50 Times People Experienced A Serious Case Of Pareidolia In The Most Unusual Spots (New Pics)

Sometimes, our eyes love playing tricks on us. We’ve probably all been there — you look at your delicious meal and suddenly, it looks right back at you. Or you point to the moon and see a man or a rabbit calmly spending their days on the lunar surface. Don't worry, you’re not going mad. Pretty much any observer perceives a familiar look in vague visual patterns, usually of a human face.

To learn more about this tendency to see specific images in the most random objects and ambiguous situations, we spoke with Dr. Jess Taubert, a psychology researcher at The University of Queensland, Australia. When asked whether we are hardwired to see cases of pareidolia in every corner of the visual world, she told Bored Panda that it is difficult to say. However, "there is some evidence that babies detect face-like patterns moments after they are born so that certainly suggests that we are sensitive to faces right from the beginning," she added.

There is evidence that this shared experience evolved because of our need to judge whether a person is a friend or foe. Humans are cautious beings, and our brains are sometimes on high alert to detect possible threats that could jump out at any moment. Yet, our sensitivity toward faces is much more foundational than that, Dr. Taubert argued.

"A bias towards faces might promote parental care while we are young and vulnerable," she said. Moreover, it might support "pro-social behaviors to include being about to evaluate other social agents and decide whether to approach them or not. For example, looking at faces helps us understand speech and understand what other people are attending to."