Hey Erin,
> ERIN
> Example: Let's say one culture has only two color words. Every color was
> either black or white. If you asked a person from this culture whether
> they could see a color difference of a blue crayon and a black crayon and
they
> >> would say no. To them they are both "black". But when given a bunch of
> >crayons
> >> and forced to divy them up to a certain number of groups you see they
do
> >> perceptually see the difference by how they group them.
>
> >RICK
> >Correction: ...you see they do perceptually see A difference. But not
> >necessarily the one we see. A member of your hypothetical culture would
> >likely tell you that he sees several shades of black and white because
his
> >cultural definition of what is real and not real tells him that that's
all
> >there is. The question at hand is whether the cultural filter works pre
or
> >post visualization.
>
> ERIN: True but technically what I see as red and you see is red can not be
> shown either. We have both agreed on calling a certain shade "red" whether
my
> shade is the same as yours who knows. So the fact that we are built with
the
> same makeup of color detection and a Natchez can separate green color
chips
> from blue color chips based on different shades then to me he can "see"
the
> difference.
RICK
This is spurious. It's true that what I see as 'red' and what you see
as 'red' cannot be shown to be the same. But it's also true that you and I
would both count 'red' as one of 7 different colors (roygbiv) each with its
own 'family' of shades. The Natchez, however, only sees six colors
(royXiv). So while we both see some particular 'family of shades' as blue,
and some particular 'family of shades' as shade as green... the Natchez
would see both 'families' as shades of X.
ERIN
To make my point clearer let me give two examples
> 1) let's say there are three people, you, the Natchez dude, and a person
from
> your culture who is green-blue colorblind.
> I think the only way a person fails to distinguish blue and green shades
is if
> their biological make-up to detect color is different. Since you could
teach a
> Natchez dude the difference and not a colorblind it hard for me to say
they
> don't "see" the difference.
RICK
But 'teaching' the Natchez dude to see the difference would entail ridding
him of his culture's definitions of what is real and what is unreal. That
is, by lowering his 'Natchez objectivity'. So this example still doesn't
help place whether the social-filter is pre or post visualization. We are
still left to wonder whether his diminished 'Natchez objectivity' has
allowed him to 'visualize' the light, or 'recognize' the light. Though we
agree that the green-blue colorblind guy would never see the difference, no
matter what his 'objectivity' was like.
ERIN
> 2)There is a gender difference in the number of color words a female and a
> male has.
RICK
Really? I thought we all got our words from 'Websters'? Is there some
secret feminist-color dictionary you gals have been hiding from us?
ERIN
Imagine this scene..(I have no idea about these two colors but they
> are supposed to be shades of off-white if somebody is familiar with them
and
> don't think they work in this example I will look up two that do--probably
> should have looked in a jcrew mag for ideas).
> Martha Stewart: Could you hand me a set of papayawhip colored napkins,
they
> are right next to the set of lemonchiffon napkins. My guess most people
> probably would be able to see the difference of the two napkins but just
as
> different shades of off-white. The difference doesn't seem important
(except
> to Martha) to go to the effort for the different shades but that doesn't
mean
> that I can't "see" the difference.
RICK
When I tell Martha I can't see the difference between papayawhip and
lemonchiffon I don't mean it literally. I just mean that I don't have
enough experience to know which name refers to which shade of off-white.
But if Martha held the two napkins up next to each other I would quickly be
able to identify them both as different shades of white... I assume the
Natchez would also.
Now let's say Martha held up a green napkin next to a blue napkin and
asked both the Natchez and I to name the shade of each. I would tell her
that one is some shade of blue I can't name and one is some shade of green I
can't name. The Natchez, however, would see the difference as the same
kind of difference he saw between the papayawhip and the lemonchiffon. He
would tell her they're both some shade of bleen/glue and he couldn't name
the shade of either one.
That is, I would SEE two different colors, in shades I don't RECOGNIZE.
The Natchez would SEE one color in two different shades he didn't RECOGNIZE.
rick
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