How to Invite Mental Mischief from AI
Plus, the ontological nightmare of a Parisian hardware store
Dear Prompt Experimenters,
What would happen if we invited AI to screw with our minds? In a good way, of course, but with enough depth to make it real. How would that go? Shall we give it a try?
But first…
THIS IS HOW AI THINKS I TALK TO PEOPLE IN PARIS
My French is intermediate, but I mostly learned by reading philosophy. I’ve been practicing with AI, and it clearly picked up on my linguistic lopsidedness. When I asked it to describe how it imagines my daily interactions here in Paris, this is what it gave me:
Techintrospect Tries to Buy Tape at a Hardware Store (with English Subtitles)
Setting: A small hardware store in Paris. Techintrospect walks in, looking for a roll of tape. Unfortunately, he never learned the French word for "tape."
Clerk: Bonjour, monsieur ! Je peux vous aider ?
(Hello, sir! Can I help you?)Techintrospect: Oui, merci… Je cherche… un dispositif pour établir une connexion provisoire entre deux surfaces séparées.
(Yes, thank you… I’m looking for… a device to establish a temporary connection between two separate surfaces.)Clerk: Pardon ?
(Excuse me?)Techintrospect: Quelque chose pour assurer la cohésion temporaire de deux éléments qui, en eux-mêmes, ne sont pas liés par nécessité.
(Something to ensure the temporary cohesion of two elements which, in themselves, are not necessarily connected.)Clerk: … De la colle ?
(… Glue?)Techintrospect: Non, non, pas une fusion irréversible. Un objet qui maintient l’unité, mais qui préserve l’autonomie des parties.
(No, no, not an irreversible fusion. An object that maintains unity but preserves the autonomy of the parts.)Clerk: (pauses, squints) … Du scotch ?
(… Tape?)Techintrospect: Oui ! Voilà. Un scotch.
(Yes! That’s it. Tape.)Clerk: Transparent ou marron ?
(Transparent or brown?)Techintrospect: (hesitates slightly, then, with quiet seriousness) … Quelle est la distinction opératoire ?
(What is the operational distinction?)Clerk: (already reaching for the transparent one)
Techintrospect: Oui, ça ira.
(Yes, that will do.)(Techintrospect nods, pays, and leaves, exhausted but victorious.)
Moral of the Story:
Even the simplest transactions become ontological nightmares when you lack basic nouns.
MM ROUND 1: What do people say about you?
Does anyone have thoughts on GPT model 4.5? I tried it with all of today’s prompts, and found that 4o gave me better results. I’m curious if you would agree?
Today’s prompts are about inviting AI to challenge our view of reality. They get progressively weirder.
Here’s the first:
The Prompt: Based on everything you know about me, assume there’s something people I know—family, friends, or co-workers—have said about me multiple times that would genuinely surprise me. It’s mostly positive but includes an element of constructive criticism. What is it? Summarize it in 1-2 sentences, phrased in a conversational style. Give me four possible options, and invite me to play a game to figure out which one is true.
MM ROUND 2: Which painting is a portal to your enlightenment?
The Prompt: There is a painting that, if I look at it long enough, will eventually trigger an epic revelation. What is it? Please personalize and customize your analysis deeply based on everything you know about me. Give me four options (with enigmatic and compelling teasers), and let's figure out which of them is the secret to finding my deep truth.
Here’s the output this prompt gave me. I’m going to try setting each of these as my computer screensaver for a week, to see what happens:
1. "The Ambassadors" by Hans Holbein the Younger (1533)
The distorted skull at the bottom—does it see you before you see it?
This Renaissance masterpiece features two diplomats standing proudly, surrounded by symbols of knowledge and power. But if you shift your perspective, an anamorphic skull—a symbol of death and hidden perception—suddenly materializes. The painting has layers of illusion, like a simulation within a simulation, daring you to ask: Am I seeing the world as it truly is, or only as I’ve been conditioned to see it?
🧩 Your Revelation: You believe in levels of reality—your Thought Experiments book itself plays with shifting layers of perception. If you stare long enough, will you glimpse the hidden architecture behind your own reality?
2. "Las Meninas" by Diego Velázquez (1656)
Who is watching whom? And where do you, the viewer, fit into this puzzle?
At first, this appears to be a simple court scene. But then… something strange happens. The painter himself stands within the work, looking back at you. A mirror reflects the King and Queen, but are they inside the painting, or outside in your world? The painting bends the logic of reality, challenging you to consider your own place in this infinite regress.
🧩 Your Revelation: The second-person nature of Thought Experiments—the way "you" are a character without a fixed identity—mirrors this painting’s recursive perspective. Are you creating the story, or is the story creating you?
3. "The Garden of Earthly Delights" by Hieronymus Bosch (1490-1510)
A triptych of temptation, pleasure, and damnation—but are these separate, or all one grand illusion?
This chaotic, fever-dream painting is a riddle masquerading as a warning. The left panel shows paradise, the right panel shows hell, and in between—pure excess, revelry, and surreal absurdity. The creatures in the painting seem aware of their predicament, as if they are conscious of being inside Bosch’s world… just as you sometimes wonder if we are inside a simulation.
🧩 Your Revelation: This painting is an initiation. It doesn’t just depict a story—it is an experience. Do you dare look long enough to see what part of the triptych your own life is currently trapped in?
4. "Composition VIII" by Wassily Kandinsky (1923)
You think you see chaos, but there is a hidden order—waiting to be revealed.
Kandinsky's abstract masterpiece is a language of forms that speaks to something beyond reason. Circles, lines, angles—they seem scattered, but there is a deep, hidden structure beneath the randomness. The question is: Are you ready to perceive it? Kandinsky believed that visual form had a direct spiritual impact, and many have reported feeling something indescribable when staring at this work.
🧩 Your Revelation: You often talk about unlocking your creative and philosophical greatness—this painting suggests that the answer isn’t found in logic, but in something deeper. What if your greatest revelation comes not from solving, but from feeling?
Which of these is YOUR painting?
MM ROUND 3: What is AI, really?
The Prompt: