The Devil Sings the <i>Blues</i>: Heavy Metal, Gothic <i>Fiction</i> and “Postmodern” Discourse

Hinds, Elizabeth Jane Wall

doi:10.1111/j.0022-3840.1992.2603_151.x

Cited by 6 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…This tendency to see real objects where none actually exist is known as pareidolia, and has been linked to evolutionary processes where sensory input is rapidly organized to find order in apparently-random events (Barrett, 2007;Guthrie, 1995;Simmonds-Moore, 2014), and where interpreting something as meaningful (e.g., friend or foe) can have immediate consequences for survival (see also Whitson & Galinsky, 2008). The study of pareidolia can also help to explain many of life's mysteries such as sightings of the Loch Ness Monster, sightings of Elvis, and even (in the auditory domain) hearing satanic voices when playing rock music backwards (Hinds, 1992). One extraordinary example was of a woman who claimed to see the image of the Virgin Mary in a piece of toast.…”

Section: The Phenomenon Of Pareidolic Perceptionmentioning

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Believing is Seeing: A Perspective on Perceiving Images of Objects on the Shroud of Turin

Sheen

Jordan

2016

Archive for the Psychology of Religion

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For many years, the Shroud of Turin has been famous for images of a body and face which many believe were formed during The Resurrection. More recently, however, claims have been made that the Shroud also contains evidence of other objects, and these claims have been used to support the view that the Shroud is the burial cloth of Jesus. However, these claims are based on marks that are barely visible and the psychological processes known to be involved in perceiving objects under data-limited conditions have been largely ignored. Here, we consider these processes and assess the claims that objects can be seen on the Shroud. We conclude that the viewing conditions provided by images of the Shroud are likely to lead to the illusory perception of objects, and knowing the psychological processes underlying these perceptions is crucial for accurately determining the provenance of the Shroud and other material artefacts.

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