It's a feature of the mind that seeks order or familiarity out of randomness.
For example, when you look up in the sky and see a cloud and say, "that looks like a rabbit."
Or those Infamous photos of the pyramids on Mars. In my opinion those are just huge rocks and shadows that look like pyramids. ( in my opinion
) So, "that looks like xyz...") is pareidolia.
Sad Man, the reason I asked about what your senses are picking up, is I saw something very strange and wrote up a little report here. Debi interviewed me regarding it and these are many of the questions she asked. In general, people's reactions are similar.