patternicity

The human mind works in miraculous ways. Peoples minds are naturally attracted to patterns, whether it be for religious beliefs or even conspiracy, it truly is our way of life. As productive humans in today’s world we have thousands of occurrences daily, and from those occurrences we subconsciously pick and choose which ones we learn from. And from those occurrences that we have learned from we develop patterns. According to the article “Patternicity: Finding Meaningful Patterns in Meaningless Noice”, written by Michael Shermer patternicity is exactly that, finding meaning in meaningless noise. There are two different types errors associated with patternicity according to Michael Shermer, a type 1 error and a type 2 error. “A type 1 error is a false positive, or believing something is real when it is not. A type 2 error, or false negative is not believing a pattern is real when it is. Patternicity occurs whenever the cost of making a type 1 error is less than making a type 2 error.” The best example of patternicity that I have found is in Michael Shermer’s article, “Meaningful Patterns in Meaningless Noise”, in which he states, “For example, believing that the rustle in the grass is a dangerous predator when it is only the wind does not cost much, but believing that a dangerous predator is the wind may cost an animal its life.” As an avid outdoorsman I think I relate to this example the most, in fact I have had an experience that seems like it may be the epitome of this example. My friends and I decided to take a hike up to the top of a mountain, above an oasis a few miles away from my friend’s house. On our way back down the mountain we decided to take a shortcut through the oasis when we heard something that we thought could be a bobcat. We all were pretty freighted, and quickly took cover. But when a couple of my braver friends, not including me, decided to grab blunt objects and get a closer look, it turned out to be just a few ground squirrels moving