Irish filmmaker George Clarke stumbled upon a strange sight when watching the DVD extras for Charlie Chaplin’s film The Circus. During footage from the film’s premiere, a woman walks by, holding something to her ear and seemingly speaking into it. It looks like a cell phone, and she’s using it like a cell phone, but is it a cell phone? She couldn’t have picked one up at a local store, since the footage was from 1923. (Read what science has to say about the possibility of time travel.)

So what’s this woman’s deal? Clarke says she must be a time traveler, using a cell phone from the future. Yes, really. Clarke says he’s screened the footage for 100 people, and none of them could come up with a better explanation. But NewsFeed can help. (See the top 10 failed futuristic predictions.)

It can’t be a cell phone — or at least our version of one. The time-traveling woman must have been from further into the future than we are, because her phone seems to work without the help of satellites or towers. NewsFeed has to agree with the New York Daily News, which suggests it could be a hearing aid. They were invented in 1920 and were widely manufactured by 1928. Why is she talking into it? She could be testing the aid, talking to someone near her, or she could just be crazy and talking to herself. Don’t judge her, she’s hard of hearing as it is. But she’s probably not a time traveler. (See the top 10 time-travel movies.)

And while everyone’s spouting fantastical theories, anyone see a strange coincidence between this video and the 25th anniversary of Back to the Future? NewsFeed’s just saying. (via New York Daily News)