Apophenia is also the name of Dr. Danah Boyd's brilliant research Weblog,
which I've frequently been tempted to cite on this list:

http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/

--Uche

On Sun, Aug 26, 2012 at 8:13 PM, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Apophenia
> From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> Apophenia is the experience of seeing meaningful patterns or connections
> in random or meaningless data.
> The term was coined in 1958 by Klaus Conrad,[1] who defined it as the
> "unmotivated seeing of connections" accompanied by a "specific experience
> of an abnormal meaningfulness", but it has come to represent the human
> tendency to seek patterns in random information in general (such as with
> gambling), paranormal phenomena, and religion.[2]
> Meanings and forms
>
> Conrad originally described this phenomenon in relation to the distortion
> of reality present in psychosis, but it has become more widely used to
> describe this tendency without necessarily implying the presence of
> neurological differences or mental illness.
> In 2008, Michael Shermer coined the word 'patternicity', defining it as
> "the tendency to find meaningful patterns in meaningless noise."[3][4] In
> The Believing Brain (2011), Shermer defines patternicity as "the tendency
> to find meaningful patterns in both meaningful and meaningless noise." The
> Believing Brain thesis also says that we have "the tendency to infuse
> patterns with meaning, intention, and agency", which Shermer calls
> 'agenticity'.[5]
> [edit]Statistics
> In statistics, apophenia is known as a Type I error - the identification
> of false patterns in data.[6] It may be compared with a so called false
> positive in other test situations.
> [edit]Paranormal phenomena
> A common example of perceived, but non-existent pattern are paranormal
> sightings, including sightings of ghosts, Unidentified Flying Objects,
> cryptozoology, etc., which may be due to apophenia.[citation needed]
> [edit]Conspiracy theories
> Main article: Conspiracy theory
> Likewise conspiracy theorists are famously prone to identify a (perhaps
> coincidental) pattern, and conclude that it must have great
> significance,[7] although things that are important, life-changing, and
> even catastrophic, can occur simply out of random chance.
> [edit]Religion
> The attempt to foretell the future, present, or past by finding patterns
> in animal entrails, tossed sticks, or by picking random passages from a
> holy text are often cited as examples of apophenia. A more extreme example
> is the pareidolia associated with finding the faces of religious figures in
> pieces of toast, the grain of cut wood, or other such patterns.[8]
> Recent real-world examples include the finding of a cross inside a halved
> potato;[9] the appearance of Jesus and Mary inside a halved orange;[10] and
> the appearance of Jesus' face on a piece of toast,[11] in the frost on a
> car window,[12] and inside the lid of a jar of Marmite.[13]




-- 
Uche Ogbuji                       http://uche.ogbuji.net
Founding Partner, Zepheira        http://zepheira.com
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