Beware Pareidolia in Ghost Hunting

Last night, a group of friends and I were having hours of fun debunking purportedly paranormal photographs. 

We had an eclectic mix of views about ghosts, all represented with respect for each other.  Some of us believed that ghosts existed, but one thought that ghosts could not be captured on camera.  The rest didn't think that there was life after death, and certainly not spirits on Earth.

For the former, debunking pictures was a quest with an agenda.  Personally, I think that the majority can be explained away.  But if 99% of real ghost photographs can be explained by other means, then that renders the final 1% extremely interesting indeed.

For the latter, the case was more clear cut.  There wasn't a ghost in that picture, so what suggested that there was? 

Pareidolia was the first thing that any of us checked, often with hilarious results.  Take the goblin in the picture below for a start.

Can you see it?   Peer at the picture for several seconds, the goblin may well present itself shortly.

At least it did to us.  In the full knowledge that there was a goblin there, one by one we declared that we could see it.  After all, debunking any picture relies upon finding the entity in question, in order to work out what is really there.

Unfortunately, it turned out that we'd all found different goblins.  Our, ahem, expertly drawn pictures demonstrated this beautifully.

You'd not be mistaken for thinking that we're all just finding random faces in the pattern on the rug.  This was pure pareidolia.  We were finding that goblin face so that we could declare pareidolia.

The case was made complete, when it was realized that the story had been misread.  We weren't even looking for a goblin.  That was a totally different story!  But it does show how three people, primed to find a goblin, delivered the goods.

Just for the record, we were supposed to be looking at the cursed chair and the giant fish instead.  Ghostly mist or ectoplasm is the usual explanation.  It was merely the giant fish, as we tried to guide our fellows to our own personal goblin face.

Then there was the ghost of Edward Jenner, or a barracked soldier in the doctor's attic. 

Once my friend had pointed out that the 'ghost's' trousers matched the color of the walls, and the head had been dismissed as something stacked in that loft, we were convinced that this was pareidolia. 

We could all see the ghost sitting there, our eyes had been tricked. Our brains had filled in the gaps, in that particular arrangement of light, shade and items on show, in order to recreate a human form.

But what was suggesting an arm on the left hand side?   I thought that it might be a print on the window blinds or curtains.  Someone else thought that there may be a picture there.  Pareidolia struck again.

This was all done with much laughter; and in the full knowledge that we were either tricking our brains to see what was there, or becoming so lost in our own pareidolia, that we couldn't see anything truly anymore.

You might be thinking by now, 'Forget the picture on the curtains!  There's a man sitting in that chair!'

No, there's not.  There's not even a chair.  Look again.  If you're struggling to see past the patterns produced by your brain, start at the top.  Can you see the corner in the roof panels?  Follow that down, until you grasp that the ghost's crotch and legs are created by the corner of the room.  His enormous pelvic area is suggested by two walls meeting there.

It's exacerbated by the fact that those 'walls' are actually thin, painted panels of plasterboard.  There's a rogue panel leaning up against walls of the same color, in that corner.

The 'chair' is suggested by the leg of a table on the right-hand side; and the background on whatever print is on that curtain, or window blinds, or picture to the left.  Light is streaming through the window, turning more of that print into the ghost's chest.

Look closely at the head.  It's too indistinct to call it completely, but it looks to me like a rag hanging from a hook.  Or something else stacked there. 

I believe in ghosts, but I also believe in pareidolia.  This image, to my mind, is pure pareidolia and an excellent example of why ghost hunters need to watch out for it.

Every ghost hunter wants to get the piece of definitive evidence, which convinces the whole world that ghosts exist.  That will never happen, if a charge of pareidolia can be proven, in the telling, the image, the audio recording or the footage.

The most important thing of all to protect your investigation from such ridicule is to learn about pareidolia; and to recognize how it works. 

It's not just in pictures.  It can be in the music or white noise, which tricks your ears into discerning certain words called.  It can be your interpretation of what you just saw in the corner of your vision.  It may also be in your senses of touch, taste and smell.  We can all be tricked by our own minds, finding patterns to aid our survival.

Because if you're not sure what you're seeing, hearing, touching, tasting or smelling, then it's a very sensible thing to step away until you are certain.  Pareidolia helps spread the alarm to trigger that stepping away.  Don't hate it for its own sake.

But apply it!  Study your evidence with a ruthless abandon.  It may not be pareidolia, but if it could be, then it's not the proof that the world will accept.  You are searching for that elusive 1%, the evidence which cannot be explained away nor ignored.  Good luck.