Why can't we imagine new colours?
See or imagine?We can currently see all the colors imaginable within our visual spectrum. Our tech level has gotten so good that it's gone commercial.Photoshop \adobe boast's literally millions of colors which are available.Imagine? As we leave our visual range we leave the ability to determine the selected light of things, that is what color basically is - light hits an object and is absorbed to a point - what isn't absorbed is reflected and our eyes see the reflection as “color”.As a nerd I'm aware that some humans can see on the edges of our visual range. People who can see a little into the ultraviolet range describe it as bouncing off stuff like a haze/spray or a glow sitting on the surface of objects.People who see into the infrared describe it as seeing a glow emanating from objects like light from a bulb through a lampshade.All that to say we can see every color we are designed to see, there are no colors to “imagine”.
Why can't we think of a new colour? Is it really impossible to think of any colour that doesn't exist right now? Is the light spectrum the only possible source for new colours, or might there be something else?
As many already answered about much of the biology of perception, I'll answer the smaller part that asks "or might there be something else?" where no science can answer.First of all, the color spectrum is actually best shown as a circle, as our perception of far blue and far red reconnect in the same color, magenta.It seems like the Nature is shutting the doors to new colors by closing the circle already...So here are some narrow options about what could happen when the Nature is allowing a wider perception of color to a random animal:There could be a "stretch to fit" of our own spectrum, as there could be, indeed, be no other color "feel" in the nature (figures indicate the wavelenghts):There could also be an extension, but this is less elegant (could be true!):Or the color "feels" allowed in the Nature are infinite and they are anyway differents than ours:I tend to believe that as astonishing as it sounds, there could be only the colors we know and that any animal with a wider "broadband" sees the same, only stretched to fit its range of vision. But the science of today is currently at the point where Eratosthenes was able to calculate Earth's circumference, estimate relative moon and sun distances and diameters, but not knowing at all about relativity. So what I illustrated above isn't science, sadly. Hope the wait won't be too long to give you a better answer. It would take more than just look with MRI in our brains and that of animals.A last point to be more complete:Even if there are only the color "feels" we experience as humans, that no human "knows" different colors, there is the possibility (that science can't investigate by now) that our circle differs in rotation for everybody. Here I show three graphics with you in the middle. For the person to the right, it's rotated +120° and to the left rotated -120°. These people would live their lives without having any doubt they all see the same.Interestingly enough, black and white are also colors, that could take part in a succesfull mash-up with colors and still be coherent enough to live with it without noticing.
Can anyone imagine world without colour?
I use black and white processes in therapy to help people disassociate from painful memories. How and where memories are stored conceptually in our minds, change how we feel about them. What ever we imagine is real, our bodies act as if it's real. Color in life does things to us emotionally. We talk about gray sky's being depressing. When we feel alive, colors are more vibrant and vivid. But another interesting dynamic are people with a certain brain damage.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cer... achromatopsia is a type of color-blindness caused by damage to the cerebral cortex of the brain, rather than abnormalities in the cells of the eye's retina. It is often confused with congenital achromatopsia but underlying physiological deficits of the disorders are completely distinct.There is an interesting patient Dr. Sacks wrote about. Oliver Sacks is best known for his book Awakenings. He has written on his fascination with brain disorders and the people who live with it. In one of these stories he describes a man who, as a result of a car accident, suffered an unusual condition. The Case of the Colour-blind Painter This artist, Sacks called him Mr. I, had the very rare total colour blindness caused by his brain damage. Mr I retained the awareness of colour even though he now could only see in shades of back and white. He knew he was not seeing "real black and white" and as a painter, found it unpleasant to do certain things. Watching colour television was better to watch in black and white than In color. Certain foods became unappetizing to look at so didn't eat them. They looked dead. He started going outside only at night where color basically disappeared. He started transforming his external world to match his internal perception. In order to get away from "abhorrent grey". That included the dog. It was a brown lab and he thought a Dalmation might help. He continued to paint but now only in shades of grey. Clearly we are more in gaged when life has color.
Imagine you know everything about color, but you have never seen colors other than black and white. One day, you see color. Will you learn anything new?
Thank for A2A Jacob,Considering Mary’s room concept, nothing can be purely black & white forvme. It can be ACHROMATIC WORLD having tones in between black & white. Considering myself knowing everything about colour in terms of physical & biological properties, it's something I have imagined. I am sure I'll not only learn but DISCOVER a whole new CHROMATIC WORLD. Then knowing myself I would like to apply my knowledge and see empirically if what I imagined through knowledge is right or wrong. I'm sure visually it's going to be totally new experience.Above: Black & White but for me it is Achromatic.It just changed the whole meaning of picture for me & see the Value of these colours in above image. I even learned Value of these colours while replying. It's Chromatic. Chroma is term used for any colour. Thanks:)
Can we imagine all? Can you imagine a color that does not exist?
It’s a good old question - are there colors out there that we’ve never seen?Yes!We have three color receptors in our eyes - Red, green and blue. When we see the color “yellow” (which has a frequency mid-way between red and green), it triggers both the red and the green receptors - and our brains say “red+green must be yellow!” and we get the right impression.Trouble is, there are two ways to get that impression - your computer screen has red, green and blue light sources - but no yellow ones. So to display yellow, it takes advantage of our visual system and displays a mixture of red and green light. Our eyes can’t tell the difference - so we see “Yellow”.OK - so there are two colors, one is a mixture of red and green light - the other is a pure, single frequency of yellow (such as you get from a old-fashioned sodium street lamp). They look absolutely identical - but they really, truly are not! If you take a photo of a sodium lamp and display it on your computer next to a real sodium lamp - they look exactly the same.OK - so the color halfway between red and green looks like a mixture of red and green.What about the color halfway between red and blue? Well, the single light frequency midway between them is green. But a mixture of red and blue doesn’t look green…it looks like a very vivid pink, called “magenta”. The color of barbie doll boxes! We can see that it’s green because we happen to have a green sensor…but people who are color blind who lack a green receptor see green and magenta as identical colors.So - think about this. The difference between red+blue and the frequency between red and blue is as drastic as the difference between green and shock-pink!Now let your imagination wonder what the “real” color yellow would look like if we only had the capability to see it. Doubtless it would look as different from the “red+green” color as green is from magenta…so it certainly wouldn’t look like yellow.Sadly “imagining” that the color exists - and imagining what it looks like are very different things!
Why is it so hard to imagine "nothing"?
Why is it so hard to imagine if there were no earth;or no color? Why can't we take our studies farther? Did the world take 'time' to form, or did it just happen? It's so confusing! What do you think happened?
Why is it impossible to imagine a colour never seen before?
I've thought about this before. I do not think its humanly possible. If you find a way, let me know. But I also think there are colours out there that do exist, that we can't see. After all, our human eyes only see a select amount of colours, with a vast amount of shades. Its perfectly logical that there are other colours in the prism that our human eyes do not take in.
If it is true that imagination is infinite? Can you imagine a new color and what is the name of that new color?
One can say that imagination is infinite in a poetic or expressive sense, but from a scientific factual view, the human brain is a limited number of cells, neurons, etc. with a massive but limited number of connections which are capable of producing a limited number of electrical impulses during a human being’s lifetime. Therefore creative imagination which is a conjectural based subset of that activity is also limited, and it is smaller by its very nature.Last week I was reviewing some basic color theory with my art to class. I pointed out that the traditional color wheel that I have hanging on my wall (which is a simplified Munsell system type wheel) is a lie from a certain point of view. The tertiary colors such as yellow-orange or red-violet are shown as if they are a single hue, when in reality there is a range of shades that are neither the pure primary color nor the pure secondary color. I find it humorous that most people consider art to be a vague and mysterious field of study yet when it comes to things like linear perspective and color theory we use rather precisely defined scientific terms.As for your new color, here it is:Pick any of the many variations of yellow-orange which is neither pure yellow (587 nanometers) nor pure orange (609 nanometers.)Add a touch of white to make it a higher value (tint), or some black to make it a lower value (shade), or else a bit of both (a tone), or perhaps some of the complementary color (blue-violet) to drop it’s chroma.When you are happy with that color, we will call it Irawan.Image via wikimedia.org. File:HSL color solid dblcone chroma gray.png
Why is it impossible to imagine completely new colors?
Au contraire, people imagine, create and name new colors all the time. Just take a look in the paint section of your local hardware store. You will find thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of colors -- each with a name and directions on how they should be mixed. Since there are billions and billions (to quote the late Carl Sagan) of possible colors, the range of colors from all the paint companies in the world does not describe every possible color. Stoned or not, to imagine what is not there is at the heart of all creativity. Why not imagine a fiery hot red that is so hot it appears ice cold? I don't think you would see that at a paint store, but it would be great for a company logo. With regards to other answers, in particular the colors of a rainbow. A rainbow is merely a dispersion of the different wavelengths of light and does not mix wavelengths that are not adjacent. Therefore, a rainbow is NOT "all the colors" and lacks the majority of colors. To claim that new colors are not created because the wavelengths have always been around is a bit like saying nothing has ever been invented because the atoms have always been around. One can always put things together in new and exciting ways. PostScript: I will concede that the PRIMARY colors already "span the spectrum." :-) However, that was not a condition, nor even hinted at, in the initial question. :-( So, my response still stands as a reasonable answer to the question. What is really sad, though, are the thoughts expressed that we cannot imagine what we have not experienced. As an inventor and entrepreneur, it is a sad that so many people needlessly limit themselves. I feel pity for those who cannot imagine what does not exist. My world is not so restrictive. I do not know why you think that your world is so confined. Invention is the talent of youth, as judgment is of age. --Jonathan Swift
Can a color-blind person imagine colors they can't see? (concerns UV light)?
Suppose a person is color-blind and cannot see the color blue. Is it theoretically possible for this person to imagine (correctly) what blue would look like in his/her head? Or is it outside of his sense of reality? I guess the real question that I'm leading to is, would it be possible for an ordinary person to imagine colors they can't see (outside of the visible spectrum), for example ultra violet? If you could for a day trade vision with an insect and see the UV colors it can see, and then come back, would you be able to describe or remember the non-visible colors you saw? Or would UV to them look the same as some other color does to us? It's difficult for me to wrap my head around the idea of imagining non-visible colors, because my instinctive reaction is that if we can possibly imagine and represent in our minds a color not visible to us, then it must by definition become a visible color (why couldn't it exist if you can get some sense of it)? Can YOU imagine/invent a color you've never seen before (even if it is within the visible spectrum but you've never seen it due to limited exposure to the world)? It has to be a unique color, and not some varying shade of another.