I read your radioplay, 'Resurrection,' some time ago, and today I was again thinking about the concept. While considering the fact that I might attempt to make a short film on a similar idea (the preservation of a person in an electronic system) it occurred to me that the entire concept may in fact be redundant.
If an exact copy of someone is rendered in a machine while they are living, should we assume that the original would have any control of or some share in the consciousness of the simulated? Or, in a subtly different situation, if a person were to die, and then their copy to be loaded on or initiated in an electronic simulation, would their consciousness then somehow be transmitted to the simulation?
Considering a more tangible example: were I to scan and 3D-print myself in the same room as me, would I share in that print-out's consciousness, or, were I to be scanned and 3D-printed an instant before my death, would my consciousness then be transferred to the print-out?
If the answer to these questions is 'no, probably not,' then isn't finding immortality by way of electronic simulation/preservation unfeasible? To the original human at least, the idea would be redundant, as surely their own consciousness is extinguished when they die.