You got your Jesus in my tortilla!
October 6, 2003 8:20 AM   Subscribe

Pareidolia. This is my new favorite word. Seeing things that aren't there, whether it's Jesus or Satan, is just one of the neat tricks the human brain plays on itself. Here's a great collection of pareidolic photos, collected by thefolklorist.com. (Warning: Java)
posted by majcher (13 comments total)
 
[This is good]
posted by anastasiav at 8:39 AM on October 6, 2003


Somebody tell these guys cuz I don't think they understand. I mean they sorta do. They do talk about how not everything is ghosts, but then they turn around and... well they alternately take themselves too seriously and then not seriously enough I guess is what I'm trying to say.

And of course I always like to give a shout out to June Houston whenever this kinda topic comes up. She's a dear and has been living in a place she thinks is haunted for several years now, with cameras set up in all the dark and spooky corners of her house, looking for visual proof to coincide with the noises she's heard. Does she take herself too seriously or not seriously enough? Well, she kinda let's you be the judge of that.
posted by ZachsMind at 9:10 AM on October 6, 2003


Just for the record, pareidolia is not mistaking flash-illuminated dust particles for "ghosts" as shown in one section of the big collection linked above. There's no element of seeing something that's not really there in those photos, it's just that certain morons think those "spheres of light" are spirits.
posted by kindall at 9:20 AM on October 6, 2003


Apophenia is the spontaneous perception of connections and meaningfulness of unrelated phenomena ... In other words, seeing patterns where none exist.
posted by carter at 9:20 AM on October 6, 2003


Oh yeah, whoever sent this one in was sure "seeing things"... what twisted minds they must have!

[Fun link, majcher!]
posted by soyjoy at 10:03 AM on October 6, 2003


The Tea Stain Angel: "This miracle happened after working for 17 hours one day while I was compiling, editing and collecting the miracles for EXPECT MIRACLES."

My kitchen could keep this person occupied for years!
posted by taz at 11:48 AM on October 6, 2003


Maybe it's just me, but that tea stain angel looks like it's bent over, burdened with the terrible weight of a giant penis growing out of its back.
posted by majcher at 1:17 PM on October 6, 2003


Yes, it's a horribly grotesque, deformed -ooking angel... but that's a niiiice-lookin' penis.
posted by soyjoy at 1:50 PM on October 6, 2003


looking
posted by soyjoy at 1:50 PM on October 6, 2003


Interesting to compare the original post with Jim Hagart's Subliminal World (warning: over-use of tacky Java). Nice pictures of crass old adverts, but much of its analysis of claimed subliminals looks like pareidolia to me.
posted by raygirvan at 5:11 PM on October 6, 2003


tea stain angel; I see it as a Norman soldier in a long dress being shot in the stomach with an explosive round.
posted by raygirvan at 5:16 PM on October 6, 2003


I would love to know why this needed Java functionality for a simple list of files. It completely locked up my browser. Not your fault, majcher, but I wish people would realize sometimes that simpler is better. (Was there some special effect that the Java was used for? I couldn't get far enough in to tell.) As soyjoy's link shows, it's easy enough just to link to the photos without using Java at all.

Darn, I wanted to look at all of these, but I don't want to crash my browser again.
posted by litlnemo at 5:58 PM on October 6, 2003


litlnemo, you'll like Subliminal World even less. Also just a set of images with text annotation; likewise, I can't imagine why the designer thought Java necessary.
posted by raygirvan at 6:16 PM on October 6, 2003


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