What with all the sightings of Mary and Jesus — and my debunking of them — I thought my Bad Readers would be amused to see this image which I spotted in the latest issue of the magazine Physics Today:
The pattern arises from the way light interacts with atoms in a crystal, and it’s called a Brillouin pattern. I’m showing the image to you here because of the specific pattern in it. You want a conspiracy, a miracle? I’ll ask you: Where is cutting-edge work being done on Brillouin patterns? Why, The Technion, an institute in Israel!
I’ll see your Underpass Mary, and raise you an Abe Vigoda (who is Jewish, by the way)!
P.S. The title of this entry comes from the word pareidolia.
May 30th, 2005 at 12:45 am
Amazing. You won’t believe what I *just* found on my toast! I took a picture — http://tinyurl.com/cwr6b
I imagine there are no institutes in Israel studying burnt bread. However, I could probably make a killing off of it on eBay.
May 30th, 2005 at 1:05 am
I live in North Texas so I found this particularly interesting:
http://www.nbc4.tv/irresistible/4541162/detail.html
People are claiming to see Jesus on an apartment window in Ft. Worth. They are even holding church services in front of the apartment. The only thing I see, even when I try to make out a face, is a big smudge!
May 30th, 2005 at 1:34 am
TO Sam: I live in DFW and yet I haven’t heard about that! And yes, I just see a smudge, too.
May 30th, 2005 at 8:55 am
I see things like that window smudge and I wish I could leave this planet. (Leave it FAR behind.) Even websites like BA & others that promote science and critical thinking sometimes aren’t enough to keep me from thinking that humanity is a lost cause. Sometimes.
Finding imagery and hope in a window smudge, piece of toast, potato, highway underpass, etc. is a testament to people’s desperation and lack of faith in their own abilities & potential. I’m not saying it’s wrong to have faith in a higher power of some kind (as long as that belief doesn’t harm others); I’m saying it’s wrong to misdirect one’s attention in such obscure and/or subjective ways.
To put it another way: why not put some of that creativity & imagination to good use and help other people, rather than just use it to see “miracles” dumped in your own lap?
Sorry about the ranting, everyone.
May 30th, 2005 at 8:59 am
Dude, did you happen to check the web site that you were linking to to demonstrate that Abe Vigoda is Jewish?
May 30th, 2005 at 9:43 am
Yikes! I removed the link. Thanks! I googled Vigoda, and when I got to that page I skipped right down without paying attention. I think I’ll be a little more careful in the future… thanks again.
May 30th, 2005 at 11:11 am
That is nothing. I see Jesus in the mirror (and in any reflective object by that matter) all the time.
May 30th, 2005 at 11:40 am
Now I just want to find an image of Lenin kissing Abe Vigoda on an overpass….
May 30th, 2005 at 11:56 am
Sure thing.
May 30th, 2005 at 3:42 pm
Oh my! This MUST be a sign!
May 31st, 2005 at 12:20 am
Hi @ all,
you missed clearly making the point: it is all part of the vast jewish conspiracy planning to take over the power. *LOL*
But the story with the scruffy window beats me. How come people believe this crap? Probably the same people believe in the “moon hoax” which explains this question
)
May 31st, 2005 at 2:53 pm
This. Made. My. DAY!!!
June 1st, 2005 at 5:54 pm
I still say the “Lenin” in your shower curtain is really Col. Sanders”
http://badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=349215&highlight=sanders&sid=59296f38b22414296837dc981819650c#349215
August 4th, 2005 at 8:43 am
The shade of Lenin appearing in your shower curtain? Well, the Communist Manifesto did talk of a ‘spectre haunting Europe’, so we should be expecting such things in the USA too, I guess.
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April 17th, 2007 at 5:53 am
Kind of related, did you see they finally debunked the “face on mars” story? I found a news item at digg.com which showed really detailed closups of the rock formation, and some site has a 3d flyaround which shows its nothing like a face!
Everything, seen through particular light and at the right angle looks like SOMETHING its not!