Shadow people

Ever heard of shadow people? These are the wispy figures that appear in dark shadows or appear in your peripheral vision. They are usually described as

• Tall, slender, bipedal figures.
• Dark, one-dimensional shadows.
• Not quite a fully human form or without any detailed facial or body features.
• Wearing a hat and a trench coat or a cape.
• Having glowing red or orange eyes. 

Some may be similar to the Outlier logo of this blog.

When you first notice shadow people, you have an ominous feeling about them and may freeze, and, as you watch them closely, they also don't move. When you turn a light on them, they disappear, and when you remove the light, they don't reappear. Much like the Weeping Angles in the BBC television show Doctor Who, shadow people only seem to move when you are not looking at them.

What are shadow people? Some say they are extraterrestrials, demons or other spirits, astral bodies, time travelers, interdimensional beings, or just figments of imagination. More likely, the reason for seeing shadow people is the same reason we see the face of a man on the surface of the moon or mars or we see the image of Jesus on a wall or on a piece of burned toast or we see the image of Satan in a cloud of smoke; it's called pareidolia.

Pareidolia is a psychological phenomenon in which the mind responds to a stimulus, usually an image or a sound, by perceiving a familiar pattern where none exists. While at first, something may seem to be just a random assemblage of shapes and colors, once you pick out or have pointed out an object in the clutter, you see it and cannot unsee it. Likewise, a random noise may sound like a word if you are told to listen for the word. Numerous examples of pareidolia can be found on the internet. 

Humans have evolved to quickly identify the human shape, as well as the shapes of other animals in their environment because they may be potential threats. Camouflage clothing works not because it hides the soldier from view, but because it hides the shape of the soldier.

Maybe there is another explanation for shadow people. Maybe they are manifestations of outliers who are studying other humans in an effort to understand why they say, do, and believe such stupid things, such as the existence of shadow people.