Many people are familiar with the question, “do all people see the same color the same way?” What brought up this question is not a scientific discovery claiming to give proof that we do not all see the same color the same way, but rather the sheer fact that no human device, invention, or scientific observation can answer the question. The issue is this: since we cannot describe a color, except by saying that it is bright or dull, we cannot compare one person’s description of a color to another’s to see if they are seeing the same thing. The words bright and dull also cannot be defined. Try it!
If we did not all see the same colors, but our colors were switched, such as my red is your blue, and your green is my purple, then blending would be an issue. For example, the colors purple and green blending to be yellow or red would be difficult for us to understand. Blending familiar to ourselves makes sense somewhat, and we can understand to a certain extent why two colors blend to be another. However, we would have trouble understanding how humans that see colors differently can make sense of blending that would not make sense to us, and vise versa. People have been seeing colors the way they see them since infancy and have never known a different way. People just accept that a certain color is how it is and blends how it does because in their eyes (literally) it always has.
There is also the possibility that there are more colors. In fact, the most interesting activity to me when I pondered this question was attempting to imagine another color. A person cannot think of a color that is not already a color to them. This does not mean, though, that someone else cannot see colors that you cannot perceive. It is also possible that at birth, a person’s brain assigns a color to the wavelengths of light that their eyes sense. Maybe at or before birth, a child is able to imagine many colors and randomly assigns a color to objects with varying colors. Perhaps certain emotions are evoked with certain colors in the child’s head or imagination and the child matches that color to the color of the first object that gives the child the same emotion. For example, if the child matches the color red (which he/she had imagined in her head) with fear, and their older brother made them afraid by throwing a stuffed animal at them, the child could assign red to the color which that stuffed animal was because they were afraid for the first time while looking at the stuffed animal.
This process of assigning colors based on emotions is certainly plausible because emotions can sometimes be evoked by a color being overly present in a room. If a room is re-decorated and grey is the prevalent color, many people can feel sad or gloomy as a result. Likewise, if a room is light blue, people can feel happy. While giving reason to the emotion assigned color theory, the fact that color sometimes evokes emotion also causes harm to the theory for a different reason. Many people feel certain emotions from the same colors. For example, blue usually does not make one angry just as red usually doesn’t make one cheerful. The same colors evoke the same emotions for most people and it is unlikely that all people saw the same color for the first time with the same emotion for the first time. In other words, if the theory were true some children would see blue as their first color in accordance with fear, some, orange, some pink, and some red. However, people all across the board think of the same colors in accordance with fear: red or black. It is unlikely that all people saw red or black for the first time when they were afraid. This causes the theory to have problems and renders it unlikely to be true.
The same thing applies to the other senses, but mainly the ones where it is most difficult to describe the different effects. Sound can be more accurately described: loud, shrill, high, low, distorted, etc. It can also trigger other senses: sound can visibly be interpreted on a computer and low, bass notes produces vibrations that can be felt by the body. However, attempt by yourself to describe a taste. Try to define the words sweet, sour, or spicy. Try to define a smell without comparing it to an object. The way we explain smells to others is by saying, “it smells like lavender,” or, “it smells like a garlic.” We cannot describe a smell without attributing it to an object or by saying that it is preferable or terrible. Because of our incapability to describe these categories of things that our senses differentiate between, we cannot know if what we are sensing is that same as what someone else would sense when exposed to the same object that we are sensing. Having said all that, you don’t what color your shirt is because its possible that its different for everyone. The bizarre thing is, we’d all call it the same color.
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