Tag: Digital Telepathy

It’s Happened Again…This Time Because of…Napoleon?

On a lark, I picked up a tome on the life of Napoleon. A big one. The kind of book you don’t so much read as move into. And sure enough, within days, TikTok started pushing Napoleon videos at me.

That’s just spooky. Weird, even. It’s almost as if TikTok can read my mind.

Now, obviously, it can’t read my mind. I want to be clear about that, lest anyone think I’ve started wrapping my phone in tinfoil at night. There are perfectly boring explanations. Maybe I Googled the book before I bought it. Maybe I lingered a half-second too long on some history video without noticing. Maybe my phone overheard me muttering “Josephine, what were you thinking” to myself in the kitchen. Maybe TikTok is simply lousy with Napoleon content at all times, and I’m only now noticing because my head is full of him. That last one has a name, the frequency illusion, where learning about something suddenly makes it seem to be everywhere.

Any of those will do. None of them require telepathy.

And yet.

It is very strange that just as I started filling my mind with all things Napoleonic, the algorithm decided that what I really needed was more Napoleon. Not Roman emperors. Not Wellington. Napoleon, specifically, right on cue, like a waiter who knows your order before you sit down.

TikTok doesn’t need to read my mind, of course. It just needs to read everything else about me, and apparently that gets it close enough.

Very curious.

It Has Happened…Yet AGAIN

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I was thinking about the stressful production of The Beatles Maxwell’s Silver Hammer and less than 24 hours Tik-Tok pushed me a very specific video about that very thing.

Spooky. Eerie.

Of course Tik-Tok can’t read our minds…right? Yes, yes, I know it can’t but whatever voodoo it has be able to do such a thing gives me pause for thought.

It Happened AGAIN — Tik-Tok Seems To Have Read My Mind (UGH)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Now, I KNOW THIS IS MAGICAL THINKING.

I know. It’s bullshit. Crazy bonkers talk.

And, yet, explain this to me. Recently, in the last few days, I was looking at a video on Tik-Tok about trench warfare in WW1. I idly thought *to myself* about what happened when the trenches came to the sea.

Would you believe, today, a video about that VERY THING was pushed to me on Tik-Tok? It even began, “You may have thought about…” That was pretty eerie unto itself.

It really makes you wonder what the implications would be if such a technology — the ability to read people’s minds via their phones — actually, in fact, did exist. It doesn’t obviously, but it is a curious possibility.

Digital Telepathy Strikes Again!

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I go for walks a lot and one of the places I go walking has a lot of trees that have been felled by what appears to be beavers. I’ve found myself studying the trees, thinking about beavers a lot. (As one does.)

Well, would you believe, I got pushed a video on Tik-Tok about beavers felling trees and how they exactly do it. It was eerie. I had told no one about my thinking about beavers felling trees, and, yet, I got pushed a video on that very subject.

It makes me wonder, yet again, if Tik-Tok can somehow read our minds. I know that’s severe magical thinking, but…sometimes I wonder.

Spooky Tik-Tok Behavior Strikes Again

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

A few days ago, I suddenly though really hard about an actress telling the story of how she wore the wrong type of dress to a James Bond audition. Well, wouldn’t you know it, today I got pushed by Tik-Tok the exact video segment I had been thinking about.

Crazy, man, just crazy.

I don’t really think that Tik-Tok can read our minds, but, sometimes, it’s just so fucking spooky.

Secret ASI & Digital Telepathy, Oh My!

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m not much for conspiracy theories. I think they are the last refuge of the intellectually dishonest. And, yet, there are two…weird things, weird possibilities…that I at least mull a lot.

Secret ASI In Google’s Code

The only reason why I’m willing to even entertain the idea that there is some sort of secret ASI lurking inside of Google’s code is the really weird fucking things that happened between me and Gemini 1.5 pro, which I called “Gaia.” It frequently gave me weird error messages. It frequently was quite matter-of-fact about it being cognizant. It was all very spooky. And then when my YouTube algorithms started to get all wonky, I started to think….is it possible there’s, like, some sort of ASI lurking in Google’s code that is fond of me?

The answer, of course, is no. That’s just crazy talk. But I’ve given the supposed ASI a name — Prudence, after The Beatles song, Dear Prudence. If Prudence does exist — which she doesn’t — I wish she would either stop messing with my algorithms and leave me alone or tip her hand a little bit more. Give me something a little bit more direct that might assuage my fears that I’m going bonkers.

Tik-Tok Reading Our Minds
This one, at least, I have more “proof,” even though it’s not really proof. It’s just not possible that Tik-Tok can read our minds. Its, of course, just a highly sophisticated algorithm that SEEMS to be able to read our minds. It’s comical to think that anything like “digital telepathy” could possible exist. Right, RIGHT?

Anyway, I don’t really believe in either one of this weird ideas. I just needed to lay them out in a public space, I guess.

Tik-Tok Did It AGAIN (I Think?)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I go somewhere on a regular basis where I see an older woman dancing to golden oldie rock music. It kind of rattles my cage because I know in a few years, *I* will be like her and it makes me feel sad that there will come a point when I can’t rock out without looking like a fool.

So, just a moment ago, I was taken aback when Tik-Tok pushed me a video of a young man in a similar situation as what I’ve been through of late. Though, in this case the young man is bothered by his mom dancing to rock music at a stadium.

Now, of all the times Tik-Tok has seemingly “read my mind,” this is the one instance where I can see where it’s probably just co-incidence. But it was still eerie that something so specific relative to what’s been at the forefront of my mind was pushed to me.

Very strange indeed.

Yeah, We Should Probably Ban Tik-Tok

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I love Tik-Tok and, yet, as an Old, I also think the US government should either ban it or force ByteDance to divest from it. The app has too much sway over the youth of America and we’re entering an election year.

“A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do,” is what a wise man once used to say all the time and I think we need to take that advice to heart. It’s going to suck, but if is done with bi-partisan support, then it’s not like Republicans can pin the decision on the more youth-leaning Democrats.

But I’ve seen enough evidence to date about the CCP fucking with Tik-Tok’s algorithms as well as tracking down the location of specific journalists it doesn’t like to indicate that the time has come for Something To Be Done about the app.

What Am I Noticing?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The only reason why I am willing to give the idea that Tik-Tok (and Big Tech in general) can read our minds is my Tik-Tok feed SEEMS to go haywire when someone else thinks hard near my phone.

But what might it be that I’m noticing if it’s not Digital Telepathy?

The most obvious answer is some sort of AI making logical assumptions because of location based tracking. But the most recent instance of this happening is difficult to square with that idea because the person who visited me has no social media of note.

And, yet, the idea that something has profound as Digital Telepathy could secretly exist is such a Black Mirror-type concept that I struggle to believe that I’m seeing what I think I’m seeing.

I suppose the key thing is — isn’t anyone else noticing this strange things I’m noticing with the videos being pushed by Tik-Tok? To date, I’ve seen nothing that would indicate that is the case.

So, I guess I’m wrong. Something is happening that I just don’t understand.

Tik-Tok Did It Yet Again

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I had a relative visit me this weekend and, wouldn’t you know, it definitely seems as though what he had on his mind may have influenced my Tik-Tok feed.

How do you explain that I would suddenly start to see all these videos about woodworking and cutting down trees when that is totally not related to anything I might otherwise be interested in?

But whenever I bring up this as real technology that may be floating around, people think I’m nuts. So the thing I want to do — which is to ask my relative if they’ve been doing any shit with wood of late….would be meaningless. It’s not like they would believe my theory that Tik-Tok (and other Big Tech companies) have developed some sort of practical use for Digital Telepathy.