Friday, November 16, 2012

Loki's in the Details

This evening I caught sight of some masterfully placed dirt on our driveway. First thing I saw was, Loki!
Do you see it? The horns, the helmet, the robes/ cape, the evil stance? It's so awesome. 

This is a phenomenon called pareidolia. Pareidolia is imagining hearing or seeing something, like a face, in physical stimuli. A common occurrence of this is when one sees animals or people in clouds, or the Man in the Moon. 

And today, I saw a Norse god in a pile of dust. I suppose you could say every day emoticons are examples of pareidolia as well- while most people would see :) as a happy face, it really is just a colon followed by a parentheses. And let's face it (no pun intended)- :) doesn't bear much resemblance to a human face.

(Note: I'm copying most of this information from my sister Mary Margaret's explanation of pareidolia and apophenia at dinner several months ago. See how well the information stuck?) 

Wow- who would ever have thought I'd be writing a scientific post? You must all be shocked. 

I dare you, if you're participating in Nanowrimo, to include an instance of pareidolia in your next chapter. I know I will. 


1 comment:

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