The concept of teleportation was originally developed during the Golden Age of 20th century science fiction literature by writers in need of a form of instantaneous disembodied transportation technology to support the plots of their stories

Teleportation has appeared in such SciFi literature classics as Algis Budry's Rogue Moon (Gold Medal Books, 1960), A. E. van Vogt's World of Null-A (Astounding Science Fiction, August 1945), and George Langelaan's The Fly (Playboy Magazine, June 1957). The Playboy Magazine short story led to a cottage industry of popular films decrying the horrors of scientific technology that exceeded mankind's wisdom: The Fly (1958), Return of the Fly (1959), Curse of the Fly (1965), The Fly (a 1986 remake), and The Fly II (1989). The teleportation concept has also appeared in episodes of popular television SciFi anthology series such as The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits. But the most widely recognized pop-culture awareness of the teleportation concept began with the numerous Strar Trek television and theatrical movie series of the past 39 years (beginning in 1964 with the first TV series pilot episode, The Cage), which are now an international entertainment and product franchise that was originally spawned by the late genius television writer-producer Gene Roddenberry. Because of Strar Trek everyone in the world is familiar with the 'transporter' device, which is used to teleport personnel and material from starship to starship or from ship to planet and vice versa at the speed of light. People or inanimate objects would be positioned on the transporter pad and become completely disintegrated by a beam with their atoms being patterned in a computer buffer and later converted into a beam that is directed toward the destination, and then reintegrated back into their original form (all without error!). 'Beam me up, Scotty' is a familiar automobile bumper sticker or cry of exasperation that were popularly adopted from the series.

However, the late Dr. Robert L. Forward (2001) stated that modern hard-core SciFi literature, with the exception of the ongoing Strar Trek franchise, has abandoned using the teleportation concept because writers believe that it has more to do with the realms of parapsychology/paranormal (a.k.a. psychic) and imaginative fantasy than with any realm of science. Beginning in the 1980s developments in quantum theory and general relativity physics have succeeded in pushing the envelope in exploring the reality of teleportation. A crescendo of scientific and popular literature appearing in the 1990s and as recently as 2003 has raised public awareness of the new technological possibilities offered by teleportation. As for the psychic aspect of teleportation, it became known to Dr. Forward and myself, along with several colleagues both inside and outside of government, that anomalous teleportation has been scientifically investigated and separately documented by the Department of Defense.

It has been recognized that extending the present research in quantum teleportation and developing alternative forms of teleportation physics would have a high payoff impact on communications and transportation technologies in the civilian and military sectors. It is the purpose of this study to explore the physics of teleportation and delineate its characteristics and performances, and to make recommendations for further studies in support of Air Force Advanced Concepts programs.

—Eric W. Davis, Teleportation Physics Study

The concept of teleportation was originally developed during the Golden Age of 20th century science fiction literature by writers in need of a form of instantaneous disembodied transportation technology to support the plots of their stories

Teleportation has appeared in such SciFi literature classics as Algis Budry's Rogue Moon (Gold Medal Books, 1960), A. E. van Vogt's World of Null-A (Astounding Science Fiction, August 1945), and George Langelaan's The Fly (Playboy Magazine, June 1957). The Playboy Magazine short story led to a cottage industry of popular films decrying the horrors of scientific technology that exceeded mankind's wisdom: The Fly (1958), Return of the Fly (1959), Curse of the Fly (1965), The Fly (a 1986 remake), and The Fly II (1989). The teleportation concept has also appeared in episodes of popular television SciFi anthology series such as The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits. But the most widely recognized pop-culture awareness of the teleportation concept began with the numerous Strar Trek television and theatrical movie series of the past 39 years (beginning in 1964 with the first TV series pilot episode, The Cage), which are now an international entertainment and product franchise that was originally spawned by the late genius television writer-producer Gene Roddenberry. Because of Strar Trek everyone in the world is familiar with the 'transporter' device, which is used to teleport personnel and material from starship to starship or from ship to planet and vice versa at the speed of light. People or inanimate objects would be positioned on the transporter pad and become completely disintegrated by a beam with their atoms being patterned in a computer buffer and later converted into a beam that is directed toward the destination, and then reintegrated back into their original form (all without error!). 'Beam me up, Scotty' is a familiar automobile bumper sticker or cry of exasperation that were popularly adopted from the series.

However, the late Dr. Robert L. Forward (2001) stated that modern hard-core SciFi literature, with the exception of the ongoing Strar Trek franchise, has abandoned using the teleportation concept because writers believe that it has more to do with the realms of parapsychology/paranormal (a.k.a. psychic) and imaginative fantasy than with any realm of science. Beginning in the 1980s developments in quantum theory and general relativity physics have succeeded in pushing the envelope in exploring the reality of teleportation. A crescendo of scientific and popular literature appearing in the 1990s and as recently as 2003 has raised public awareness of the new technological possibilities offered by teleportation. As for the psychic aspect of teleportation, it became known to Dr. Forward and myself, along with several colleagues both inside and outside of government, that anomalous teleportation has been scientifically investigated and separately documented by the Department of Defense.

It has been recognized that extending the present research in quantum teleportation and developing alternative forms of teleportation physics would have a high payoff impact on communications and transportation technologies in the civilian and military sectors. It is the purpose of this study to explore the physics of teleportation and delineate its characteristics and performances, and to make recommendations for further studies in support of Air Force Advanced Concepts programs.

—Eric W. Davis, Teleportation Physics Study

And this, too, is not magic as the credulous call it;—as I have so often said before, magic (or science that violates Nature) exists not;—it is but the science by which Nature can be controlled. Now, in space there are millions of beings, not literally spiritual, for they have all, like the animalcula unseen by the naked eye, certain forms of matter, though matter so delicate, air-drawn, and subtle, that it is, as it were, but a film, a gossamer that clothes the spirit. Hence the Rosicrucian's lovely phantoms of sylph and gnome. Yet, in truth, these races and tribes differ more widely, each from each, than the Calmuck from the Greek—differ in attributes and powers. . . . He who would establish intercourse with these varying beings, resembles the traveller who would penetrate into unknown lands. He is exposed to strange dangers and unconjectured terrors. That intercourse once gained I cannot secure thee from the chances to which thy journey is exposed. I cannot direct thee to paths free from the wanderings of the deadliest foes. Thou must alone, and of thyself, face and hazard all. . . . Amidst the dwellers of the threshold is ONE, too, surpassing in malignity and hatred all her tribe—one whose eyes have paralyzed the bravest, and whose power increases over the spirit precisely in proportion to its fear. Does thy courage falter?

—Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Zanoni: a Rosicrucian Tale

The key to the above incompleteness argument is that one can, by measurement of an observable of particle 2, predict with certainty the result of any measurement of a particular observable of particle 1. In his presentation of the EPR incompleteness argument (which concerns position and momentum) Schrödinger uses a colorful analogy to make the situation clear. He imagines particles 1 and 2 as being a student and his instructor. The measurement of particle 2 corresponds to the instructor consulting a textbook to check the answer to an examination question, and the measurement of particle 1 to the response the student gives to this question. Since he always gives the correct answer, i.e., the same as that in the instructor's textbook, the student must have known the answer beforehand. Schrödinger presents the situation as follows: (emphasis by original author)

Let us focus attention on the system labeled with small letters p, q and call it for brevity the 'small' system. Then things stand as follows. I can direct one of two questions to the small system, either that about q or that about p. Before doing so I can, if I choose, procure the answer to one of these questions by a measurement on the fully separated other system (which we shall regard as auxiliary apparatus), or I may take care of this afterwards. My small system, like a schoolboy under examination, cannot possibly know whether I have done this or for which questions, or whether or for which I intend to do it later. From arbitrarily many pretrials I know that the pupil will correctly answer the first question I put to him. From that it follows that in every case, he knows the answer to both questions. . . . No school principal would judge otherwise . . . He would not come to think that his, the teacher's, consulting a textbook first suggests to the pupil the correct answer, or even, in the cases when the teacher chooses to consult it only after ensuing answers from the pupil, that the pupil's answer has changed the text of the notebook in the pupil's favor.

—Douglas L. Hemmick, Hidden Variables and Nonlocality in Quantum Mechanics (dissertation, .pdf)