Originally posted by zorgon
Aliens? Paredolia? Figments of the Imagination? Elementals?
Some would claim such...
But if it was simply Paredolia then why does the camera see it as well? And why do others see the same thing?
If you ask nicely... and wish for them to appear... they will come. They appear to many, though those that see 'only rocks' will never have the joy.
More is the pity
[..]
I have also captured many other elemental, of the forest, in the rocks and even in fire... U2U me and I will send a link. They would be wasted on the
skeptics 
Besides this is not the right thread 
[edit on 11-6-2009 by zorgon]
Originally posted by imd12c4funn
reply to post by nicholaswa
Yes, it could be a rock. I find it strange how many "rocks" look like life forms or man made art.
But the biggest anomaly in my opinion is the "glassy tubes".
I dare anyone to explain how these are determined to be naturally forming geological manifestations.
Please, explain...anyone....
I'd gladly give a shot at explaining! However, first I'd like to make a note of how you are emotionally attached to recognizing 'special' things
(
"though those that see 'only rocks' will never have the joy. More is the pity"); I understand there is a lot of joy to be had. Like
anything with an emotional reward, if I were to try to say that some of this joy has no ground, it will be seen as an attack instead of an
explanation.
Furthermore, I've already indirectly pointed out that I'm not one of the people that experience joy by these images (although some definitely spark
my interest) - so as soon as my explanation is seen as an attack, I'll probably be accused of simply not being able to appreciate the details
(
"They would be wasted on the skeptics ").
I wanted to point those two things out, because I've seen quite some emotions fly around in this thread (although I've seen much worse) and I don't
think those are necessary. An explanation can be analyzed objectively.
First a little babble about odds: of course, if this is a rock, it is an anomaly of 1 in 100000000000. Rocks always look different, and you can only
have so many different rocks before something is depicted, in a way. The chance of an upside-down alien may be astronomically small, but the amount of
pictures/rocks Mob has scanned for these kind of anomalies must be astronomically large ;].
On to the case! We know from our forum-experience that a lot of images can divide us into two quite different 'groups' - those that believe
something out of the ordinary is captured, and those that believe it is only our interpretation of the stimuli (graphical features in this case) that
is out of the ordinary.
Who is on what side differs per image - but all too often the groups like to generalize the other group (implying the other to be either a 'skeptic'
or 'fantast'). The interaction between those groups causes a lot of socio-emotional turbulence, while the image remains its innocent self.
Why are those groups so quickly defined? This brings us back to the question:
"But if it was simply Paredolia then why does the camera see it as well? And why do others see the same thing?"
Pareidolia does not relate to the stimulus (the image itself); it's the interpretation of the
stimulus, the making sense of what you see, that tells us what the image is about - and it is in this process that pareidolia can occur.
Until an image is interpreted, it is nothing. Consider a drawing of a 2 year old - you need to hear what it is before you can say "nice horsey!".
Maybe you can even see how the horse is depicted. But is the image itself really a depiction of a horse? It may look more like a complicated
mathematical function than a horse. Does this mean you're not going to put it on the fridge and show it to the rest of the family as a horse? Of
course it doesn't - our appreciation of the image depends on the intent instead of the content.
An image like this is being appreciated for its content and implications rather than intent. Imagine the implications of having a photo of an alien on
Mars! Instead of a fridge, we stick it on a forum, on which we share the interpretation. Apart from the division of people who see nothing at all and
those that do, there is a division within those that do: those that believe that the recognised stimuli (grey) is actually there, and those that do
not.
Both of those groups have the pattern recognition going for them, making the unconscious telling the conscious there is a face, a body, a
limb, a cube, etc. We don't see an image for what it is - what we see is no more and no less than what our brain puts together. Those that put the
same things together
and believe it is more than just our interpretation are bound to share their enthusiasm, agreeing with each other that
"there's something out there". Whether that means this group is right and the other two are wrong does not depend on how many people are in the
group; conversely, how many people are in this group does not depend on whether they are right or not. It depends more strongly on how devoted the
individual is to believing what he sees is really there.
I hope that answers the question how it could be just pareidolia. I have left some gaps in the explanation because I kept writing incredibly lengthy
posts .. If Mob's ok with it, I'd gladly fill in those gaps when there is a need to.
[edit on 11-6-2009 by scraze]
Third straw post. How hard is it to see this? Plain as the nose on your face. The interpretation may vary, but surely you can see this? 
) 
