This post is prompted by a tweet from JP Castlin: “Just had one of those moments when something occurs to you (an “insight”, to use the commonplace nomenclature) which is either an epiphany or an apophany and you have no idea which.”
“a moment when you suddenly feel that you understand, or suddenly become conscious of, something that is very important to you”
apophany or apophenia
“the tendency to mistakenly perceive meaningful connections between unrelated things.
The term (German: Apophänie) was coined by psychiatrist Klaus Conrad in his 1958 publication on the beginning stages of schizophrenia.”
“a type of illusion or misperception involving a vague or obscure stimulus being perceived as something clear and distinct… For example an image of Mother Teresa in the folds of a cinnamon bun.”
“the happening by chance of two or more related or similar events at the same time”
See also the book Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle, from Vol. 8. of the Collected Works of Carl Jung, 152 pages, Princeton University Press.
Articles of Interest 