Are You Backed Up?

I have often been struck by the parallel between religious terminology about salvation and the ways we talk about digital data: in terms of being “saved. And there are those who hope to achieve longer life, if not ultimately eternal life, by making a backup copy of their mind that can be transferred to a computer, or better still an artificial body. It’s a staple of science fiction, and even gets a mention in an episode of Friends.

Could you see conservative Christians of the future asking people “Are you backed up?” instead of “Are you saved?” – adopting a newer metaphor? Would you consider a backup copy of yourself as eternal life for you, or merely a copy of you? And if there are an infinite number of universes, would the fact that somewhere a version of you always exists provide the same comfort?