Elaborate Pareidolia and other Mysteries

Zip Monster- Glad you included "LOL" in your statement about "maybe i was a consultant" about the Sandra Bullock poster. If i were, it would have been pure, unadulterated pareidolia, which it is obvious not the case with the image shown on the poster. The poster might be a good meditation for Neil and others who seem not to be able to distinguish pareidolia created by Nature and man made manipulated images like the one on the poster. Pure pareidolia has perfect taoistic flow lines that no man could duplicate, (like the image seen above the poster.) To quote Andre Gide- "Art is a collaboration between the artist and God, the less to do with the artist the better." This is why pareidolia is not strictly speaking "art," because it is not "created" by man. Perhaps this is the main reason why there is such a limited market for pareidolia. It falls into a category by itself. i agree with you though that some day there will be a market for this phenomenon which makes all art except the transcendental (Van Gogh for example) seem like amateur's play, once people see with their own four eyes, (see William Blake) and not with the single Newtonian sleepy eye of the non-visionary.

In the interest of clarity for new readers and no offense intended; statements such as: “perfect taoistic flow lines,” “Art is a collaboration between the artist and God, the less to do with the artist the better,” and “makes all art except the transcendental (Van Gogh for example) seem like amateur's play,” and “once people see with their own four eyes.” And “ not with the single Newtonian sleepy eye of the non-visionary,” are not scientific arguments, any way you look at it.

My major premise (for this thread) has always been this: the higher the level of elaborateness of a face; in terms of proportion, detail, orientation, and correspondence to familiar objects of our experience, the more likely that it is an artificial object (in this case art) and not a natural formation. And the more assured, convinced or positive we are that we are dealing with an authentic, un-doctored image, the more certain we can be that our conclusions are valid. These principles hold whether we are looking at an object on earth or on Mars.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by neilderosa</i>
<br />In the interest of full disclosure, I’m one of those guys that can always see the face of the stunt men during movie brawls and action scenes—did you know that Angelina Jolie used a male stunt person for her Tomb-Raider action scenes? I can also see a loose nut and bolt at a ¼ mile away and I don’t even have good eyes. <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">You can see everything BUT real pareidolia. How odd. What should we make of that?

Like Fred said, the one Zip posted is an obvious fake. Your favorite kind.

rd

In the interest of new readers, Neil's entire pseudo-scientific argument has been shredded from the beginning of this thread, and all throughout the "Pareidolia Has No Bounds" thread. I suggest new readers read for themselves. It's really quite obvious if anyone is interested in taking the time. Although, unfortunately new readers will not get to see (in real time) how frequently he has resorted to ad-hominem attacks when his logic fell short, because all of those comments were sensored by the moderators.

rd

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by rderosa</i>
<br />new readers will not get to see (in real time) how frequently he has resorted to ad-hominem attacks when his logic fell short, because all of those comments were sensored by the moderators.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">We'll let the last two posts stand so those "lucky" readers can see how badly <i>both</i> DeRosa brothers have behaved in these exchanges. There was taunting even before it just became directly ad hominem.

I might have acted sooner, but am out sick at the moment. So I'll start now, which means Rich gets a 10-day break.

When that is up, I'd like both of you to start treating each other's viewpoints (as expressed here) with respect. And I'd like the debate over telling artificial from pareidolic to stop being redundant, and therefore to end until something new and important comes along.

Fred's response to Neil and ZM managed to communicate a valid point that "Premonition"'s art is an example of man-made art, not pareidolia. But the bulk of Fred's post was so far off topic and argumentative that it would be amazing if readers got the point. Fred, keep your personal beliefs to yourself. They just cause friction and unneeded arguments about off-topic subjects.

Gentlemen, let's get back to worthy, intellectual points. If there are no more, then let the topic expire. -|Tom|-

I thought ZM’s Premonition image contribution was new information and worthy of comment because although obviously art, it begins to vindicate my position, or at the very least it offers supporting evidence. Namely; although it is art, it is <i>designed</i> to look like pareidolia. Possibly to suit the theme of the movie (which explains the sub title, “It’s not your imagination”). I’m pretty sure that was the reason why ZM posted it.

A corollary reason that I think this image supplies supporting evidence for my theory is that it is even more elaborate, and more detailed (apparent) “pareidolia” than Fred’s art is. So much so that most people (at least most of us) probably knew automatically that it was art and not pareidolia. This supports one of my key points that the most important criteria separating the probability of artificiality from random or natural forms is the degree of complexity, or as I say, “elaborateness.” This factor, coupled with proof of authenticity (of the images themselves) will prove extremely important in deciding for or against artificiality on Mars as more evidence comes in. (None of this by the way is critical of the need for formal, objective scientific evidence and demonstrations.)

Some of this may indeed be redundant, but it is legitimate to restate one’s case as new evidence comes in.

I‘m glad Dr. Van Flandern is feeling better. Also my apologies to Fred in that I should have agreed with him that the Premonition image is indeed art and not pareidolia, but I perhaps mistakenly thought that was obvious.

Neil