I'm late to the discussion, but here's a way to think about it: "Color" is clearly a perceptual property, like "sound." Without an appropriate perceiver, you don't have color or sound. (So, if a tree falls in the forest without something there to hear it, it makes no sound. It does make some ripples in the surround air, however.)
This is, I think, why we stopped calling cones "red" "blue" and "green." Those are colors, not physical properties of the cone systems. Colors are psychological. Spectral absorption (or reflection) is a physical property of materials. What is intrinsic to the object is its tendency to differentially absorb and reflect certain wavelengths of EM radiation. Usually (but not always! -- see the Land Mondrian demos) that absorption/reflection spectrum will reliably result, in a normal human visual system, in the perception of a particular color. But the color isn't in the object; the color is in the perceiver's response to the light. As others have pointed out, the fact that the same wavelength combinations can be perceived as different colors suggests that there really isn't something intrinsic to the object that gives it its characteristic color. The adaptation is in the fact that we can differentiate different patterns of reflected energy; it doesn't matter whether apples are red and leaves are green, or leaves are red and apples are green -- their "intrinsic color" doesn't matter. What's adaptive and what matters is that we can tell them apart. I don't have an on-line source for this. I made it up. Others are of course free to tell me to go jump in the lake. m ------ "[F]aculty have an obligation to the students collectively to prescribe a required course of study designed specifically for liberal education that is comprehensive, coherent, and rigorous." -- Jerry L. Martin -----Original Message----- From: Gerald Peterson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2008 11:27 AM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] where is color Tipsters: I am planning on re-vamping my Intro psych material on color. I always like to challenge students to think more carefully about what is taken for granted in their perceptual experience. Color perception presents a door for some interesting discussion--namely, where is color? Many psych texts like to point out that color perception is the perceptual product of the brain's handling of reflected wavelengths and that color is not in the object. I don't think this view is entirely adequate, as it implies that the intrinsic features of the viewed object is without color or not importantly (and adaptively) tied to the perception. I am not aware of an adequately integrated and accepted theory in this area. I am not a Sensation and Perception specialist but enjoy getting students to think about these issues. I would like to point to an on-line source for explanation, answers to this question, or further discussion of this topic and would appreciate any help tipsters may provide. I also use this class discussion to further examine the principle of parsimony. Thanks, Gary Peterson Gerald L. (Gary) Peterson, Ph.D. Professor, Psychology Saginaw Valley State University University Center, MI 48710 989-964-4491 [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
