Can color exist to a blind person?

[Jonathan]

Here's an example:

http://www.flexodepot.com/X-Rite-530-Spectrodensitometer-P53C72.aspx

If you'd like to see more brands and models, just do a Google search for "color densitometers." Some manufacturers probably even have downloadable user's manuals and spec sheets at their websites if you're interested in investigating the matter in greater detail.

J

[Peter]

Jonathan wrote:

Actually, my argument is based on the reality that true color is composed of three elements, and that in everyday life, we experience them all.

end quote

Good discussion, ladies and gentlemen, and the same to you, you d**kwads and Poindexters 8 - ) My understanding of this subject is elementary but on one of the cable science channels an *expert* said some creature (it may have been a squid) sees in four elements and I think one of them was ultraviolet. Sorry, I was only half paying attention while I read a book with the other eyeball.

So what if a creature from the planet Zork could see in the entire electromagnetic spectrum? Would their blindness be more profound? I have heard it expressed that a bloodhound’s sense of smell is so intense it “sees” with its nose, and the same has been said of echo sounding bats and dolphins. And sharks and stingrays “feel” electromagnetism. They can “hear” a beating fish’s heart through its electrical discharge.

Ah, I hear “The Big Bong Theory ” is on. Then comes, “Two and A Half Poindexters” and at nine, “A Person of Interesting Smells,” and then at ten, “Elementary, Moron,” starring that British dude and his China doll. Just my level.

Peter

[Jonathan]

Jonathan wrote:

Actually, my argument is based on the reality that true color is composed of three elements, and that in everyday life, we experience them all.

end quote

Good discussion, ladies and gentlemen, and the same to you, you d**kwads and Poindexters 8 - ) My understanding of this subject is elementary but on one of the cable science channels an *expert* said some creature (it may have been a squid) sees in four elements and I think one of them was ultraviolet. Sorry, I was only half paying attention while I read a book with the other eyeball.

So what if a creature from the planet Zork could see in the entire electromagnetic spectrum? Would their blindness be more profound? I have heard it expressed that a bloodhound’s sense of smell is so intense it “sees” with its nose, and the same has been said of echo sounding bats and dolphins. And sharks and stingrays “feel” electromagnetism. They can “hear” a beating fish’s heart through its electrical discharge.

Ah, I hear “The Big Bong Theory ” is on. Then comes, “Two and A Half Poindexters” and at nine, “A Person of Interesting Smells,” and then at ten, “Elementary, Moron,” starring that British dude and his China doll. Just my level.

Peter

I don't know that a creature which could see more of the electromagnetic spectrum than we do would necessarily have a fourth attribute of color. It would depend on how its brain organized the interaction of the differing wavelengths. It might just result in an increase or decrease in saturation.

J

[BaalChatzaf]

Peter

I don't know that a creature which could see more of the electromagnetic spectrum than we do would necessarily have a fourth attribute of color. It would depend on how its brain organized the interaction of the differing wavelengths. It might just result in an increase or decrease in saturation.

J

Consider the case of bees which apparently can detect frequencies above ultra violet. Humans cannot do this. We simply do not have the organs for detecting in this frequency and there is no way we can truly visualize it. The best we can do is use a false color analog.

[Jonathan]

Peter

I don't know that a creature which could see more of the electromagnetic spectrum than we do would necessarily have a fourth attribute of color. It would depend on how its brain organized the interaction of the differing wavelengths. It might just result in an increase or decrease in saturation.

J

Consider the case of bees which apparently can detect frequencies above ultra violet. Humans cannot do this. We simply do not have the organs for detecting in this frequency and there is no way we can truly visualize it. The best we can do is use a false color analog.

Yeah, we can't know what bees experience. Their ability to see UV might bee (I couldn't resist it) something like what we see in an object which radiates its own light, or it might bee something that we can't imagine. We'll never know, unless we meet an entity which can describe it to us in our terms. Maybe someday bees will evolve to the point where they can explain it to us.

J

[BaalChatzaf]

Color is something that is experienced. The conditions for experiencing color can be explained but the perception of color itself must be experienced. We will just have to be happy to experience an analog to colors outside of our visual sensory range. Perhaps some day we will be able to interface an ultra-violet light detector that puts out electrical signal, to our visual cortex. We will then experience something but there is no way to know if that experience is the same as the experience of a bee.

[Frediano]

Re: It does not matter a whit if our internal experiences are the same or not. We produce the same external results.

Exactly the point! There is no imaginable consequence. If there was an imaginable consequence, then we could imagine an experiment to prove that we either did or didn't.

Because there is no imaginable consequence, the most we can conclude about the issue is 'we don't know.' That is not the same as saying we perceive the same color(or sound or taste or smell.)

For all we mutually know we are individually 'false coloring' all of the stimuli delivered to our brains; what enables us to interact on a consistant basis is the each of us independently are consistant in our 'false coloring' with external reality-- and there is no interactive consequence if our 'false coloring' is each identical or not.

I mean, other than the fact that some are blind and some are not, that some prefer chocolate to vanilla and so on.

I don't mean 'false color' in the sense that it is 'wrong' -- I mean, false color in the sense that (in my hypothetical) a perception engine of wetbits applies a self-chose and arbitrary(but consistant) palette of 'colors' to the stimuli delivered by the optic system (or aural system, etc.)

No matter what our individual palettes (be they identical or not), we yet do not all agree on the same aesthetics, either visually or aurally. We account for that as 'difference in tastes.' Yet, for all we know, we literally all do have 'different tastes...'

"I like these colors together." "I like these patterns of sounds." (We don't all like the same music or paintings or food.)

There are other models of explaining these aesthetic preferences; how is it possible to rule out that our perception engines (whatever you want to call the receiving end of all this delivered stimuli from the real world by way of sensory systems) are themselves key to these differences? Isn't that in fact how we explain such differences?

We all don't have the same wetbits in detail, only very close approximately.

At one level of abstraction, we are all the same, and at a deeper level we are fundamentally not the same, we are unique as individuals. That is or should be a key insight for Objectivists, I would think.

Not all will agree; because in the end, we are all different.

regards,

Fred

[caroljane]

The senses intersect when brain alteration occurs. Even when not, it is a regular occurrence in synaesthesia which I have commented on here. Regularly lightning - struck or brain traumatized people wake up from comas "seeing sounds" or "tasting colours" or whatever. I understand this was regular with LSD users.

[caroljane]

There is also of course, rand's famous insistence that the tv aerial she saw was a tree, because her senses told her so.

[BaalChatzaf]

If a person were totally blind, say born without eyes as one individual I knew years ago, can color or even the concept of color exist for that person?

I don't mean simply a definition of color as reflection of light, or a description of light as a measurement of wavelength along the electromagentic spectrum, etc. I mean the redness of red or the brownness of brown, etc.? I would assume not, as this is outside of his nature (i.e., total blindness)

If the blind person then stated that color doesn't exist and anyone who believes there is such a thing as color is irrational, would he be correct? If not, how would you prove he was incorrect?

A blind but hearing person can be given a color sense (sort of) by using a device that translates the frequency of visible light into sound pitches.

A blind person will then be able to make the same color distinctions as a sighted person.

Color is frequency. It is as simple as that.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[BaalChatzaf]

If a person were totally blind, say born without eyes as one individual I knew years ago, can color or even the concept of color exist for that person?

I don't mean simply a definition of color as reflection of light, or a description of light as a measurement of wavelength along the electromagentic spectrum, etc. I mean the redness of red or the brownness of brown, etc.? I would assume not, as this is outside of his nature (i.e., total blindness)

If the blind person then stated that color doesn't exist and anyone who believes there is such a thing as color is irrational, would he be correct? If not, how would you prove he was incorrect?

A blind but hearing person can be given a color sense (sort of) by using a device that translates the frequency of visible light into sound pitches.

A blind person will then be able to make the same color distinctions as a sighted person.

Brightness or intensity can be represented by volume.

Color is frequency. It is as simple as that. Louder = brighter.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[anthony]

If a person were totally blind, say born without eyes as one individual I knew years ago, can color or even the concept of color exist for that person?

I don't mean simply a definition of color as reflection of light, or a description of light as a measurement of wavelength along the electromagentic spectrum, etc. I mean the redness of red or the brownness of brown, etc.? I would assume not, as this is outside of his nature (i.e., total blindness)

If the blind person then stated that color doesn't exist and anyone who believes there is such a thing as color is irrational, would he be correct? If not, how would you prove he was incorrect?

A blind but hearing person can be given a color sense (sort of) by using a device that translates the frequency of visible light into sound pitches.

A blind person will then be able to make the same color distinctions as a sighted person.

Brightness or intensity can be represented by volume.

Color is frequency. It is as simple as that. Louder = brighter.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Not true. He would have, or reinforce, the concept of - 'sound', not of color (As the OP's question asks.)

Being able to differentiate 'red' (from violet, green, etc) by some other means than vision, doesn't impart 'red-ness' (or 'color').

[caroljane]

Not having followed this thread, did Helen Keller ever have anything to say about this>

[BaalChatzaf]

Not true. He would have, or reinforce, the concept of - 'sound', not of color (As the OP's question asks.)

Being able to differentiate 'red' (from violet, green, etc) by some other means than vision, doesn't impart 'red-ness' (or 'color').

Our blind person will learn to interpret the sound of his device as color. He will be able to distinguish bodies by color as well as a sighted person.

While you are at it look up synthesia. See http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Synthesia

Some people can taste the color of what they see or hear the color of what they see.

I am proposing a learned version of synthesia so people can hear what they see. By the way, bats do it all the time.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[JTM]

On ‎3‎/‎20‎/‎2013 at 7:31 AM, Mike82ARP said:

If a person were totally blind, say born without eyes as one individual I knew years ago, can color or even the concept of color exist for that person?

I don't mean simply a definition of color as reflection of light, or a description of light as a measurement of wavelength along the electromagentic spectrum, etc. I mean the redness of red or the brownness of brown, etc.? I would assume not, as this is outside of his nature (i.e., total blindness)

If the blind person then stated that color doesn't exist and anyone who believes there is such a thing as color is irrational, would he be correct? If not, how would you prove he was incorrect?

 

 

The following statement comes from Rand's book:  Intro to Objectivist Epistemology

- With certain significant exceptions, every concept can be defined and communicated in terms of other concepts. The exceptions are concepts referring to sensations, and meta-physical axioms. --- -
Sensations are the primary material of consciousness and, therefore, cannot be communicated by means of the material which is derived from them. The existential causes of sensations can be described and defined in conceptual terms (e.g., the wavelengths of light and the structure of the human eye, which produce the sensations of color), but one cannot communicate what color is like, to a person who is born blind. To define the meaning of the concept "blue," for instance, one must point to some blue objects to signify, in effect: "I mean this." Such an identification of a concept is known as an "ostensive definition."        OSTENSIVE definitions are usually regarded as applicable only to conceptualized sensations...
 

 

 

Consider trying to define red to a blind person????        What is the dictionary definition of the word red??         it is,  the color red!          There exist no other terms to describe it

Also, you'd face the same situation, should you try to define noise to a person that has been deaf from birth?   not possible!

 

JTM

The following utube videos directly address this matter (conceptualized sensations)

 

Vsauce: Is my red the same as your red?

 

 

 

Tommy Edison is blind from birth. In this video he tries to understand color.             From his perspective, our descriptions of colors MAKES NO SENSE WHATSOEVER!

 

 

explaining colors to a blind person:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91VUFVp1eXk

 

describing intangible concepts to a blind person:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGYLAKYNVX8&ebc=ANyPxKoSU8V2BOBMuRtKrP48Gp7PY0b9hJKg_0OtY1HIPmDgW1Uu6Ahd11j_QSXgmphtoTPKUNaZGcNaEZTgcwxnHYDpjQ-roA&nohtml5=False

 

colorblind people seeing colors with special glasses:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csx_PHKJei8&ebc=ANyPxKorgGFh40hxxIa9wQieY9s8V0gAkLHKhswr_u9ZZXzMSgHeZAqEFX_3uhEnJejqzTQAo0X8xgTRn-jQtw4nXxY0grOoUg&nohtml5=False

 

Young girls sees colors for first time
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUuH3itKZ8E

 

man sees a colorful sunset for fist time and is moved to tears:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCiP5bo4j4E&nohtml5=False

 

man sees colors for fist time and then is shown which colors are which (he is conceptualizing colors for the first time ever!):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkyd-wNuFsw&ebc=ANyPxKrgLQ53ZBUBLzDl3dVDrBGp3YpvBFPyFPkjkooPedrXthySJHWWUlKwHyxLoGky-XeZ07ZV4DrsYr7TbT1jfnE9xiBg-Q&nohtml5=False

 

recieving en-chroma glasses (speaking in foreign language - Italian) yet you can still relate to;  and understand the universal reactions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjBP8U1BwEI&nohtml5=False

 

Video compilation of individuals hearing for the first time ever!   an emotional tear jerker!  (The adults cry happy tears - & the children react with joy! - even an infant)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnnAIV4-SeM&ebc=ANyPxKrulafmj46WLJa2btq1syu3xZhaNwt_op69jjoso5qZd9rccKhcLIAc57LMb69Eq4Eg2i1xLNlN6CYco_rQxRZLRjHtOQ&nohtml5=False

 

Baby screams with joy upon hearing sounds for the first time
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB6C1e23vhU&nohtml5=False

 

Little girl hears her own voice for first time!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyY2JfM1RlM

 

A woman hearing "MUSIC" for the first time ever (Bon Jovi)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MV4uytD0Hk&nohtml5=False

 

A woman hearing "NOISE" for the first time ever
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymyt5s0btVk&nohtml5=False