It’s always hilarious to me the way mind-reading is portrayed in movies and other media, as if you’re thinking in neat, linear sentences in your head and the mind reader can just drop into the narrative and play along like it’s a book on tape. Sure, much of the time there’s language, but even at that I defy anyone (but maybe one or two people) to decipher what I’m actually thinking based on what they might “hear”. It’s absurd. It’s a jumbled up mess in there, and the most coherent stuff that goes on is probably either replaying a conversation I’ve already had or composing writing in my head. I should hope if someone came along and heard me plotting various murders, they’d realize I wasn’t actually about to commit mayhem. But while I may have a grocery list in my head on repeat, I don’t often bother to think what I’m thinking in longhand. And I’m someone who prefers, even internally, to arrange my thoughts in words rather than pictures, so I suspect most people are even worse than I am. It’s not just all Homer Simpson in there. When I do think in very structured, expository language about whatever I’m thinking of, there’s still too much going on under the surface, and I think that’s the heart of my point. And can you hear what I’m thinking over the song (or mix of songs) that is ALWAYS going on in there?

That’s why I think any telepathic communication (or anything approaching it, if you’re uncomfortable with the notion of ESP) is necessarily based on images, emotions, and a simple transfer of “knowing” rather than a literal reading of the narrative. Most of us are more nebulous and complicated than that, and it simply isn’t practical.

Yes, I realize it’s a plot device. It’s still funny.