Claim: Pareidolia is bias

[Todd Feinman]

As 51/50 mentioned

It hinges on whether the object is real and accurately identified vs. a familiar object recognized within the chaos of random, ambiguous data. You can see two elephants at the circus: one working with a trainer and another in the clouds. You know the cloud isn't an elephant, but your brain's pattern-matching found something familiar and reported it back to you. That'd be pareidolia.

The Mars face is pareidolia because you're staring at blurry image of a rock face, but perceiving anthropomorphic features, resembling a human face. It's apparently even got it's own specific term: mimetolithic pattern -- the pareidolia seen within the patterns of eroded rocks. It reminds me of this one rock formation I saw once that I swear resembled the U.S. presidents.


The "eyes" would be a form of mimicry to deter predators, not prey. It's not settled that it's the eye similarity that deters predators, though. Either way, both moths developed these features through the same process: random mutations > predator/prey adaptive responses > selective pressure > reproductive success (or failure). An "eye" or "skull" design wasn't deliberate, of course. Both seem to serve the same purpose as defensive mimicry, though.

I agree with Ann that pareidolia is reliant on the brain viewing it. However, I don't think either of these are examples of pareidolia since the anthropomorphic features we detect aren't the result of pattern-detection amid the chaos. They're evolutionarily-driven defensive traits that aren't subject to change. It's a constant output that remains, regardless of when or where we look at it, unlike an amorphous cloud shifting in the wind. Although the more I think about that distinction, the less solid I think it is, haha.

Did I hear something about mescaline? Uh-oh, someone's pushing drugs on Ann's block and she ain't going to like it. Hey, speaking of potent psychedelics, I have a really interesting molecule we should discuss...



Our fusiform face area is the specialized part of our brain responsible for facial detection. Regardless of what an artist does, it's always on and scanning. Our FFA lights up immediately with the same response time for an actual face as it does something resembling a face. I think it happens faster than we consciously register it (pretty cool feature). It doesn't do this for any random thing, though.

Interestingly, there are people who have facial blindness and can't remember or recognize faces. To them, it's like us viewing faces upside down; just complete confusion. I think I watched a 60 Minutes on this years back.

A feature on 60 Minutes documenting a rare condition called face blindness.

Content from External Source

Nailed it.

 

[Area 51/50]

Deliberate no, but "intended" maybe? it's all a thought experiment to see where people draw the line on when the phrase applies.

I don't think the Death's Head is thought to be defensive mimicry though, I was using the 2 examples as contrasting similar things where the lines start to blur.

Death's Head Moth, possibly just a random pattern or sexual selection or something else, not "intended" to look like anything, but we see a face (a small human type skull)

Owl eye, possibly evolutionarily selected to represent a face (possibly an owl) so an "intended" representation.

Is deliberate conveying a different meaning than intended here? Perhaps we're getting hung up on semantics because I think I'm shifting ambiguously from the "random" and "deliberate" terms for evolution into "random" and "deliberate" terms for pareidolia. My fault.

Regardless of the utility provided to our moth friends, both the skull and eye design are "random" in the sense that random mutations resulted in these phenotypical traits; wing design wasn't deliberately chosen with any intention. But from our perception, the wing pattern is not random as it's reliably present on each moth, meaning not pareidolia. For pareidolia, the "random" is a pattern that isn't purposefully arranged, which our moth friends are, despite them having no idea or influence. Confusing to write.

How about this distinction:

If you and I stare at the clouds together, we're liable to rack up several instances of pareidolia each. But when we compare notes, I saw a frisbee, one of Mick's famous balloons, and even something resembling a cloud. You saw a tesseract, the Disney Castle, and the starting lineup to the 1995 Chicago Bulls. You always get the cool stuff. We both experienced pareidolia, but the results were completely different as the phenomena is subjective to our unique perceptions.

But if you and I stare at those moths together, it's likely we'll both just see moths with a skull-like design on their bodies. We need better hobbies. I think that makes sense, though?

I do think you may be right on whether it's defensive mimicry, though. I overlooked that I said mimicry for both. I meant the specific design is likely part of it's defenses like most of their vibrant wing designs. Perhaps the little eye dots, but I doubt mantids are like, "Wait, is that a human skull?" Good catch.

Word, I get you. For me, the fact that it's not an ambiguous pattern removes it from pareidolia contention. Perhaps seeing a face in a peacock's feathers would count as a one-off if the sun triggered the iridescence in the right spot. But every time I see a peacock and it looks like the NBC logo, I'd say no.

If viewed upside-down, the entire Death's-head Hawk-moth Acherontia atropos (Linnaeus, 1758) conveys an illusion of an eyed head. The famous skull-like mark on the thorax becomes a 'nose' and its eye-sockets become 'nostrils'. Discal spots on the forewings become small 'eyes' and other features appear as 'ears', 'muzzle' and 'lips'. A very similar illusion is conveyed by Convolvulus Hawk-moth Agrius convolvuli (Linnaeus, 1758). Photographs are shown of those two species and of similar images in five species of moths. Possibilities are discussed of eyedhead illusions in other hawk-moths and in noctuid moths. The function of such images is almost certainly to deter, distract or otherwise deceive predators.
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/cont...rt00005;jsessionid=2fdu0uxe2gx5v.x-ic-live-02

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Reminds me of Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs.

 

[jarlrmai]

the wing pattern is not random as it's reliably present on each moth, meaning not pareidolia

The "Death's Head" on a the Death's Head Hawkmoth is reliably present on each moth as well, there's some gene that expresses as that pattern, but nothing evolutionarily pressured it towards looking like skull as far as we know it just the way it happened to go. So as random as a cloud?

But on the Owl eye moth the eyes shape were seemingly selected for over the ages as the resemblance of a face of a owl meant improved survival and breeding chances for the species.

 

[Area 51/50]

I'm confused on when we're discussing pareidolia definitions or evolutionary biology stuff. IDK, I'm not super confident in my definition of what constitutes pareidolia, tbh. I'm not sure it matters what the moth is doing. The body codes for it reliably, so I don't necessarily consider it random. But if it's not "intentionally" showing us a skull, which it doesn't even know what that is, it's random in that sense... ughhhhh... *head explodes*

I've been up far too long and am drifting off. I think I'm shifting to them being pareidolia because they're not intended to be skulls and eyes and that's what our brain immediately notices them as. I think I convoluted my definition earlier.

What the heck is this thread about anyway? We cracked Roswell?

Signing off for a bit. Nice chat. Have a good day, everybody.

 

[Todd Feinman]

The "Death's Head" on a the Death's Head Hawkmoth is reliably present on each moth as well, there's some gene that expresses as that pattern, but nothing evolutionarily pressured it towards looking like skull as far as we know it just the way it happened to go. So as random as a cloud?

But on the Owl eye moth the eyes shape were seemingly selected for over the ages as the resemblance of a face of a owl meant improved survival and breeding chances for the species.

Exactly. The "Death's Head" on the moth that has evolved may or may not offer some selective advantage for the moth; it has nothing to do with our seeing a human skull. The pattern doesn't hinder it enough to be eliminated at the current time. Randomly selected patterns that began to or rather instantly started to look like big eyes to possible predators, conferred a selective advantage to those moths with the characteristic, while fewer of the species without the frightening markings survived to breed.

 

[Ann K]

Interestingly, there are people who have facial blindness and can't remember or recognize faces. To them, it's like us viewing faces upside down; just complete confusion. I think I watched a 60 Minutes on this years back.

I have a friend who is unable to recognize faces. She recognizes voices, though, and always knows who I am if I speak to her first.

 

[Ann K]

Looking at your work in a mirror will instantly show you your drawing errors. A great way to get better. Artists also paint with the work sometimes upside down; that's another way to get a fresh perspective.

I have several mirrors in the studio for that very reason. Before I built my current studio I painted in a tiny "baby's bedroom"-size room. I was told by another artist that I needed to back off further and look at my work from a distance. I told him if I did that, I'd fall down the stairs! I ended up propping work at the head of the bed and looking at it in the mirror on the opposite side of the room, thus doubling the distance.

 

[Todd Feinman]

I have several mirrors in the studio for that very reason. Before I built my current studio I painted in a tiny "baby's bedroom"-size room. I was told by another artist that I needed to back off further and look at my work from a distance. I told him if I did that, I'd fall down the stairs! I ended up propping work at the head of the bed and looking at it in the mirror on the opposite side of the room, thus doubling the distance.

Have you heard of the Sight-Size method? It is a method for drawing based on the apparent size of an object / person at distance.

 

[Ann K]

Have you heard of the Sight-Size method? It is a method for drawing based on the apparent size of an object / person at distance.

Yes. It comes in handy for something like figure drawing, but it's next to useless for something like plein air landscapes, where the object is to make a decent painting, rather than an accurate representation of a scene. Nature doesn't usually present perfect compositions.

 

[Todd Feinman]

Yes. It comes in handy for something like figure drawing, but it's next to useless for something like plein air landscapes, where the object is to make a decent painting, rather than an accurate representation of a scene. Nature doesn't usually present perfect compositions.

You do plein air? Nice! I do sometimes, too. A lot of fun.

 

[MyMatesBrainwashed]

Dunno if relevant but feels like it might be...

I don't know how broad the category is, but when looking at things created in a human form (probably not just human) we NEVER assume pareidolia.

I think it might be what made the face of Mars so compelling.

If you see something that looks like it was made to look like a face you assume the person who made it meant it to look like a face. Not the other way round (which would be pareidolia). Obviously gets fuzzier the more abstract you go.

Induced pareidolia seems relevant too. How it's not actually pareidolia even though it's the reason the observer sees whatever it is. Looking at noise for anomalies has a certain "inducing pareidolia" aspect to it but I can't fit it together yet.

 

[JMartJr]

If you see something that looks like it was made to look like a face you assume the person who made it meant it to look like a face.

I'm not 100% sure I'm following your argument, but I have to disagree with this bit. I see a lot of things made by humans that look like a face, I do not assume that was always the intent.

 

[MyMatesBrainwashed]

I see a lot of things made by humans that look like a face, I do not assume that was always the intent.

Because it wasn't the intent.

My post says "made to look like a face".

Like a bust. You'd never assume it's pareidolia why you see a face on it. The Easter island heads, you'd never assume pareidolia. You assume someone made a head. Paintings. Etc.

 

[JMartJr]

Like a bust. You'd never assume it's pareidolia why you see a face on it. The Easter island heads, you'd never assume pareidolia. You assume someone made a head. Paintings. Etc.

Ahh, I see now what you are saying, and largely agree, though I'd argue it's still the same mechanism that makes an Easter Island Head look like a face to our brains as it is that makes the images in my post 132 (two up, or one up now since one has been deleted as I type!) look facey. Whether or not WE see a face where there is not in fact a face has nothing to do with whether the stimulus was produced by an artist with intent, evolution with producing a scary face on a moth's wings, or just a random rock weathering. That process is internal to the brain of the viewer.

If you showed me just one Easter Island Head, in a place where we there was no context to suggest any culture ever existed to create such things, maybe my FIRST thought might not be "Oh, that's just natural rock and some pareidolia is happening." But absent evidence that people ever lived there to make it, pareidolia would have to be on the table as a likely explanation.

Look at these two images of rocks, one carved by people and one by weather:

If you had the one picture to go on (which is the case we tend to have for "artifacts" found on Mars, for example) I am by no means sure I'd say definitely that one was inadvertent pareidolia and one was an intelligent artist portraying a face. If I DID, I'm not sure I'd get right which was which! Neither actually looks much like a real human face (this is NOT a disrespecting of the artists on Easter Island, naturalistic portraiture was not the goal and is not the only way to make art) but both undeniably look like faces to our brains. For the same reason -- it's a thing our brains like to do, make sense of stuff, find patterns, find faces, find what we've seen before in something new, categorize stuff...

 

[Giddierone]

Saw this on Twitter. JAPAN- Tokyo's world famous 'Museum of the Many Faced Rocks'.

Source: https://x.com/folkhorrorforum/status/1395165744967659526

 

[Ann K]

All natural, but hidden until they're cut open:

 

[Todd Feinman]

Saw this on Twitter. JAPAN- Tokyo's world famous 'Museum of the Many Faced Rocks'.

Source: https://x.com/folkhorrorforum/status/1395165744967659526

Baby trolls exposed to sunlight?

 

[jdog]

There was a reference upstream to using AI analysis to help avoid being misled by pareidolia. Which reminds me there is a whole series of self-published papers by Rhawn Gabriel Joseph and a few colleagues purporting to have found ancient (and current!) arthropods, cyanobacteria, cocoons and more on Mars by analyzing thousands of NASA photos for things that look like arthropods, cyanobacteria, cocoons and more. In one case they did some sort of "morphological and computerized quantitative pattern analysis" of holes in rocks from a Santa Cruz beach and photos from Mars that supported their hypothesis that the Martian holes had to have been created by Martian mollusks. In another they showed a bunch of photos to "Twenty experts, sixteen specializing in insect and worm biology were consulted and of those who replied: eight agreed these ovoid forms are similar to worm eggs and/or cocoons."

(They wind up taking the argument in both directions -- these things may have biological origins because they look similar to living things on Earth. The fact that they only resemble living things on Earth just supports the idea things evolved differently on Mars after possibly being seeded from the same interplanetary source.)

 

[MyMatesBrainwashed]

I think this guy illustrates my point quite well cos I don't assume pareidolia looking at it. Or at least I assume it's been made to look like it does and therefore isn't pareidolia.

That it's a natural formation, that it's random, is harder to accept. To be convinced it's pareidolia I'd require some evidence that it wasn't made on purpose.

It's the total opposite reaction to what the authors are concerned about.

And you touch on why the "probably pareidolia" for the face on Mars. Because there shouldn't be anyone around to create a face on Mars. We didn't know the mountain doesn't look like a face and it was actually just noise pareidolia. It was probably gonna look like a face but wouldn't have been a created face and therefore still be pareidolia. The created part being the most important.

The pareidolia it turned out to be was even more disappointing than originally thought.

It didn't start out the same as "this noise looks like bones", "probably pareidolia".

 

[Asherah]

If someone perceives a puppy-shaped cloud, no reasonable person would consider this worthy of investigation. What's different about a face-shaped rock formation?

The difference is the prior belief that the prior existence of intelligent life (that is inclined toward producing art) on Mars is a live possibility.

 

[Ann K]

If someone perceives a puppy-shaped cloud, no reasonable person would consider this worthy of investigation. What's different about a face-shaped rock formation?

The difference is the prior belief that the prior existence of intelligent life (that is inclined toward producing art) on Mars is a live possibility.

Well ...no, intelligent life on Mars is not plausible in the least. We have a pretty good idea of the history of the atmosphere and the water content of Mars. We would be tickled pink to find any evidence of something as rudimentary as microbial life on Mars, but we don't even have that yet.

 

[JMartJr]

intelligent life on Mars is not plausible in the least. We have a pretty good idea of the history of the atmosphere and the water content of Mars. We would be tickled pink to find any evidence of something as rudimentary as microbial life on Mars, but we don't even have that yet.

I agree, but of course the CULTURE is steeped in Mars as the home for life other than Earth, in movies , novels and other fictional works of art, so it makes sense that people believing live aliens are in the solar system are thinking first about Mars. And we have rovers there sending lots of pictures back, so there's plenty of imagery randomly carved rocks to give the appearance of being fossils or dropped tool or bits of old buildings.

"Prior belief" exists -- it's just not well founded (or maybe "it's not up to date" is the better way to put it.)

 

[John J.]

If someone perceives a puppy-shaped cloud, no reasonable person would consider this worthy of investigation. What's different about a face-shaped rock formation?

The difference is the prior belief that the prior existence of intelligent life (that is inclined toward producing art) on Mars is a live possibility.

Sort of agree.

Must admit, when I first saw the Cydonia face I thought "Wow, that's interesting. I hope we can get a better look at it somehow",
although I was, and remain, sceptical about there being any life on Mars in the last few hundred million years.
Maybe I had just a smidgen of hope (and certainly curiosity) that it might be something more than pareidolia, whatever my beliefs (and what I might have been taught, or read).

We now know no sane human-type species would choose to settle on Mars in the past, because of the clear warnings of the
Daemonic Alien Big Cats of Cydonia, emblazoned on the Martian surface near the Human Skull of Cydonia.



(If you squint a bit, the top one gets a leonine mane too).

 

[jdog]

Sort of agree.

Must admit, when I first saw the Cydonia face I thought "Wow, that's interesting. I hope we can get a better look at it somehow",
although I was, and remain, sceptical about there being any life on Mars in the last few hundred million years.
Maybe I had just a smidgen of hope (and certainly curiosity) that it might be something more than pareidolia, whatever my beliefs (and what I might have been taught, or read).

We now know no sane human-type species would choose to settle on Mars in the past, because of the clear warnings of the
Daemonic Alien Big Cats of Cydonia, emblazoned on the Martian surface near the Human Skull of Cydonia.



(If you squint a bit, the top one gets a leonine mane too).

We'll be safe as long as no one points a laser at Earth.

 

[MyMatesBrainwashed]

Oh, that's disappointing. And it means it's not pareidolia; it's been manufactured to have features that resemble a face.

That leads to be wary of simply assuming pareidolia is pareidolia.

And this statement it truer than the one the article uses (that a natural formation that looks like a face is still an anomaly winds me up about their statement. It suggests they aren't actually interested in anomalies, only unnatural ones. I think that's important).

But it only works as long as you can't prove (or accept) something is natural. It doesn't work for bone-like. That's pareidolia, no assuming. To not assume it's pareidolia in this sense would be that something made it to look like bones.