=
×

Julian Cope presents Head Heritage

Head To Head
Log In
Register
The Modern Antiquarian Forum »
Hardwired
Log In to post a reply
139 messages
Topic View: Flat | Threaded
Hob
Hob
4033 posts

Re: Seeing faces in rocks
Mar 10, 2006, 23:43
That's an interesting and highly valid point Peter.

The hard wired face recognition template is fact, but what you're saying about faces in stones is quite true. I never noticed this:
http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/post/20396
whilst taking the photo, and on many subsequent revisists, I've not managed to find the face again. The bumps that made it, yes, but the actual image, no.

However I'm not so sure that human brains don't construct illusory faces when out in the environment. In fact, it may be that with our modern day familiarity with 2D representations of 3D objects, combined with our general acceptance the extreme verisimilitude of the photographic image, we are actually less likely to see faces in stones, trees or clouds than our predecessors of even a couple of generations ago.

But in reference to Littlestone's original post, where he was drawing a distinction between ourselves and cultures outside the Greco-Roman influence, is it possible that the development of realistic 2D representations of human faces by the greeks was the start of a process which effectively supplied fuel to the facial recognition templates in our brains, ending up at the point where we don't see these things as easily these days? If so, it's a neat example of 'nurture' re-writing the software that ran on the face recognising hardware, thus overriding the 'nature' of the genome which produces the neuronal substrate of the face recognition process.

Which may all be a pile of tosh to some, but fekkit, what do I care? I *like* cognitive archaeology, I just wish someone would fill in the gaps between the appearance of behaviourally modern humans and the time when people started leaving permanent reminders of their existence.
In reply to:
Seeing faces in rocks (PeterH)		 Replies:
Re: Seeing faces in rocks (wolfnighthunter)
Re: Seeing faces in rocks (PeterH)
Re: Seeing faces in rocks (FourWinds)
Topic Outline:
The Modern Antiquarian Forum Index