What's Out There?

[Mudhammam]

By color I mean simply ... red, blue, yellow, etc. These are how we experience objects, from  the reflections of different light wavelengths, which appear in our vision, and as Jorm said, are processed by the brain... but we wouldn't say that the objects or energy itself contains "redness" or "blueness" as an intrinsic property... I presume anyway.

I don't see any reason to suppose that our perceptions must be as things are.  Physicists tell us that solid objects are really mostly empty space with tiny particles moving about (or at least, that is what they said a few years back).  That is not how I experience my dining room table.

As for the color words, they are ambiguous, in that sometimes "red" means particular frequencies of light.

Sure, but we still operate from the framework --- when reconstructing the history of the planet, or the solar system, or the universe, for example --- that there are macroscopic structures that exist in the same manner as perceived by us, even when no one is around to view them... I'm just trying to figure out what they might appear like, if color is only a subjective phenomenon.

[Pyrrho]

I don't see any reason to suppose that our perceptions must be as things are.  Physicists tell us that solid objects are really mostly empty space with tiny particles moving about (or at least, that is what they said a few years back).  That is not how I experience my dining room table.

As for the color words, they are ambiguous, in that sometimes "red" means particular frequencies of light.

Sure, but we still operate from the framework --- when reconstructing the history of the planet, or the solar system, or the universe, for example --- that there are macroscopic structures that exist in the same manner as perceived by us, even when no one is around to view them... I'm just trying to figure out what they might appear like, if color is only a subjective phenomenon.

Color is how things appear.  That is, to beings that are not colorblind.  Without a perceiver, there is no perception.  Of course, none of that means that there are not frequencies of light without something perceiving them.

[Mudhammam]

Sure, but we still operate from the framework --- when reconstructing the history of the planet, or the solar system, or the universe, for example --- that there are macroscopic structures that exist in the same manner as perceived by us, even when no one is around to view them... I'm just trying to figure out what they might appear like, if color is only a subjective phenomenon.

Color is how things appear.  That is, to beings that are not colorblind.  Without a perceiver, there is no perception.  Of course, none of that means that there are not frequencies of light without something perceiving them.

So what would a most accurate conception of the world without any percepts be like in terms of color? None at all?

[ignoramus]

Hello darkness my old friend
I've bumped into the wall again.
Etc.

[Pyrrho]

Color is how things appear.  That is, to beings that are not colorblind.  Without a perceiver, there is no perception.  Of course, none of that means that there are not frequencies of light without something perceiving them.

So what would a most accurate conception of the world without any percepts be like in terms of color? None at all?

There are different frequencies of light.  What more could there be to color without a perceiver?

[Mudhammam]

So what would a most accurate conception of the world without any percepts be like in terms of color? None at all?

There are different frequencies of light.  What more could there be to color without a perceiver?

That doesn't really answer my question. Does a "snapshot" of earth in the hypothetical scenario that no beings are actually present to view it lack blue oceans and green forests? Are you saying that colors exist in the different frequencies of light? Is it any more strange to ask if a falling tree makes a sound when no one is around to hear than it is to ask if the numerous atoms and molecules that compose bodies (like your table) really exist as they appear --- distinct, spatial, macroscopic objects --- when there is no perception involved to form that image of them? Intuitively, the answer seems to be an obvious yes --- your table exists as it does even when you're in the other room. But what does the frequency of light cause an object's features to be like if there is nobody there to appreciate it either? Is it just unknowable?

[Mudhammam]

Whoops. Double post. Damn internet connection.

[Pyrrho]

I am not surprised that you do not regard my post as an answer to your question, as I am still unclear on what your question is.

Color is simply different frequencies of light.  That is all it is, as a thing that is not perceived.  The subjective experience of color cannot occur without something perceiving it.

The same idea applies to a tree falling in a forest.  Sound is vibrations in a medium (typically air, but it can be in water or some other thing).  In the absence of anyone there to hear the tree falling, the air is still moved by the falling of the tree.  But there is no subjective experience of sound, though there still is the movement of air that would likely be audible if someone were there to hear it.  So, if by "sound" one means the vibrations of the medium (the air in this case), then there is a sound in the forest when a tree falls and there is no one there to hear it.  If by "sound" one means the subjective experience of those vibrations, then obviously there would be no sound in that sense because there is no one hearing it.

The only way I can see someone saying that there is a problem with what I am saying is if they disagree with the modern scientific understanding of the world and say something like "to be is to be perceived" along the lines of what George Berkeley said (I am not directly quoting him, but am conveying the idea), but unlike Berkeley, saying there is no God.  Berkeley was a metaphysical idealist, who said that only mind stuff exists, not physical stuff.  But if you were saying something like this, it seems unlikely that you would be asking a question like the one you are asking.

[Mudhammam]

This article is a good read, and essentially answers what I was aiming at (though whether or not it answers correctly is open to debate, as made clear by the comments below): http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/reality/looklike

The bottom line, apparently:

The world as we experience it is necessarily a function of the brain.
And even our conceptions of what the world, or “reality”, would be like are themselves in the brain.

[The Grand Nudger]

They are (brain function), but that doesn't mean that our brains are always wrong.  We have a whole array of equipment available to give us a second opinion when we have reason to believe that they are.  Both my biology -and- the  spectrophotometer, for example, will tell you that the oceans are blue, it's just that my biology and the spectrophotometer use different shorthand, just as people do when they say blue or azul.  In fact, I could build you a box right now to blind out a small portion of the ocean (say 1 foot by 1 foot?) so you could check it and see...when no one's "looking"..... whether or not the equipment changes it's tune.  I'm betting that it won't, the conditions of your hypothetical would be fulfilled.  "How something looks" -when there's nothing to do the looking is a strange question though, eh?  It -would- look the same, so far as we can tell, but it would be a moot point, and the question can't be asked (or answered) sensibly in any case - as you're asking someone to describe what your question insists -must not- exist, hypothetically.

In any case, brains function here, in the real world, their use appears to be directly tied to their ability to do work in that real world.  If our brain functions were -just- brain functions I see no reason that we'd suffocate by swallowing large crayons....and yet......so sure, sure, it's all a projection of the minds eye, but things like color and oversized crayons appear to be referent. Our apparatus appears to depend upon the things referred to, the things referred to rarely appear to depend upon our perception of them. Brain function reduces as well, and what that reduces into..can be reduced, on and on it goes, fucking infuriating, eh?