So let's say your in a pitch black cave, and you can't see anything. Is the ground still brown, or is it only brown once I shine my flashlight on it?

You said the cave was pitch black...and you can't see anything...How do you know it's brown in the first place?
I don't think your flashlight can make the ground turn brown...



Mind Freak has spoken!

Hey, is this like, "If a tree falls in the woods, but no one's around to hear it, does it still make a noise?"

The obvious answer would be yes, but then you should think about whether or not sound is effective if nothing can hear it. I guess the same would be with colour?

I've just confused myself

Some things are the colour they are because of the light that shines on them, and the angle to which you are looking at them.

Scientific Fact

Colour is simply reflected visible light. So if there is no light, there is no colour. And thus the floor the cave is black, not brown.

Without light, everything is black.

Heres another imponderable- if you were to create a perfect hollow sphere, the inside of which being a seemless mirror- what wou ld be reflected? Say there was some sort of light source in it.

I'd say the inside of the sphere would illuminate....









Mind Freak has spoken!

Your in a pitch black cave because it's dark. There are no shadows. If you closed and opened your eyes - blink a few times, you wouldn't know the difference.

Is there a shadow that extends beyond where you shine the light? Yes and they extend beyond your focus> it's bright > you look away trying to adjust the focus. You slowly come back to the center of the light - in the circle.

What color a bulb do you have in the flashlight? There are two types you can put in. One - is more yellow-ish and the other white-ish. (You know the 2 types you put in car headlights).

If the ground really was brown, it was really brown before the light hit it. When you shine the light on it ( don't forget the glass covering )- it will turn slightly > uh,,, lighter? yeah lighter.> So if it was black dirt, it would be harder to say if possible - if you start going through the color schematic why you even said brown.

Did you say brown as a trick question? Because if you walk on the dirt, it may change colors too-

You did ask if the ground was STILL brown...

Color only exists when their is light. No light and everything is black. Objects dont actually "have" color. It's just light that illuminates it.

BINGO

Wow this is just like my philosophy lessons at college! This is all we do in it, DEBATE and argue! Its the question of what happens to objects when no one is percieving them? We cannot know whether an object still exists when we arent perceiving it. For example when i put an apple or another object in a drawer i am not perceiving it, when it is in the drawer. But i cannot know if it exists still when i am not doing this. It is only when i open the drawer and see the apple, i know it exists because i am perceiving it with a sense organ - my eyes. Basically the argument is that objects do not exist independantly of sensation.

There is also the arguement that representative realism brings up, this is the idea of seeing the world by something called "sense data". The objects in the world send out data which we then perceive through our sense organs (eyes, mouth, skin etc) as "sense data" or "ideas". We therefore see sense data DIRECTLY and the material world INDIRECTLY. This theory creates a "veil of perception" which we cannot cross, it almost creates 2 seperate worlds. The world of sense data which we think of as our world, and the real material world. The material world causes our experiences but we cannot experience it directly because of this veil.

You may say that the ground does exist as your percieving it with not your eyes, but your touch as you can feel it beneath your feet. But what you cant say, according to representative realism is that, the colour exists as your are not perceiving this particular quality, as it is secondary to the object. Primary and secondary qualities are very confusing. In short a primary quality is there already, as it is independant of the mind. Things being mass (i think), a secondary quality of an object needs to be perceived by the mind, so this is things like colour. Of which you cannot see in a pitch dark cave!

So i think (in my idealist mind) that it doesnt exist as you are not perceiving its colour at that time.

And with the tree in the forest thing mentioned somewhere. If no one is there to hear it (perceive it) then it doesnt exist. But also the tree doesnt exist because its also not being perceived!


Anyway thats my little philsophical rambling done! Just seeing how much i can recall without my notes! I have an exam on this soon!

AAAH, someone told me about this but i didn't understand until you put it like that...thankyou.....hm...i agree with this..

Not true. Black is the presence of all color. White is the absence of color.

First of all, the eye can only perceive color if the light is over 50 lux. Under that, and things merely look black and white and shades of grey. So how powerful is your flashlight?

Also, colors are different when dealing with light versus paint. The three primary colors for paint are red, yellow, and blue. This is subtractive color, and black is all colors, and white is the absence of color.

The three primary colors for light are cyan, magenta, and yellow. This is additive color, and black is the absence of color, and white is all colors mixed. That is why light passing through a prism splits into the rainbow.

So, yes, the color of the ground would depend on the color of the light shining on it. It also depends on the colors that are absorbed by the ground (reflecting the color it appears to be).

In other words, is an apple red because it looks red? Assuming it's not a Granny Smith, or Golden Delicious! An apple is red because it has absorbed all the other colors in the spectrum, reflecting only the red.

This is also ignoring people who are color blind. Many men have trouble seeing red/green. (Maybe this explains traffic accidents!) So for them, the brown ground is some other color entirely. In the light or out of it.

I can't believe I didn't actually get it when I said it...( me being an artist too *damn it* ) see he was asking a trick question you know...

He asked if the ground was STILL brown...how much natural light was there - for there to even be brown YET???

We don't know that....He never told us, if it was day or night or anything....

So how is it still brown when it's dark + pitch black when it started that way before you went into the cave?

By the way, if you can't see anything why are you asking? Isn't that pointless?

I say yes its still that colour just our eyes in that darkness don't see it as that colour until there is more light,light doesn't make something a colour it exposes it.

So to answer the trick question with a trick answer, just because the guy says he has a flashlight, doesn't mean he's not blind.

no no no no, white is the presence of all colors, not black.

if the tree falls, it still disturbs matter, yes it makes a sound even though nobody is there to hear it as sound is just disturbed matter
the brown would still reflect brown even if not perceived if light is shown on it
Still brown means he went in with a light on, and turned it off. the makup of the ground is still the same.

QUOTE(kaiboijin @ Dec 11 2005, 11:11 PM)

Not true. Black is the presence of all color. White is the absence of color.







I already explained this earlier in the post. You're both talking about different things. Subtractive vs Additive colors. Look back and you'll see.

Black is the absence of light. If it is pitch black (assumed no light source) in the cave then the floor of the cave is black, there is no light to reflect from the surface of the object, in this case the floor, therefore the object is black. There's no need to bring philosophy into a question that is solved with science. All colour is reflected light at differant frequencies, in the absence of light, everything is black.

O.K. Let's get really - really specific about something.

I want to rephrase his statement/question using only him as the 'character' and nobody else. I want to see what you would say about it.

'So let's say 'I'm' in a pitch black cave, and 'I' can't see anything. (Bind? no. o.k.). Is the ground still brown, or is it only brown once 'I' shine 'my' flashlight on it?'

Let me answer that for you. Your in a pitch dark cave. You can't see anything because it's dark.

Don't trick me now, I know what you want to say is 'black', you can't say black when there is no color because you can't see the color can you? No, you can't see anything.

So like any pitch dark place, you close your eyes and open them repeatedly, and you see nothing but pitch dark. You also said you can't see anything. ( I already said this before but no one was listening to me)>

The truth is, the ground was always brown.

No not [/i]still[i] brown, always brown.

When you turn your flashlight on in a pitch dark cave what do you see? A cave that already had a brown ground, that is no longer pitch dark, it is just a little less pitch dark.

There- easy- O.K.?

It only becomes brown to us, because light is bounced off the object and into our eye blah blah blah. Objects absorb the different colors of light in different ammounts and bounce the rest off creating color in our eyes. It could appear completely different to something, someone who could see outside the range of visible light for humans.

It's only brown because you shine light onto it.

Bah.

Colour:
The appearance of objects or light sources described in terms of the individual's perception of them, involving hue, lightness, and saturation for objects and hue, brightness, and saturation for light sources.

So if it is dark, there is no colour (anywere). However, the ground retains the physical properties which make light shone off it look brown to our eyes.

So, to our eyes (only), the ground at that moment is not brown. But, it still has the properties that make it brown in the presence of light.

Thank you, EXACTLY. Unless your blind.

well, youve answered your question by asking it.

inside a sphere with a seemless mirror coating, and a lightsource inside. well, what would be reflected would be the light source.... imponderable is how you managed to come up with the question and answer, and not realise you did...

Yeah, well, how would you create a perfect hollow sphere with a light source inside that would float in the middle with zero gravity? How would it be a seamless mirror- what matireal would you use? How is it you think you would even see inside the sphere with the naked eye? No poking holes inside the sphere...no hidden cameras. This is imponderable.

1) How do you make a seemless internal mirror?
2) How do you put any light source in the middle without puncturing the mirror?

O.K. so if you think this up, you find out why he probably wouldn't ask the question, maybe...I do it all the time..