a “basic” philosophical question
when you perceive the color red, is your red the same as my red?
i hated that question as a kid, because other kids would always ask it to demonstrate their elite philosophical intelligence, but they had no idea (NO IDEA) what they were even asking.
i hated that question because it had no answer. and i (generally) hate questions with no answers.
so i stopped thinking about it for years. not because i gave up on answering it, but out of sheer annoyance that i didn’t believe there could be any consensus.
then one day i was thinking about color, being careful to avoid the frustrating idea of perception, when it hit me: maybe color is more than what you perceive. maybe color isn’t a visual thing at all.
maybe “color” is the emotional, mental, and even physical effects that the different wavelengths produce.
for example: it’s well known that green is a calming color. so, maybe it doesn’t matter what “green” visually looks like to you, because it’s the calming effect that we agree is green, and that translates subconsciously.
the same goes for red, which makes people hungry (google it!).
just a thought… :]
