Comments on: Goethe and color https://habitablezone.com/2013/05/04/goethe-and-color/ Tue, 07 Apr 2026 19:18:10 -0700 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: ER https://habitablezone.com/2013/05/04/goethe-and-color/#comment-23705 ER Mon, 06 May 2013 18:30:24 +0000 http://habitablezone.com/?p=32045#comment-23705 The article is written as if there is some conflict between Goethe's and Newton's conception of light and color, but there really is no contradiction here. The scientist describes color in a different way than does the artist, and so does the psychologist. Each "description of reality" is perfectly valid in its own context, there is no contradiction, we're talking about apples and oranges, and both can exist simultaneosly.. Newton's is reductionist, he correctly and succintly explains what color is in terms of wavelengths or frequencies of electromagnetic radiation. This is undoubtedly and unquestionably true. But color is that which is perceived by the human mind, and it has a psychological interpretation, a reality which is just as valid as Newton's. Many people, and many organisms, cannot see color at all, or they may see colors we can't. They may live in the same universe we do, but they have to deal with it very differently. Not all colors are perceivable, after all. Radio, infrared, ultraviolet, X-rays and gamma radiation are also colors which are invisible to human eyes, but there are machines and other creatures who can detect some of these portions of the spectrum. For the consciousness that perceives the color, there are relations and manifestations which depend on the perceiver, not just what is perceived. Artists can manipulate color to induce certain psychological states, and nature uses color in a variety of ways, communication, camouflage, and perhaps in other ways we can't even imagine. To study these objectively is just as scientific and verifiable as reducing it all to a matter of vibrations in the aether, or discrete photon energy levels (two totally contrasting scientific models, by the way). To say Newton's concept of color is the only correct one is as closed minded as saying you can't play or enjoy music unless you know how sound is transmitted as a pressure wave in a fluid, and how human physiology converts those vibrations into a conscious experience with emotional or symbolic content. A person deaf from birth can learn about acoustics, but can he experience music? Does that make music any less real. There is a real world, but that's not what we experience through our senses. But what we experience is the only evidence we have of that real world. And how we interpret and organize internally those sensory experiences is the only universe we will ever really know. The universe is the totality of what we perceive, and what we imagine. Everything else is just arbitrary models we assemble to help us understand, not what is "out there", but what it means to us "in here". The article is written as if there is some conflict between Goethe’s and Newton’s conception of light and color, but there really is no contradiction here. The scientist describes color in a different way than does the artist, and so does the psychologist. Each “description of reality” is perfectly valid in its own context, there is no contradiction, we’re talking about apples and oranges, and both can exist simultaneosly..

Newton’s is reductionist, he correctly and succintly explains what color is in terms of wavelengths or frequencies of electromagnetic radiation. This is undoubtedly and unquestionably true. But color is that which is perceived by the human mind, and it has a psychological interpretation, a reality which is just as valid as Newton’s. Many people, and many organisms, cannot see color at all, or they may see colors we can’t. They may live in the same universe we do, but they have to deal with it very differently.

Not all colors are perceivable, after all. Radio, infrared, ultraviolet, X-rays and gamma radiation are also colors which are invisible to human eyes, but there are machines and other creatures who can detect some of these portions of the spectrum. For the consciousness that perceives the color, there are relations and manifestations which depend on the perceiver, not just what is perceived. Artists can manipulate color to induce certain psychological states, and nature uses color in a variety of ways, communication, camouflage, and perhaps in other ways we can’t even imagine. To study these objectively is just as scientific and verifiable as reducing it all to a matter of vibrations in the aether, or discrete photon energy levels (two totally contrasting scientific models, by the way).

To say Newton’s concept of color is the only correct one is as closed minded as saying you can’t play or enjoy music unless you know how sound is transmitted as a pressure wave in a fluid, and how human physiology converts those vibrations into a conscious experience with emotional or symbolic content. A person deaf from birth can learn about acoustics, but can he experience music? Does that make music any less real.

There is a real world, but that’s not what we experience through our senses. But what we experience is the only evidence we have of that real world. And how we interpret and organize internally those sensory experiences is the only universe we will ever really know.

The universe is the totality of what we perceive, and what we imagine. Everything else is just arbitrary models we assemble to help us understand, not what is “out there”, but what it means to us “in here”.

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