BedBrochFlick
existence of colour
Wavelengths of light exist outside our brains, but colors are subjective mental phenomena that depend on our visual systems.
The easiest way to realize this is to consider how televisions and other displays create the subjective experience of color. They use red, green and blue light (meaning light with the corresponding wavelengths). With these 3 wavelengths, a television can be used to create any color imaginable.
Consider how red light and green light can be combined to create yellow light. This has nothing to do with physics. The two types of light wave do not in any sense "mix", except at the retina.
The retina is not the whole story, however. The neuroscience of color vision is complex, and only partially understood. The famous image of the blue-and-black / white-and-gold dress illustrates this. Some people can voluntarily switch between the two percepts. This implies that the retina is not the only part of the visual system that is involved in color vision. Voluntary control is generally assumed to act at higher levels of the visual hierarchy.
Yohan John, PhD in Cognitive and Neural Systems from Boston University
existence of colour
Wavelengths of light exist outside our brains, but colors are subjective mental phenomena that depend on our visual systems.
The easiest way to realize this is to consider how televisions and other displays create the subjective experience of color. They use red, green and blue light (meaning light with the corresponding wavelengths). With these 3 wavelengths, a television can be used to create any color imaginable.
Consider how red light and green light can be combined to create yellow light. This has nothing to do with physics. The two types of light wave do not in any sense "mix", except at the retina.
The retina is not the whole story, however. The neuroscience of color vision is complex, and only partially understood. The famous image of the blue-and-black / white-and-gold dress illustrates this. Some people can voluntarily switch between the two percepts. This implies that the retina is not the only part of the visual system that is involved in color vision. Voluntary control is generally assumed to act at higher levels of the visual hierarchy.
Yohan John, PhD in Cognitive and Neural Systems from Boston University