05 January 2009

"Accidental maps"



This week the often-interesting site Strange Maps featured images of things that look like maps:
"... cartocacoethes - the compulsion to see maps everywhere... In its most general definition, this experience of seeing patterns in random data is called apophenia - a term that also covers the phenomenon of ‘false positives’ in statistics, for example.

A more specific type of apophenia, applicable here, would be pareidolia: perceiving significance in stimuli that have none. This perceived significance is usually more revealing of the perceiver than of the stimuli, which is why this principle is used in Rorschach (i.e. inkblot) testing. It also might explain why it’s often the devout that see images of Jesus on a piece of toast.
With that introduction, the two images above are Australia in a mud puddle (Snopes discussion here), and Argentina in (appropriately) a piece of meat.

More examples (U.K., U.S., Mexico, Africa, China) at the primary link.

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