This is a description of the scientific mental model of color. But we can't forget that color is experience as....well, color. Or "qualia." Redness just is.

Sure, we can mathematically represent red as a lower frequency electromagnetic wave than blue, but this useful representation doesn't replace Matisse.

I would. How could a red apple be only potentially a red apple.

By understanding that it may be viewable under different coloured lights, or by analyzing it in the absence of visible light.

-

Why would that show that it was only potentially red? If I viewed my nose from several different perspectives, and it looked a different length from each perspective, would that show that my nose had only a potential length? Why would you think that for an apple to be (actually) red, that it would have to look red whatever the conditions of perceptions are? Why, for an object to be blue, would it have to look blue, even under a yellow light? In fact, if an object looked blue (and not green) under a yellow light, I would believe it was not blue, since I happen to know that blue objects look green under a yellow light.

The importance of the question 'What is being?' notwithstanding, I would agree with Leibniz over Aristotle, for now at least.

My decision has to do with the amount of complexity modern science brings to the question about object hood. Modern science understands the nature of the world in terms of fundamental forces, thus the answer to the question 'What is being?' has been provided in a rather dramatic fashion. And whether intentionally or not science ultimately understands the universe as a whole as being without purpose.

I keep peeling back the properties of objects as one would peel the layers of an onion, so to speak. Like Leibniz, I always end up with endless connections of properties.

I believe that the foremost question in all of this is, how can we locate certain knowledge? For Plato, I know, the solution lies in the metaphysical 'forms'. I guess he means something like, the mathematical structure of substances are permanent possibilities, more pure and everlasting than the examples themselves. A retreat to universals in order to stabilize our knowing. This is rationalism at its finest.

The proof for Plato is that there can be no knowledge of a thing if that thing is one of a kind. There is no knowledge to be gained in the examination of existential objects without recourse to categories of knowledge. The categories logically precede the existential occurances. But the moderns stood all of this purposeful reasoning on its head.

Starting with a universe which contains absolutely nothing except for one object I ask myself: what are the properties of this object?

If the object does not contain its own internal source of light, then it has no color. If the object contains no internal source of heat, then what is its temperature? Whether or not the object possesses the capacity for locomotion, in what direction can it be said to be moving? what is its mass? If it has shape, from where does shape originate? What is the ontological derivation of shape? What is the origin of the nuclear particles?

That's my procedure. Imagining the self alone in the universe and existence, substance and being are then relative to mind, I believe. The end of all science is the unification of mind with body contemplating its own motion as it moves within relative space.

Yes, we are saying that we do not know of the colour. In science, the specific colour or wavelength that is used to analyze different parts of matter is important because they reveal to the scientists certain important features. So in science experiments there is a fixed wavelength but not colour. Since colour is not an item of knowledge, the numerical wavelength is used as a fixed standard. The wavelength serves as a guage for scientific purposes.


As has been alluded to previously in this thread, there is a distinction between colour, which depends upon the human eye, and wavelength, which is relative to its practical implementations.


As has also been said, light is not necessary for an object's existence. The object is said to persist unaffected without external light sources. This is why colour is an accidental property of objects.

By understanding that it may be viewable under different coloured lights, or by analyzing it in the absence of visible light.

But can we stick to your argument, please? Your argument was that the apple is not red, but only potentially red because it does not appear red under all conditions of perception.

But why do you think that argument is valid? Why must an apple appear red under all conditions of perception (for example, if it is perceived under a strong light of a different color) for it to be not only potentially red, but actually red?

Why is that argument a valid argument?

The color of the apple is entirely dependent on the light source and the perceiving organ.

If the sun's light was shifted to a predominantly blue spectrum and the apple remained exactly the same it would still appear different. If the eyeball shifted up into utraviolet and lost red in its spectrum and the apple remained exactly the same it would still appear different.

In fact, it could be that we all see colors differently. It could be that we just agree on the names for which we call the spectrums we see individually as being the same universally.By the design of the eyeball, probably not, but there is still no way to see through another's eyes so the possibility remains open.

I am going to that it is because it is the conditions under which the eyeball perceives the apple which determine the color, not the apple itself or the eyeball for that matter.

The color of the apple is entirely dependent on the light source and the perceiving organ. If the sun's light was shifted to a predominantly blue spectrum and the apple remained exactly the same it would still appear different. If the eyeball shifted up into utraviolet and lost red in its spectrum and the apple remained exactly the same it would still appear different.

In fact, it could be that we all see colors differently. It could be that we just agree on the names for which we call the spectrums we see individually as being the same universally.By the design of the eyeball, probably not, but there is still no way to see through another's eyes so the possibility remains open.

I suppose that's where it has to be determined what is a predicate of what.

I would not go so far as self emanating attributes. But I have been too brainwashed by Aristotle on this subject though. It almost sounds that instead of looking at predicates outside in, you want to look at predicates inside out. To tell the truth, this does seem Leibnizian. God puts everything in a single monad at creation, thus everything reflects in the self contained monad, and what we see is that which reflects the universe most accurately. But even in this though, you still have a divine predicate.

This sounds like Aristotle conclusions as to the nature of God, an unmoved mover. One of the more interesting occupations Aristotle attributed to God was that it was contemplating itself since it is in itself the all perfect being.

But can we stick to your argument, please? Your argument was that the apple is not red, but only potentially red because it does not appear red under all conditions of perception.

But why do you think that argument is valid? Why must an apple appear red under all conditions of perception (for example, if it is perceived under a strong light of a different color) for it to be not only potentially red, but actually red?

Why is that argument a valid argument?

Either we are examining properties of objects or we are asserting norms. Why is red the actual colour of the object when it is potentially blue or green?

An apple does not have to appear red under all conditions of perception for it to be actually red. The question is whether the colour is a potential one or an actual one. Either we are examining properties of objects or we are asserting norms. Why is red the actual colour of the object when it is potentially blue or green?

-

As asked earlier, if a red ball was placed on a cave with absolutely no light source, would it now not be a red ball anymore? And if you think it wouldn't, why?

Hm, I don't see how this is relevant. All you've demonstrated is that you can conjure up a thought experiment. What if the earth was gravity-less, like most of space (that is, the laws of physics changed)? Does the fact that things could have been different, mean that when I jump out this window I won't fall twelve stories? Not that I can see. What is, still is, no matter how much I imagine it to be different.

Just because something could be, doesn't mean we have to consider the possibility plausible. It's more than likely that we see colors similarly. I already made a thread on this a while back. Maybe I'll link to it later if I feel like digging the old thread up.

Just shine different colored lights on an apple and see if the apple appears differently. It is a simple test that you can do to clear up your confusion. You will easily discover that the color of the apple depends on the color of the light you shine on it.

As stated before, of course it would not be a red ball. Nobody would ever say it was a red ball. Color only exists with light. Without light it is a black ball.

Interesting. So I assume that you think depending on how I view a penny, the shape of it changes. I never knew that. In fact, I thought a penny had a particular shape, no matter how I viewed it.

It seems that you do not believe that things have particular colors. Spinach is not green, raspberries are not red, carrots are not orange. If I flashed a green light on a carrot, the carrot is now, according to you, green. But I don't know why you would think that. I'm pretty sure most people would agree that the carrot was still orange, but that it had a green light shining on it which made it look green.

If my son loses a ball under my shed, and tells me, "Daddy, I lost my favorite red ball under my shed", I would go look for it. Say, just for the sake of argument, I find three balls under the shed, but because I cannot see the color of the balls, I bring all three out. I know, however, that only one is the ball my son was referring to. I come out, and after the light hits the balls, I quickly realize that two of the balls are yellow and the third is red. I'm relieved I found the ball, and my son, without hesitance, runs up to me and snatches the red ball out of my hand, exclaiming, "Daddy, thank you!".

It's a wonder how my son knew that that ball was the red one, or why I knew I had found the red ball, despite it not being a red ball since it had been out of light's reach for quite some time. According to you, it was a black ball my son was referring to, but, for some reason, he picked the particular ball he did. You believe it was simply a wild guess my son took? Should I have told my son, "Young fella, once a ball is in darkness, it loses its color and becomes a black ball. I'm sorry, son, but we will never know which one is the red ball ever again"?

I suggest that an object's "true color" is a useful abstraction.

So if Mary walks into a beauty salon (if that is what those places are called nowadays) and gets her hair dyed so that although she was originally a brunette, but walks out a blonde, it is only a useful abstraction to say that the true color of Mary's hair is brunette, but that now it is blonde? Or if I am thinking of buying a coat, and the coat appears to have one shade under the store's florescent light, so I want to take it into daylight to see what the coat's true color is, that is merely a useful abstraction?

I wonder what kind of look recon. and tris. give people when they stop at red lights. Do they curse at the other drivers, arguing that the color is subjective?

Edited*