In the words of Stephen Jay Gould "The human mind delights in finding pattern—so much so that we often mistake coincidence or forced analogy for profound meaning. No other habit of thought lies so deeply within the soul of a small creature trying to make sense of a complex world not constructed for it."

Let me give you an example, I grew up in a fairly liberal household where I was encouraged from an early childhood to question everything. I was introduced to the scientific method and the skepticism that comes with it. One of my friend has become a fundamentalist who is convinced that god is pulling the strings behind everything and is for some reason convinced that science is just a lie that satan is playing on the unsuspecting men and women. This brings up the broader question of what constitutes reality? is it something physical or purely mental or something in between? or is my ape brain getting way ahead of itself by projecting some neurochemicals inside my skull onto the world by assigning arbitrary meaning to whatever it is that I see, feel and experience?

Influences as in the things that go into making the subjective experience of viewing the world from one's own perspective.

Makes sense, thanks for pointing the way.