Does telepathy work on changlings?

[Xerxes1979]

I don't see why Starfleet didn't have a psi corp of Betazeds at high security facilites across the Federation.

How about that episode where Sisko was trying to find out if Gowron was an imposter? Wouldn't a mental scanning of the room served the purpose better than attempting tricorder scans or blood tests?

The inability to read the thoughts of a Klingon in the room would have raised a red flag as well. Most spieces except the Ferengi and Gul Dukat seem vulnerable to telepathy.

 

[DS9 Gal AZ]

Psi corps? You B-5 watcher you!

Actually, I don't believe telepathy worked on Changelings. I seem to remember Ambassador Troi saying something to Odo along the lines of, "I may not be able to sense your emotions, but I can read your expressions." I wonder if they could read the Jem'Hadar and/or the Vorta? Some telepaty might have come in handy when the Dominion took over Betazed in the war...

 

[Myasishchev]

It would've worked if the Changeling wanted it to work, and they'd have read what the Changeling wanted it to read. It's clear that wherever the cognitive part of the Changeling is, they can accurately simulate a body down to arbitrarily small scales, so with whatever handwavium Betazoids use to read minds, they're only reading the simulation of consciousness.

On the other hand, a simulation of consciousness should be, well, conscious, and thus have agency and will. To be a completely accurate simulation, it would behave identically to the individual it's a simulation of. So how does that square with Changeling Bashir blowing up suns? When the overriding Changeling consciousness is moving the Bashir body, does the Bashir simulated consciousness rebel (ineffectively)? Is it simply put to sleep and reawoken later? Is it placed in some kind of virtual reality where it's not trying to destroy the Bajoran solar system?

One supposes that might be where Sloan got his crazy ideas about Real Bashir's potential second personality from in "Inquisition." By any of the methods described above, Changelings would presumably escape scrutiny under any telepathic scan as long as the overriding Changeling consciousness isn't forcing the body to do anything out-of-character, and with the virtual reality method even if they are doing something out-of-character. But of course at that point you don't need to be a telepath anyway.