dust” – a dense but compact and virtually undamagable ashlike substance. Next, the transport dust and the zirconium chip are safely sealed inside a small cylinder, like the canisters used by drive-through banks, and the cylinder then travels through a special underground tube, powered by electromagnetic technology, at speeds exceeding 10,000 miles per hour. The cylinder arrives at the company's terminal in Paris in less than fifteen minutes and, once it is safely ensconced in a booth just like the one in New York, the transport dust is rearranged, in precise accordance with your personal blueprint. You then emerge from the booth in Paris, feeling as if the whole experience has taken no time at all.