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- Joined: 03 Apr 2018
Pareidolia (/pærɪˈdoʊliə/ parr-i-DOH-lee-ə) is a psychological phenomenon in which the mind responds to a stimulus, usually an image or a sound, by perceiving a familiar pattern where none exists.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia
Patternicity
A proximate cause is the priming effect, in which our brain and senses are prepared to interpret stimuli according to an expected model.
...whenever the cost of believing a false pattern is real is less than the cost of not believing a real pattern, natural selection will favor patternicity. ...
For example, believing that the rustle in the grass is a dangerous predator when it is only the wind does not cost much, but believing that a dangerous predator is the wind may cost an animal its life.
...the cost of believing that the rustle in the grass is a dangerous predator when it is just the wind is relatively low compared with the opposite. Thus, there would have been a beneficial selection for believing that most patterns are real.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... -patterns/