Mr. I and the Experience of Color

(I don't remember whether we're all supposed to post, or only some us, but here's mine:)

Different parts of our reading for this week, and in particular Arnheim and Sacks, brought me back to one of the papers I had to write for a tutorial while at Oxford. The paper was specifically concerned with critiquing an argument by John Campbell called the Simple View, which kind of takes a Wittgensteinian/quietist approach to explaining the underlying nature of color. A number of philosophers of mind are very interested in color in general, as it plays a major role in human culture and art, and has more than once taken the spotlight in 20th-century philosophical debates about perception and consciousness. I'll briefly try to summarize some of the things I discussed in my paper, and then tie it into Sack's case study of Mr. I.

One of the major things debated between philosophers of color is its "underlying metaphysical and epistemological nature". For those who have learned some of the science of color (and we did in our readings for this week!), it may be apparent to some that a certain feature of what we call colors is not entirely explained by our scientific knowledge of the eyes and visual cortex. This is to say that the supposed "redness" of red is not intersubjective, and for example, we cannot explain what red "looks like" to someone born blind; it doesn't appear that we have the correct kind of words in the English language that allows us to describe "the redness" to anyone else or even to ourselves. Another way of thinking about it is that if we take a microscope and look at a leaf, we will see that its green color comes from the chlorophyll. If we "zoom" in enough at the chlorophyll, eventually we will no longer see any green color (remember that everything is "colorless" after a certain microscopic level -- all those electronic microscope photographs you've been shown are false-color images). Then if we zoom out again until we can see the color once more, and readjust the microscope to focus specifically on where it is, the moment we zoom in again it will disappear. We can keep zooming in and out, readjusting to the point of perfection, but we will never find the "part" of the physical object that is inducing the color experience we perceive (or alternatively, find the microstructural aspects of light that explain how certain wavelengths of it "look" the way they do).

What this means is hotly debated among different philosophers of mind. For some, the issue is merely that our science isn't good enough -- at some point, the sciences will give us some kind of knowledge about the microstructural aspects of light or our visual system (or both) that will solve the perceived issue, and even allow us to accurately explain what red "looks like" to someone born blind. For others, color is one of the features of human perception that truly subjective or perceiver-dependent, and it has a kind of special ontological status (e.g. objects are disposed to induce in us the experience of color). For John Campbell, there is no issue related to color at all, and colors are some kind of sui generis and intrinsic property of objects whose nature is already transparent to us. I won't go into the merits and pitfalls of each position, but I do think that Mr. I's case may help shed some light on the issue (that's a bad pun).

What I found most interesting about Sack's case study was how Mr. I could discriminate wavelengths of light using Zeki and Land's "Mondrians", unlike the typically colorblind individuals, but could simply not, as Sacks tries to find the right words for,

"Translate the discriminated wavelengths into color..."

"Arrive at colors on the basis of information about wavelengths, edge-matching, etc..."

"Construct color as an element of the visual world."

What is fascinating to me is how apparently Mr. I could make distinctions between colors based merely on wavelength (and without help from different amounts of gray) without the apparent experience of color. So while we typically explain that some such certain objects we are viewing are color X, Y, and Z because of their respective combinations of wavelengths of light striking our retina, Mr. I's case seems to demonstrate that the experience of the color truly may not be metaphysically tied to the specific wavelengths. Put another way, although we refer to "yellow" as the color we see when viewing light with a wavelength between 570 and 590 nm (in a globalized and Westernized culture), Mr. I's case suggests that our respective experiences of yellow are not universal or even necessarily similar. If both me and Mr. I can distinguish yellow from orange based on wavelength (and the two colors have equal amounts of white/black/gray), but he cannot experience the colors themselves, then the experience of color must not be metaphysically tied (in some form or other) to wavelength.

If not that, than I think that at least Mr. I's case helps us in trying to answer the question "are the colors that I see the same colors that you see?" by suggesting that we'll be more helped by studying the particulars of the visual association cortex than the particulars of light itself.

Cultural Influences on our perception of color

Alison Adams 

Art & Visual Perception 

Week 2: Readings 

Cultural Influences on our perception of color 

In the two Oliver Sachs articles that we have read so far, we have learnt about two different men with two entirely cases who were both similarly forced to live in worlds where they had to readjust to a world of confusion and bewilderment. Virgel was a man who lost his vision entirely at a young age and was forced to enter into a world of darkness where he could no longer enjoy his sight. After this, he was asked to do the same thing again when he went through a procedure to regain his vision. He was technically given his vision back yet he was just as confused, if not more taken aback, by the vision that he now had and the memory and understanding that he lacked to interpret what he was now seeing. 

In “The Case of the Colorblind Painter” Oliver Sachs introduced us to Mr. I, a man who was forced into a world of colorblindness after an accident left him with brain damage. Just as Virgel felt when he first entered his unfamiliar world of darkness, Mr. I felt that “He had spent his life as painter; now even his art was without meaning, and he could no longer imagine how to go on” (pg. 6). Although Mr. I had seen and identified colors in his mind before he could no longer see them, he could no longer retain this information once he went colorblind. “He knew all the colors in his favorite paintings, but could no longer see them, either when he looked or in his mind's eye. Perhaps he knew them, now, only by verbal memory” (pg. 7). Just as was the case for Virgil, it seemed that although he had once had one, he now lacked an understanding of what objects he was presented with and he was instead left with confusion. Mr. I was now to encounter “difficulties and distresses of every sort” (pg. 8). Mr. I would now experience, against his will, what it was like to live as a household pet and experience the world through only two colors- black and white. 

Unfortunately, it was more than his vision of color that Mr. I had lost in his accident. “He knew all about color, externally, intellectually, but he had lost the remembrance, the inner knowledge, of it 

that had been part of his very being. He had had a lifetime of experience in color, but now this was only a historical fact, not something he could access and feel directly. It was as if his past, his chromatic past, had been taken away, as if the brain's knowledge of color had been totally excised, leaving no trace, no inner evidence, or its existence behind” (pg. 13). This reminded me of when I read Sach's article about Virgil and how he had been able to see when he was a kid but it was the time that he was in limbo during his state of coma that he lost his memory of what he had once seen and was therefore, unable to remember what it was to have vision once he got it back and it was rendered just as useless as when he didn't have it at all. Although Mr. I once had an understanding and knowledge of color, it went away with his lose of color vision. Although he could once understand the world through his vision of color he now “found the world alien, empty, dead, and grey” (pg. 15). Mr. I now lived in a world that he was not familiar with and that did not have the stability that he knew when he was part of a color world. 

I read this article after all the other assigned readings and after I learnt about the science behind how we perceive color and I heard from Arnheim that “No one will ever be sure that his neighbor sees a particular color exactly the same way he himself does” (pg. 330). I then began to think of the ways that culture influences our perception of color. Arnheim says “When a person is called upon to choose between shape relations and color relations, his behavior will be influenced by a variety of factors” (pg. 335). I began to wonder what composes my interpretations of colors, shapes, and objects and how my perception of what I see is influenced by my memories and experiences.  

Sachs touches on this question of mine when he said: “It is at higher levels that integration occurs, that color fuses with memories, expectations, association, and desires to make a world with resonance and meaning for each of us” (pg. 29). It is so interesting to me how much our vision, in several different aspects, is effected by who we are as a person and what he have experienced differently in comparison with other people and how they see the world. 

As an artist, I also felt particularly sympathetic for what Mr. I had to go through. Sachs said: “This sense of loss and shock was doubled and redoubled for Mr. I, for he had not only lost the beauty of the natural world, and the world of people, and of the innumerable objects whose colors are part of daily life, but he had also lost the world of art, he felt- the world that, for fifty years or more, had absorbed his profoundly visual and chromatic talents and sensibilities. The first weeks of his achromatopsia were thus weeks of an almost suicidal depression” (pg. 33). It was as though by losing color, a largely significant part of Mr. I's career and life had died and he had to start again, from nothing. 

Color was such a rich part of what composed Mr. I's world. He was constantly painting in color and trying to understand images through color and now he was forced to reinterpret what he saw through black and white. Just as Virgel was forced into a world of darkness as a alien that had to literally feel his way around, Mr. I felt the same loss when his memory of color went. “Mr. I's visual sense, but his aesthetic sense, his sensibility, his creative identity, an essential part of the way he constructed the world- and now color was gone, not only in perception, but in imagination and memory as well...He found himself now not only in an impoverished world, but in an alien, incoherent, and almost nightmarish one. He expressed soon after his injury, better than he could in words, in some of his early, desperate paintings” (pg. 35). He felt desperate to put the pieces of his world back together and to regain his creative identity but this was not so easy to do without a memory of basic color. 

  However, Mr. I finally went on to see some positive light in his loss of color. He came to see a world that was unique and different from what everyone else saw and what he once did envision as well. “Although Mr. I does not deny his loss, and at some level still mourns it, he has come to feel that his vision has become “highly refined,” “privileged,” that he sees a world of pure form, uncluttered by color. Subtle textures and patterns, normally obscured for the rest of us because of their embedding in color, now stand out for him. He feels he has been given a “whole new world,” which the rest of us, distracted by color, are insensitive to” (pg. 39). I wonder how I would react to a world without color and whether I would feel predominantly how Mr. I felt at first or how he felt upon this new realization. I think that I would definitely feel the same depression and loss that he deeply felt at first, but I would soon realize that I had no other option but to accept my state and I might begin to see the world as a whole new experience in vision awaiting me. 

On this aspect of colorblindness, Sachs said: “Jonathan I did not lose just his perception of color, but imagery, and even dreaming in color. Finally he seemed to lose even his memory of color, so that it ceased to be part of his mental knowledge, his mind. Thus, as more and more time elapsed without color vision, he came to resemble someone with an amnesia for color- or, indeed, someone who had never known it at all. But, at the same time, a revision was occurring, so that as his former color world and even the memory of it became fainter and died inside him, a whole new world of seeing, of imagination, of sensibility, was born” (pg. 40). Just as Virgel was forced to readjust to a new way of seeing the world after undergoing surgery to get his vision back, Mr. I eventually found that his loss of color was not by all means a loss but was also an opportunity. I was left with a sense of hope that things would get better for Mr. I and that he would be able to slowly adjust to his new world as he discovered the meaning that lay beneath his slightly blind new world. 

Color Versus Shape

After reading Arnheim’s chapter on color, I was most intrigued by Rorschach’s theory that a person with a preference for shape generally has an, “introverted disposition, strong control over impulses, and a pedantic, unemotional attitude,” while those who respond more to color have an, “openness to external stimuli, are sensitive, easily influenced, unstable, disorganized, and given to emotional outbursts.” He also states that those who are cheerful tend to respond more to color and those who are depressed will more likely respond to shape. I found this last bit quite interesting because initially, I thought that someone depressed would respond more to color than shape. I find that color has much more to do with emotion than shape. Shape is definite and solid. Color differs from eye to eye and evokes memories and experiences, therefore evoking some kind of emotion. Depression consists of intense sadness and loss of hope. Perhaps this is why I felt that depressed viewers would respond more to color – depression deals with a whole new level of emotions. But, if Rorschach is correct, then why would somebody suffering from depression respond more to shape? I think it has to do with a deadened sense of the world and sense of self. A person suffering from depression lives in his or her own dull world that lacks anything with real meaning, thus they might react more to shapes because shapes are definite and unchanging. “Color vision action issues from the object and affects the person; but for perception of shape, the organizing mind goes out to the object.”

Charles Blanc said that, “the union of design and color is necessary to beget paintings just as is the union of man and woman to beget mankind, but design must maintain its preponderance over color. Otherwise, painting speeds to its ruin: it will fall through color just as mankind fell through Eve.” Blanc speaks of a balance between shape and color in order to maintain an aesthetic of beauty, but also of meaning; the elements necessary for a successful painting. For someone like Jonathan I, becoming colorblind threw off this balance in his work, yet he was still capable of creating successful and meaningful paintings through his use of values and shades of gray and black. What does this mean about shades? Can white and black be considered colors? Are they as ‘meaningful’ as primary colors red, blue, and green or are they colors that lend themselves more to shape?

Artist Odilon Redon said, “One must respect black. Nothing prostitutes it. It does not please the eye or awaken another sense. It is the agent of the mind even more than the beautiful color of the palette of prism.” The understanding that I get from his statements is that black may not be either shape or color. It is what the mind uses to perceive the world around us. Actually, I have to admit that I’m having a lot of trouble understanding what Redon perceives black to be. Also, for those who are colorblind – are they seeing black or are they just seeing contrasts in shade?

             When I taught in a first grade class group a couple of years ago I overheard a conversation between two boys, good friends, as they were playing the game “Connect Four.” As you probably know, “Connect Four” is a variant of Tic-Tac-Toe played with black and red checker pieces, the object being to “connect four” of your pieces before your opponent. The boy who was playing with the black pieces had had a long, hard day and seemed quite depressed. His friend, playing with red pieces, paused in the middle of their game to ask, “Are you blue?” Of course he was expressing concern for the emotional state of his friend. His friend, however, looked puzzled and angrily replied, “No! I’m black!” thinking that his playmate had become inexplicably confused about the color of the game pieces they were using; he was intent on forging ahead and winning the game. His concerned friend explained, “No, blue can mean sad. Or down. Are you feeling sad?” Still, this thoughtful query was brushed aside: “I’m fine. Let’s play.” Now both the boys seemed rather sad.

            The connection between color and emotion is fascinating—and fraught. As

 we can see in the case of these two boys color is often the best vocabulary we have to describe emotion since it speaks to a level of experiencing that language struggles to capture. But because everyone’s experience, everyone’s relationship with emotion and sensation, is different it is often the case that meaning expressed this way falls, so to speak, on “deaf ears.” Attempts to connect by speaking to emotion through color may fail, as in the instance of “Connect Four.”  But that little story also speaks to larger questions about the way people perceive the use or value of sensory and emotional experience; all too often it is brushed aside for the sake of “winning the game,” of achieving a clear form but failing to respect the power of the feelings at play and one’s relationship to them.

In these two boys’ interaction I see the tension between form and color Arnheim described as the difference between a romanticist and a classicist. He writes, “Emotion strikes us as color does. Shape, by contrast, seems to require a more active response” (Arnheim 336). He goes on to emphasize the long artistic and philosophical tradition that privileges form over color (336-7). I’m curious about the notion of emotion as a passive experience. Doesn’t emotion require an active response as well? Wasn’t it a feeling of intense despair brought on by the loss of color in his world that compelled Jonathan I to actively seek out the response of Dr. Sacks? More to the point, the gray world that Jonathan I found himself trapped in made it extremely difficult for him to take effective and fulfilling action. In a similar sense, color (momentarily) drained from the world of those two little first grade boys when one proved unwilling to acknowledge the place of emotion in their interaction.

Clearly color’s connection to emotion and expression make it a topic of heated debate, but why must the result of the debate be to compose a sort of hierarchy? I was certainly disturbed by the statement of Charles Blanc cited by Arnheim: “the union of design and color is necessary to beget painting just as is the union of man and woman to beget mankind, be design must maintain its preponderance over color. Otherwise painting speeds to its ruin: it will fall through color just as mankind fell through Eve” (qtd. in Arnheim 337).  This seems an unnecessary and unfair distinction to say the least.

            Just as Einstein came to prove that the particle nature of light need not be an idea lost to the past, just as the value of Goethe considerations of color took time to find their moment, so too ways of seeing which seem somehow unsophisticated or somehow unlikely may serve a useful function within a larger whole. Heinz Werner, the theorist whose interpretation of the experiment that asked children to chose between color and form Arnheim cites in his chapter (335), also emphasized the need to respect the emotional and sensory level of our experience. Accessing unwieldy emotion may illuminate elements of experience that transform our “organizing” intellect and create a path for insight. Emotion certainly does make life colorful and urges us to strive to appreciate its wholeness, its interconnectedness, its relationships. An appreciation for color also reminds us of creative difference.

The unanswerable question of whether we experience color in the same way alerts us to be sensitive, curious, and respectful of the differences in our experience. As Arnheim writes,   “No one will ever be sure that his neighbor sees a particular color exactly the same way he himself does” (Arnheim 330). Color itself can remind us of the infinite vastness and variety of experience. Rather than diminishing this question by chalking it up to being the simple state of affairs, it seems possible to look to this as grounds for creative discourse and acts of caring. Remembering that, as Livingstone writes, “your experience of red differs from mine simply on the basis of knowing that our life experiences have been different, ” might prevent us from making damaging and unfair assumptions—might prevent us from creating restrictive hierarchies (Livingstone 33).  We might be thoughtful enough to ask, “Are you blue?” or to acknowledge to such concern with a creative, colorful appreciation.