This Physical Geography talk will be given by Prof Tom Coulthard, University of Hull.

Apophenia is the experience of seeing meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data. Francis Bacon identified its role early "human understanding is of its own nature prone to suppose the existence of more order and regularity in the world than it finds" and whilst rarely discussed, apophenia is something that most scientists (physical and social) will experience or encounter. This presentation explores how apophenia can manifest itself within studies of fluvial systems, what this can mean and how we can try and address this. Whilst discussed in the context of fluvial systems the concepts and inferences from this presentation are highly relevant to many other studies/disciplines.