The last thing I want to talk about today
is a wonderful argument called the
perception of color that was submitted by
Jose Alberto Mosquea Del Orbea.
And Jose, I hope I've pronounced your name
correctly or at least not too
inaccurately.
The argument goes like this.
Premise 1, Joe sees as red what Sue sees
as blue.
Premise 2, Sue sees as red what Joe sees
as blue.
Premise 3, Joe labels red what he sees as
red.
Premise 4, Sue labels red what she sees as
blue.
Premise 5, Joe labels blue what he sees as
blue.
Premise 6, Sue labels blue what she sees
as red.
Premise 7, both of them see the green
color as green and label it green.
Premise 8, only Sue has this
characteristic vision.
Premise 9, the rest of the population sees
the colors just as Joe does.
Conclusion, so both of them coincide when
they label a color and Sue may not realize
that her color vision differs from that of
the rest of the population.
Now, this argument has a very weakly
stated conclusion in the version that I
just described.
It's that Sue may not realize that she
sees colors differently than the rest of
the population does.
Now, to achieve that conclusion, you
wouldn't even need all the premises that
Jose put in that argument.
It might be true that Sue is color blind
and never realizes that she sees colors
differently than the rest of the
population.
It's possible, it's unlikely but it's
possible.
But, Jose is trying to describe a
situation where the difference between
Sue's color vision and Joe's color vision
is systematic and it's not tracked in the
labeling that they use.
And Jose's point is that, when the
difference in color vision is systematic
and not tracked by the labeling in the
colors they use, not tracked by their
color nomenclature.
Then, Sue very well, may not realize.
It's not just a remote possibility that
she may not realize.
Just like someone who's color blind may
never realize that they're color blind,
because let's say they're never tested.
It's that Sue very well may not realize;
very likely may not realize that she sees
colors differently from the rest of the
population.
Now, it's an intriguing argument, but I'll
tell you why I'm not convinced.
The argument is, in a certain respect,
one-sided.
While it describes the situation in which
the normal ways, many of the normal ways,
by which Sue might come to know that her
vision differs from that of the rest of
the population are cut off from Sue.
She doesn't label colors in a way that
would betray the difference between her
color vision and Joe's or that of the rest
of the population.
It doesn't consider the fact that Sue
might, as a result of her deviant vision,
have very different aesthetic tastes than
Joe.
So, for instance, while lots of people
love Picasso's blue period, and thanks to
you Jose, I thought about a Spanish
artist.
While many people might love Picasso's
Blue Period, Sue might find Picasso's Blue
Period to be full of paintings that just
don't make any sense.
Because, after all, the blues that
Picasso's Blue Period paintings are full
of, don't look blue to Sue.
They look some other way to Sue.
And so Sue might not understand those
paintings at all.
She might find them repellent.
So, there are lots of other sources of
information that Sue could use to find out
that her color vision might very well
differ from the color vision of other
people.
And this is what I sometimes suspect when
I find that people don't like, let's
suppose, wonderful Manchego cheese.
If someone doesn't like Manchego cheese,
the only conclusion I can draw from that,
is that what Manchego cheese tastes like
to them must be very different from what
it tastes like to me.
Maybe their taste buds and my taste buds
work very differently.
And so, the way Manchego cheese tastes to
them, must be more like, let's say what
foie gras tastes like to me.
And that's why they don't like it.
So, while the premises of Jose's argument
might all be true.
And they might lead Sue not to be able to
tell that her color vision differs from
the color vision as Joe, or of other
people in the population.
It's also true that Sue might still very
well be able to tell that her color vision
differs from the color vision of Joe and
of other people by considering differences
in her aesthetic preferences.