Do We See Different Colors?

[Galactic]

A recent topic that has been plaguing my mind is that do we all see and recognize the same colors in our heads. Such as, does my green look blue to you, but you still recognize it as green. Are all people seeing different colors yet our brains have mapped it to these colors we were all told ffrom birth? It's a mysterious question that may not be answered for a very long time.

A couple arguments I have came up with:
The first being the color red. Now, everyone knows this as an angry color. They use to even raise car insurance on cars because the color of the car is red. Is the color red instinctively in our minds to be angry? A simple example is the fight between the matador and the bull. The bull has never been told the color red is red nor trained, yet he is angered by that specific color as are all bulls.
Second, color blind people. Why has their mind not mapped the same colors everyone else sees? Do their brains not interpret the same way everyones else does? Maybe this constitutes a part of the brain not fully developed. They are able to later learn that the color they see is actually this color. People who are color blind are normally red/green color blind.
Lastly, another argument is that everyone can distinguish between dark and light, or so we think. If we look at the sun long enough we are going to burn our retinas out so we must look away from it. No one has ever said they can look at the sun because it is dark and doesn't hurt my eyes (unless of course they are blind).

I think the only sure-fire way to prove this  is to do a transplant of a brain. We have done eye transplants and there was no difference in the colors to the person, so it must be controlled by the brain. Then again, a brain transplant may never work, because your thoughts and memories are still coming with it.
Stem cells have proven that our brain is able to map motor functions through different nerves after nerves are reattached. Why not map colors differently?

What do you all think?

[Savant 231-A]

I was braining that idea, too.
If someone sees blue, the blue i see is green, that should explain how some people dis-likes some colors.

But, we can't ever know if someone sees as us, or, different

RED
BLUE
 

[Sl0vi]

For 18 years I always thought a building where I live was yellow until I said "Yeah, you know the yellow building" and the other guy looked at me puzzled and asked "What yellow building?"

[BlackBox]

Well, from a quick look on wikipedia it seems most colorblindness is a photoreceptor problem (so problems with the cells on the retina directly).

They do mention problems possible in various areas such as area V4 of the visual cortex (which is tuned for orientation, spatial frequency, and color). It is tuned for "objects of intermediate complexity," simple geometric shapes and stuff. It doesn't handle things like faces or other complex objects.

So colorblindness is most often caused by a problem in the cells of the retina itself (photoreceptors) but can be caused by defects in the parts of the brain that process visual information.

As for testing how the brain maps colors, I do know this.

The brain does associate certain colors with certain emotions / feelings. I don't have the article anymore, but I was reading in a magazine (very old magazine BTW, from the 1980s) about how the human mind assigns emotions to a color. This knowledge is used in many places (here are a few examples):

-- Large bridges like suspension or lift bridges are usually painted blue. For some reason, people committing suicide are less likely to jump off of a bridge painted blue.

-- Ice cream in a red box tends to sell worse than ice cream in a different colored box. (Supposedly this is the case because red is associated with heat, like the ice cream is melting).

-- People's stress levels are generally higher in yellow rooms (yellow is associated with 'hazards' and thus causes increased stress hormone output) As a result, babies tend to cry more in a yellow room.

-- Often, pink rooms are used for interrogation / holding of prisoners (pink has a calming effect)

-- Laundry detergent almost always comes in a blue and orange container because this color combination signifies performance and value (the detergent works well for not a lot of money)

-- Green is associated with 'natural' items (color of trees and stuff like that).

There are others as well, but I can't remember them all. Anyway, a way to determine how the mind perceives colors would be to put people in a certain surrounding (or give them products of certain colors, like the detergent and ice cream examples). See how they react emotionally.

[Sl0vi]

Yeah, colors are associated with certain feelings, however it changes depending on culture. White usually represents innocence and purity in western cultures, but means death in China. Someone did some tests on this using lego's, can't remember more of it right now...

[BlackBox]

Hmm, that is interesting.

My guess for associating emotions with colors is just because that's the way they are always used in a certain culture, for example, we always put yellow, orange, or red on warning symbols / signs.

[Sirbomber]

Light is light. If orange light bounces off of something, you're going to see orange, unless you have mutant eyes. Or aren't human.

[BlackBox]

We're talking about how the brain perceives colors.

Yes, you might say Red light is 700 nm or something like that but what it actually _is_ in terms of wavelength and how the brain perceives it could be two different things.

[CK9]

colorblindness is almost always eye related.  I'm surprissed you didn't know that...we were taught about light and how colors are precieved in middle school here...just can't remember if it's the rods or the cones that control colors...

I presonally find red a relaxing color, and blue to bring me to anger (which is one of the reasons why I chose plymouth over eden when I first started playing OP2).  The best way I can think to test your thought is to describe the colors themselves.  For example, you would describe black as darkness, a void with absence of everything.  If we could find words that directly relate to the colors that do not currently show any direct correlation to those colors, we would be able to know with barely a shadow of a doubt if we see colors the same.

[op2rules]

I wondered that too, like wouldn't it be awesome to just switch minds with a different person for like 5 seconds?

[Nightmare24148]

I HAVE BEEN THINKING THIS SAME EXACT THING!!

Wow I guess this is some form of Intuition here...

[lordly_dragon]

would solve MANY problem (if given proprer time to analyse)!

[Savant 231-A]

But, every kid is learned wich color is color. It doesn't matter wich color it is, but if that parent sees that wall blue, he'l say to his kid that that is blue, but the kid sees... for example green, and now to him BLUE is GREEN

[Freeza-CII]

I used to see color now i only see gray scale

[Savant 231-A]

Oh yeah....
That's the explanation why all of your hand-made pics are black-white

[Freeza-CII]

I can use color.  But what i see is dull and lifeless. mainly gray but i still know its red i have seen it before.

[Freeza-CII]

Any way.  The view of the world is only as good as the equiment imediately viewing it.  The eyes can focus with ot with out help to make the image clear but upside down.  Now its said that the brain Turns this image right side up but i think its like a smell you get used to.  It Looks right side up because the brain is used to that view.  Like when people use those prisims to view the world upside down they get used to it and it becomes the norm.  The eyes is where color is immediately absorbed by the Cones and Rods.  One deals with light the other with color.  Owls are suppected to only see in gray scale because they have so much of one then the other.  There is no way to be sure cant see through there eyes.   After the eye you have the connection to the brain the Optic nerve.  Then to the visual center of the brain.  How things are processed is still unknown.  How ever in some animals like turkeys when there young there atracted by the color green.  But do they see the same color we do.  That cant not be known untill we can see through some ones eyes.  Even if some one is tld that blue is green then they would still pick the color blue when asked which tile is green.  Swapping the name wont ultimately change the color from green to blue.  Just the lable.  But untill we can see through some ones brain and eyes we will not know if i see red where are you will see yellow.