One kind of telepathy which I cal Masculine Telepathy, is a penetrative telepathy like that of the Scanners (1981) of David Cronenberg movie of the same name. In this form of telepathy, your mind can be forced open and entered and all its contents can be accessed by the telepath. The most extreme forms enable total physical possession of the victim's body.
Whether this forced penetration of the mind and body is accomplished by magic, technology or some other method lies beside my point here. Because there is an alternative form of telepathy I often encounter.
This other form of telepathy is more akin to making a phone call only mind to mind. words, thoughts, images, memories, feelings, experiences, in sum, all the cognitive processes of which a mind is aware, can be selectively shared. If the telepath wants to send a message, the receiver has to be willing. This other form of telepathy which I call Feminine Telepathy extends to creations who cannot read the minds of others, either willingly or otherwise but instead have the power to open their own minds to those around them like human television sets.
The affinity link of Peter F. Hamilton's Edenists is an example of a technological version of this second form of telepathy where those with the affinity gene can selectively share their minds to whatever degree they are willing. Of course in Hamilton's universe there are other ways to join minds and not all of these methods are consensual and kind. Still, given the human imagination for the varieties of telepathy, I hope that should people find some way to make telepathy a science fact that they choose to pursue the second form. Sadly, I think the military would prefer to have the former first.
