Color Perception

A topic that I find really interesting is the idea of color. I have always just assumed that every physical object in this world obtains the colors we see. I have never really thought about the fact that color, including many other aspects of the world, is something that is actually psychophysical, and not just physical. The colors that we see are actually there because of the wavelengths of objects that are reflected by those colors. Surfaces have light reflected off of them differently. None of that technical stuff comes to mind when looking around in the world, because what we see just comes easy to us. Just like humans have brains that give them the ability to see the wavelengths of color, different animals have certain abilities that make them perceive the world differently. For example, bees can see ultraviolet light, which can attract them to the area of the flower where they need to pollinate. Fire flies can see through bioluminescence, and this feature helps them attract mates. They certainly do not see the colors humans see. This proves that in fact, what humans see, is not necessarily what is right, it is just what we perceive that helps us survive efficiently. Another really interesting aspect to color is how light and dark makes us perceive colors differently. When lights are shut off and you are looking at objects, we cannot see colors. Nothing has changed of the physical property of the object, or the wavelength that is being reflected. But, since we use rods in the dark, not cones, our rods only have one kind of photopigment molecule. Therefore, we can not differentiate between colors in the dark. It’s very interesting to me that even when sitting in the dark, the actual colors that we would see in the light are still present.

One thought on “Color Perception

  1. Eligio Paul Zaragoza

    Great post! As you mentioned, it is very interesting how we as humans acquire color. Like you, I also thought color was a physical entity that each object attained. So learning that it is rather a psychophysical process that we conceptualize within the brain was an eye opener. In regards to not seeing/perceiving color in the dark; you are right it is mainly due to the fact that rod cells only attain the photopigment, rhodopsin. Thus, since rhodopsin is very sensitive to light; its threshold is reached much sooner than the cone cells. As a result, the saturation of the light causes the rod cells to photobleach and begin to regenerate; hence this why you cannot see color.

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