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Pareidolia a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant. Common examples include seeing images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon, faces on Mars and hearing hidden messages on records or tapes when played in reverse. The word comes from the Greek  words para  ("beside, alongside, instead") in this context meaning something faulty, wrong, instead of; and the noun eidōlon ("image, form, shape") the diminutive of eidos. Pareidolia is a type of apophemia seeing patterns in random data. – Wikipedia

The human brain possesses a remarkable ability, one that we might not be consciously aware of but that can nonetheless shape our perceptions on a daily basis. The capacity to see faces and other forms in random patterns may seem to be an unlikely affliction, yet a tendency to see meaningful shapes where none exist is a feature of the brain that affects us all. The late Carl Sagan hypothesized that as a survival technique, human beings are "hard-wired" from birth to indentify the human face. This allows people to use only minimal details to recognize faces from a distance and in poor visibility but can also lead them to interpret random images or patterns of light and shade as being faces. The evolutionary advantages of being able to discern friend from foe with split-second accuracy are numerous; people who accidentally identify an enemy as a friend could face deadly consequences. The Rorschach Inkblot test uses pareidolia in an attempt to gain insight into a person's mental state. The Rorschach is a projective test, as it intentionally elicits the thoughts or feelings of respondents which are "projected" onto the ambiguous inkblot images. Projection in this instance is a form of "directed pareidolia"

The infamous 'Face on Mars' is a popular example, a rock formation photographed over the planet's Cydonia region that was long thought by some to be the carefully constructed visage of a human-like face. Incidents in which religious figures such as Jesus or the Virgin Mary are seen in the dirt of a window, the stains on the walls of an underpass or even the burn marks on a piece of toast are also common examples of this phenomenon. – unexplainedmysteries.com

In his notebooks, Leonardo de Vinci wrote of pareidolia as a device for painters, writing "if you look at any walls spotted with various stains or with a mixture of different kinds of stones, if you are about to invent some scene you will be able to see in it a resemblance to various different landscapes adorned with mountains, rivers, rocks, trees, plains, wide valleys, and various groups of hills. You will also be able to see divers combats and figures in quick movement, and strange expressions of faces, and outlandish costumes, and an infinite number of things which you can then reduce into separate and well conceived forms." – Notebooks Arranged And Rendered Into English

In September 1969, conspiracy theorists claimed some Beatles records contained clues to Paul McCartney's supposed death. Many heard the words "Paul is dead,” when the song "Strawberry Fields Forever" was played backwards, a process known as backmasking. This is a common urban legend often repeated to this day. In 1971, the Latvian writer and intellectual Konstantīns Raudive detailed what he believed was the discovery of electronic voice phenomenon (EVP). EVP has been described as "auditory pareidolia." The allegations of hidden messages in popular music have also been described as auditory pareidolia.

Some experts say pareidolia is a consequence of the brain's information processing systems. “The brain is constantly sifting through random lines, shapes, surfaces and colours,” says Joel Voss, a neuroscientist at Northwestern University.” It makes sense of these images by assigning meaning to them - usually by matching them to something stored in long-term knowledge. But sometimes things that are slightly ‘ambiguous’ get matched up with things we can name more easily - resulting in pareidolia,” he says.

Pareidolia can also be a product of people's expectations, says neuroscientist Sophie Scott, of University College London.

"Being able to see Jesus's face in toast is telling you more about what's happening with your expectations, and how you're interpreting the world based on your expectations, rather than anything that's necessarily in the toast," she says.

A new study undertaken by Canadian and Chinese researchers has added further evidence to the theory that we just can’t help seeing faces in random data by using fMRI scanners to monitor brain activity in volunteers. Neuroscientists identified the portions of the brain that consistently lit up when glimpsing facial stimuli. Findings suggest it’s common for people to see non-existent features because human brains are uniquely wired to recognize faces even when there’s only a slight suggestion of facial features. The brain will automatically interpret it as a face.

Psychologically this is copacetic with previous studies on the subject adding evidence to the theory that facial pareidolia emerged from an evolutionary need to recognize other friends – and foes – in a pinch for reasons of survival.