System Error
On algorithms and the paranormal: the extended podcast version
Here’s a note for regular Wednesday readers!…I’ve discovered the ‘RSS feed’ toggle button that allows one to simultaneously publish one’s newsletter and the podcast at the same time. This has inspired in me what some might call perfectionism and what I prefer to think of as taking that little extra bit of time to create a listening experience that folks will enjoy. For a little while, as I catch up, there may be the occasional repeat story on a Wednesday, but it’ll always have a little something extra.
This story, first published a couple months back, has a new ending - my conversation with ChatGPT about this incident. Enjoy, with the new and improved audio!
Years ago, my sister was sizing up a potential love match, on a dating site that used psychological questionnaires to pair you with the perfect person. The candidate’s photo was shot from an unusual angle, and he looked vaguely familiar in a way she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She read down and under ‘pet hates’ he said he couldn’t stand food with specks, or condiments of any kind. That’s when she realised. She’d been matched with her ex-husband.
She rang me about it. ‘You’re a psychologist,’ she said. ‘The computer’s matched us. It’s, like, scientific. Did I make a mistake divorcing him?’
Of course not, I said. What can an algorithm know about love?
But that was a long time ago.
Now we’ve got big data, surveillance capitalism, technology that knows us better than we know ourselves. But I still want to believe what I told my sister. Love is unpredictable, organic, pheromonal. If a computer makes these decisions for us, where’s the magic?
I had a magical relationship once. No computers involved - we met the old-fashioned way, in a gothic-industrial club between the dungeon and the dance floor. We knew right away that our connection was miraculous, but in case we forgot it, there were signs. Uncanny things.
We played this game. One of us would think about something, and the other would guess what it was. Our hit rate was scary - a message from the universe that yes, we were meant to be. Except I didn’t listen to the universe, any more than I’d listen to an algorithm, and he never forgave me for it.
But that was a long time ago. We hadn’t spoken in a long, long while.
A few months ago I was reading a novel. At the end, a woman glimpsed her dead lover across a magic river, and I closed the book and my eyes and had a weird thought.
I wonder if he’s dead.
It was odd, this thought. I couldn’t account for why I had it. But I got on with the day, cleaned the kitchen, did some online shopping. Or I tried to - but when I scanned my credit card using my iPhone, the 16-digit number that popped up on my screen was right, but the name was wrong. Very wrong. It was wrong in a way that made me feel like the ground was dropping out from under my feet.
The man from the bank told me it was a glitch in the operating system. The woman from my phone’s customer service centre also told me it was a glitch in the operating system.
I wasn’t having it.
‘Oh no no no,’ I said. ‘This is not a glitch. The camera scans the card. If it were dark or I moved, my own name could be garbled. This is a totally different name.’
She said she understood my worry, but she didn’t really understand my worry.
I tried again. ‘Look, this person, whose name came up, he and I, we used to play a game where he could guess what I was thinking!’
This was too much information. She was silent, clearly thinking I was crazy. And it was crazy, so I rolled with it.
‘Listen,’ I said. ‘Here’s my worry. I read a book this morning about a woman who saw her dead lover across the river. I wondered if he was okay but I didn’t Google his name, I just kept it to myself, and then I go to scan my freaking credit card to buy something and his name comes up instead of mine and I’m telling you, we have history.’
She just needed to speak to her manager.
‘Ma’am, my manager confirms it is a system error.’
I decided to message him, on the last number I had for him. But I was already upset. I felt like I already knew there wasn’t going to be a second tick. It wasn’t going to change colour. There wouldn’t be a returning smoke signal across the vast digital plain.
I sent the message anyway. I put down my phone, paced, made a cup of tea.
When I came back, there WAS a message. I could barely look. Would it be him? Would it be a representative of his estate?
The matrix is real, and we are all its bitches.
Nobody but him would say that. Clearly, he was still walking the earth. If he had been dead, I probably would’ve felt a greater disturbance in the force.
I called my sister, who was spooked and thought it was paranormal. But her second husband, who’s in tech, had the same opinion as customer service. ‘It’s a glitch,’ he said. ‘They should call it artificial stupidity instead of artificial intelligence.’
Everyone said it was a system error, but couldn’t explain it beyond that. There were no logical explanations, just one of those things, although the reason had to be under there, somewhere.
But maybe I broke the system, back in the day. Maybe I’m the glitch. Maybe we were meant to be when we were together.
But that was a long time ago.
A few months ago, Open AI launched ChatGPT, a super-sophisticated chatbot. Everyone is talking about how clever it is. People worry that it is coming for their jobs. The events of last year, that moment when his name popped up on my screen when I scanned that credit card, still play on my mind.
If algorithms had caused that to happen, I thought, perhaps something from the same family - an AI - might have some insight that the human customer service agent had not been able to provide. I told ChatGPT what happened.
Could your ex-boyfriend have stored his credit card information in the Wallet app on your iPhone? the ChatGPT suggested. Without waiting for an answer, it explained how to change the default card or remove it.
No no, I said. It’s impossible. We were together before smartphones existed.
Could the device’s setting or software have been tampered with? it continued, going through the list of possibilities. Malware? A bug or a glitch in the Wallet app or IOS? If none of these things were the case, I could contact Apple customer support for assistance.
I wasn’t going there again.
I did that, I said to the chatbot. I relayed how they’d also said it was a glitch, and that this had frustrated me. I told the chatbot that I’d been thinking about my ex that morning, and then this had happened.
It is certainly unusual, replied the chatbot, especially in light of the fact that you had been thinking about him earlier that day. It’s important to remember that technology is not perfect, and sometimes glitches happen that are difficult to explain. Perhaps, it went on to say, it could be your mind playing tricks on you.
At this I took umbrage, and I became offish with ChatGPT. My mind is NOT playing tricks on me, I typed, bashing each key with unnecessary force. I took a screenshot, which I still have. I’m sure you understand why this seems like a really strange and specific glitch or bug.
This seems to have triggered some memories and emotions that is making you think about it more often, ChatGPT said.
I did not wish to discuss my emotions any further with the chatbot, but ventured one thing further. Some people have suggested that it could be paranormal, I said. Do you suppose this could be the case?
‘Do you suppose.’ ‘I’m sure you understand.’ I’m not sure why I speak this way to chatbots. Maybe it’s my age. Perhaps I am too old to fully assimilate the true nature of this dialogue.
ChatGPT would not entertain any silliness of this sort. As a language model AI, it said snootily, I am not able to confirm or deny paranormal or supernatural claims.
I wasn’t making a claim, I protested.
The concept of the paranormal is not something that can be explained or proven through scientific means and it is generally considered outside of the scope of science, ChatGPT said. It's also important to take care of your mental health and seek professional help if you feel that this incident is causing you distress.
So now everyone thinks I’m crazy.
I tried one more time today, went back to ChatGPT. Do you think two people who were once in love can experience extrasensory perception or communication, I asked.
Its response was predictable. Beyond the scope of science, yada yada yada. Memories, emotions, and experiences that two people shared together could also lead them to think they are communicating or experiencing things in a paranormal way, it said, once again implying that my mind was playing tricks on me.
I HAVE A SCREENSHOT, I said, upper case.
I understand that you have a screenshot, replied the chatbot patronisingly. If it had a hand, it would have used it to pat me on the head. But as an AI, I am not able to see it.
Sometimes I wish I could return to the long-time-ago. Today there are so many technological marvels, sometimes mysterious and fascinating marvels. But the long-time-ago had something else - the scope for true magic.
I am missing that today.
brilliant, I'm glad he wasn't dead, and I love his reply...
I have no answers, but the universe can have a strange sense of humour.
Why is the idea of an algorithm knowing us better than we know ourselves so unsettling? I don't know, but I was hooked from the first paragraph. Beautiful, beautiful writing. The way you weave between your experience and your sister's experience, and the past and the present...this story made my skin prickle!