# The Door Into....? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 7, 2008, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504 "2008-07-07T01:09:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Gukumatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/74df32/32.png) [@Gukumatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gukumatz)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2008, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/61 "2008-07-08T06:40:35Z")
Why does this topic make me imagined hundreds of beleagued Magpies distracted by something shiny? I’d stay on this side. Plenty of adventures and challenges in my life already. ---
**Author:** ![maggenpye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecc23a/32.png) [@maggenpye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/maggenpye)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2008, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/62 "2008-07-08T06:51:50Z")
Hey! I resent - ooh, shiny! ---
**Author:** ![meenie7](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7993a0/32.png) [@meenie7](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/meenie7)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2008, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/63 "2008-07-08T08:14:36Z")
[QUOTE=Czarcasm] For all those looking for an “Option #3”, let me tell you that the game is rigged. No testing will tell you anything. Sticking your hand in to feel around will get you nothing. If you stick your head in only, you get to see grey mist. If you throw a rock(or anything else) in, you will not hear the result. The OP states that you may either step through or not. [/QUOTE] So is it a test of faith or something? I’m an atheist who’s severely afraid of heights…I don’t trust floors I can’t see. What’s in there? ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2008, 8:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/64 "2008-07-08T08:35:00Z")
[QUOTE=Czarcasm] For all those looking for an “Option #3”, let me tell you that the game is rigged. No testing will tell you anything. Sticking your hand in to feel around will get you nothing. If you stick your head in only, you get to see grey mist. If you throw a rock(or anything else) in, you will not hear the result. The OP states that you may either step through or not. [/QUOTE] OK… I _think_ (only if it happens for real will we know for sure) I would be insanely curious, but also desperately cautious. The caution would most likely win - preventing me from stepping through the magical door, then the frustrated curiosity would most likely drive me batty for the rest of my life. I have a family to think about. If that were not the case, I might react differently. ---
**Author:** ![bundykala](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@bundykala](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bundykala)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2008, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/65 "2008-07-08T09:44:58Z")
[QUOTE=Mangetout] OK… I _think_ (only if it happens for real will we know for sure) I would be insanely curious, but also desperately cautious. The caution would most likely win - preventing me from stepping through the magical door, then the frustrated curiosity would most likely drive me batty for the rest of my life. [/QUOTE] That’s pretty much my answer. I think it might be different if I was with someone though. Company can be very reassuring. Also, my initial reaction would be to assume it was a prank or a dream. I would tell everyone I know about this, of course. It would make a great anecdote. I think they’d all assume it was just another one of my hypothetical make-believe things though. But they’d play along, so it wouldn’t make a difference! Thinking of that, I wuv my friends and would not regret my (reluctant, but quite final) decision to play it safe. And while I’d go crazy with the curiosity, I’d most likely end up believing it was just a dream whether that was the case or not. ---
**Author:** ![legalsnugs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/45deac/32.png) [@legalsnugs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/legalsnugs)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2008, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/66 "2008-07-08T13:30:57Z")
If the powers that made the door appear wanted to trap you, wouldn’t they just throw a trap door under your feet as you were walking? Or one of those loops tied to a tree to yank you off your feet into the unknown? Why would “they” make you \*choose \*to walk through the door to your doom? I’d go through. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2008, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/67 "2008-07-09T01:44:56Z")
Check for towel, dive through. What the hell, you only die once! ---
**Author:** ![Kolga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e56c9b/32.png) [@Kolga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kolga)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2008, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/68 "2008-07-09T01:52:08Z")
I step through. I have no kids, and am currently not in a relationship. I love my job, but the school could find somebody else to teach my students. I’d definitely miss my (very wonderful) friends and my family (some of them, anyway). “Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable." (Sydney Smith) ---
**Author:** ![freekalette](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/50afbb/32.png) [@freekalette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/freekalette)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2008, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/69 "2008-07-09T14:48:44Z")
I’d go through it. Preferably I’d have my husband and kids with me at the time the door appears (which is likely, as I rarely have reason to go anywhere alone.) But the Not Knowing would drive me totally bonkers if I didn’t go, so I couldn’t resist stepping through. Are we ever gonna be told what’s over there? ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/70 "2008-07-10T03:21:03Z")
Errrr… **Czarcasm?** What about it, huh? Is it time to find out yet? What’s on the other side of the **door**? AAAAAAAAAACKKK! NO! IT CAN’T BE!!! 14 k of g in a fpd ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/71 "2008-07-10T03:37:53Z")
**brujaja** , don’t be ridiculous. [spoiler]Actually, it’s an instant matter transmitter with a range of about 10 light years. It will minutely analyze both your body and your consciousness, so that it can send plans to reconstruct you at the far end of the link. Then it will convert your body to energy. This process takes about 3 seconds, and is excrutiatingly agonizing. Sorry, anesthesia would interfere with getting good data for the imprints. Of course, even without that particular interference, it is my sad duty to inform you that the analysis process is not exact. With each transmission, minute errors are creeping into your mind and your body. If you’ve ever taken a video tape, and made a copy of the tape, then copied that copy through several more generations you’ll get an idea of what I’m talking about. Comparing a tenth generation VHS copy to the original will show a lot of errors in the copy, but they are both clearly meant to be the same thing. The problem is that our eventual destination is within the Lesser Magellanic Cloud, some 200,000 light years from here. Which means we’re looking at approximately 20,000 disintergration/reintergration iterations before we reach our destination… I no longer expect to be coherent, nor _alive_, once we get there.[/spoiler] (And I wish to point out that this outcome doesn’t require the assumption that the host of this little game wants to mess with the guinea pigs. So, it’s possible there may be _worse_ fates available.) ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/72 "2008-07-10T04:10:05Z")
Well, **OtakuLoki** , [Aaron Cometbus,](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cometbus) who writes my favorite zine ever in life, used to work at a copy shop. And he made the notorious & distinctive covers of said zine on the copy machines at work, exploiting the very effect of which you speak. The results were freaky in a lovely kind of way. And since I’m an **animist** , I fully expect myself to step out into the Lesser Magellanic cloud in much the same condition. No worries! ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/73 "2008-07-10T04:54:23Z")
[QUOTE=OtakuLoki] **brujaja** , don’t be ridiculous. [spoiler]Actually, it’s an instant matter transmitter with a range of about 10 light years. It will minutely analyze both your body and your consciousness, so that it can send plans to reconstruct you at the far end of the link. Then it will convert your body to energy. This process takes about 3 seconds, and is excrutiatingly agonizing. Sorry, anesthesia would interfere with getting good data for the imprints. Of course, even without that particular interference, it is my sad duty to inform you that the analysis process is not exact. With each transmission, minute errors are creeping into your mind and your body. If you’ve ever taken a video tape, and made a copy of the tape, then copied that copy through several more generations you’ll get an idea of what I’m talking about. Comparing a tenth generation VHS copy to the original will show a lot of errors in the copy, but they are both clearly meant to be the same thing. The problem is that our eventual destination is within the Lesser Magellanic Cloud, some 200,000 light years from here. Which means we’re looking at approximately 20,000 disintergration/reintergration iterations before we reach our destination… I no longer expect to be coherent, nor _alive_, once we get there.[/spoiler] (And I wish to point out that this outcome doesn’t require the assumption that the host of this little game wants to mess with the guinea pigs. So, it’s possible there may be _worse_ fates available.) [/QUOTE] Did you ever read Stephen King’s _The Jaunt_ ? THAT was worse. “Longer than you think, Dad ! Wanted to see ! I saw ! Longer than you think !” \< tears out eyes \> Or, for something more deliberately nefarious there’s the Gatekeepers from the webcomic I take my name from, _Schlock Mercenary_. They ran copies off of the people who used their gates that they found interesting and used brutal and fatal methods to extract useful information from them. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/74 "2008-07-10T04:59:46Z")
[QUOTE=freekalette] I’d go through it. Preferably I’d have my husband and kids with me at the time the door appears (which is likely, as I rarely have reason to go anywhere alone.) But the Not Knowing would drive me totally bonkers if I didn’t go, so I couldn’t resist stepping through. Are we ever gonna be told what’s over there? [/QUOTE] What happens when you go through the door _just doesn’t matter_. I was seeing how some people would react to a situation where a definite decision was required in a very limited time frame with a minimum of information available. Because of the nature of the question, the “destination” has no bearing whatsoever on whether your answer was correct or not. ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/75 "2008-07-10T07:42:33Z")
Okay. _[SNL child psychologist]_ \*\* And why?..\*\* _[/SNL child psychologist]_ ---
**Author:** ![maggenpye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecc23a/32.png) [@maggenpye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/maggenpye)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/76 "2008-07-10T07:50:21Z")
So, me and the kid ran into … the unknown. Huh, we do \*that \*every day. (grumbles) no freaking answers, not even in message board fantasies - razzenfrazzenrazzenfugh!(/grumbles) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/77 "2008-07-10T08:11:21Z")
[QUOTE=bundykala] That’s pretty much my answer. I think it might be different if I was with someone though. Company can be very reassuring. Also, my initial reaction would be to assume it was a prank or a dream. I would tell everyone I know about this, of course. It would make a great anecdote. I think they’d all assume it was just another one of my hypothetical make-believe things though. But they’d play along, so it wouldn’t make a difference! Thinking of that, I wuv my friends and would not regret my (reluctant, but quite final) decision to play it safe. And while I’d go crazy with the curiosity, I’d most likely end up believing it was just a dream whether that was the case or not. [/QUOTE] I was thinking about your response and I agree, my reaction might be different if I had company, but perhaps not for the same reasons as you. I might take the plunge if my companion agreed to remain behind, to explain my disappearance. ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/78 "2008-07-10T09:41:28Z")
Well, either everything I think I know is wrong, or I’m having some sort of psychotic episode or am otherwise hallucinating. In the latter case (which I’d think to be the likely one), there’s no harm in going through the door; in the first case, I don’t think I could bear staying behind and wondering. So, I’d go through, assuming that I’m safe because I’m just imagining the whole thing anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/79 "2008-07-10T11:23:48Z")
[QUOTE=maggenpye] So, me and the kid ran into … the unknown. Huh, we do \*that \*every day. (grumbles) no freaking answers, not even in message board fantasies - razzenfrazzenrazzenfugh!(/grumbles) [/QUOTE] The answer is that you show a tendency to run _towards_ the unknown, instead of away from it. If you think that this is good in the long run, then going through that door was the right thing to do. I’m curious-was the “Welcome” mat a major factor in anyone’s decision? ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2008, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504/80 "2008-07-10T11:41:23Z")
The unknown is only worth knowing if the new found knowledge can be passed on to the benefit of others. In the scenario Czarcasm provides, there is no indication that this is likely to happen, so what would be the point of entering? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-door-into/455504.md?page=5)