Re: Futurese: Colours

Dear Javier,
Thank you for clearing up the point about RGB values and so on. However,
some problems still remain! My argument is not that there are more types of
one colour than another, but that a given colour term (red, for example) is
seen as different in quality, rather than quantity, from another (blue, for
example).
How many distinct types of red can I perceive? That's easy - one, i.e., red.
There are other distinct-to-me colours which the colour system of English
broadly includes in red (maroon, vermilion...) and others which are included
similarly in blue (cerulean, eau-de-nil(!) or whatever) but if asked, a
native speaker of English would still intuit maroon and vermilion as members
of the 'red set'. Similarly, speakers of those languages that have only two
colour terms would see our colour terms as members of the 'dark set' or
'light set'. All humans, unless they have some optical recognition problem,
perceive these colours on their retinas as 'colours', i.e., quantitatively,
but describe them quantitatively, that is, in a cultural/linguistic setting.
Mike

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