Pareidolia: the imagined perception of a pattern or meaning where it does not actually exist. Alien face anyone?
Actually female fat-legged beetle Oedemera nobilis
Not just pareidolia; but an image of the aliens in this web-comic!
http://www.schlockmercenary.com/2015-07-26
Posted by: David | July 26, 2015 at 05:53 AM
Having given it some thought. (Why, yes, it was a quiet weekend. Thank you for asking). Given that perception of pattern is an interplay between the percipient and the object of perception, is it logically defensible to say that a perceived pattern "does not exist"?
In other words, does pareidolia exist?
Posted by: David | July 27, 2015 at 07:33 AM
Good point. Equally, I suppose it could be argued that all pattern perception is pareidolia eg the Sun appears circular to us, but isn't "really".
Posted by: Iain | July 29, 2015 at 07:42 AM
Exactly. An astronomer sees constellations on a dalmatian where someone else doesn't. Are those patterns real?
Posted by: David Mitchell | August 01, 2015 at 06:13 AM
Good question. The argument over what's "real" crops up all over the place. I'm just reading about HDR imaging. Some people hate it because the images are "artificial" yet it shows more detail of "reality" than a "realistic" image, and arguably does a better job of reflecting what the eye (+brain ;-) does, which has a far greater dynamic range that a single digital image. Ditto the argument over Hubble images. Some say they are "false" because the colours aren't real. Yet what is real colour??
Posted by: Iain | August 03, 2015 at 07:52 AM