Thread: I've heard that Lucid Dreamers can see New Colours

Originally posted by dreamboat
How would one go about describing them ?.

Well, for the most part, I pretty much see exactly the same colors, but in a Sci-fi, a white robe is a white I never see in real life, so if that counts......

It is scientifically impossible to see new colors in your dreams. Try imagining a new color, right now. Can't?

Indeed.

I did dream of a new colour once but on awakening I could not visualize it. Makes me think that it was just an "idea of a new colour". Though I could have sworn it was new in the dream.

What did this color look like, if it exists?

This is what is Bugging me. In the dream it truly was a "new colour" but in 'real' life I have no way of describing it.

Well, was it on the blue side, yellow, green, or red? There are many colors in the world. It could have been tan, peach, turquiose, gold, silver, etc. Was it kind of on the brown side, slightly?

I agree with Wasup!

Maybe it was just a mish mash of various shades which I believed to be a new colour. Either the dream was Flawed or it really was a genuine experience.

Yeah...I kind of agree that there aren't any really unique colors in LDs, & I've been doing them everyday for 14 years, so I am a bit experienced..

Then this would only go to show that Lucid Dreaming has it's limitations.

Not really. It is only that you cannot imagine a never-seen color. But you can imagine alot more, & whatever you can imagine will happen in a LD, like enhancing the difficulty on a Video Game, Bobbing for carmel apples in a bowl of sprite, flying, & more!

Mmmmmmmmm. Well maybe. I am still pondering on this one. Maybe out of our normal frequency range. ie considering sound as an example. Ok, I'm shooting in the dark now. However it is a little disappointing that we are limited to our own reflections of true life experiences and cannot really experience anything truly 'Outside of Ourselves" in Lucids. Maybe I will go with OOBES instead.

To see a new colour, you have to start with a new primary colour. However, it would be impossible for us to see this colour anyway, because the eye is sensitive to mixtures of red, green and blue light. The reason red, green, and blue are primary colours is because these are the ones evolution chooses as primary colours. We are never going to see a new colour in real life, because we can't. It's impossible

Originally posted by dreamboat+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dreamboat)</div>

Maybe out of our normal frequency range[/b]

If we could see a bigger range of the light spectrum, then we could have a new primary colours for something like x-ray. Our new primary colour would be 'x-ray.' What does that look like anyway?

<!--QuoteBegin-dreamboat

Makes me think that it was just an \"idea of a new colour\"

Isn't that just what colour's are anyway? If you ask someone to define 'red,' you can't really... you can use emotions perhaps. To me colours are really just an idea. Maybe you can imagine a new colour. But that's like asking a blind person to dream about red, but maybe even worse.

EDIT: My thoughts now are, what made colours "red, green, and blue." Aren't colours just ideas inside our brain that are sensitive to light wavelengths? They don't really exist in the real world as colours then, do they? So to see a new colour, the brain would have to have another system for it, and i'd bet that's not something we can just easily imagine up with a bit of mediation; it would be too complex, not just an idea, but an entire system of the brain dedicated to making us see colours from photons.

I don't think that any of that is possible, b/c we cannot imagine colors we know nothing about!

Maybe I am getting out of my depth here, but is the colour spectrum Universal. What I mean is, could little green men for example see "New Colours".

Not really! Sorry

Well. My Dog hears Sounds that I can't so why not colours.

Well, that is typical, b/c our hearing doesn't usually match that of a dog's, unless you have a disability. Well, I jump when my cat does, but I wasn't able to talk until I was 4, so that could explain that!

Originally posted by dreamboat
Maybe I am getting out of my depth here, but is the colour spectrum Universal. What I mean is, could little green men for example see \"New Colours\".

Would they see the 'visible' spectrum in how we see red, green and blue? How do we know animals see the same thing inside their heads as we do? Dogs see in black and white (apparently).

We see this part of the EM spectrum because it was a useful thing for us to do, (in evolution terms) what if another creature evolved to see further outwards on the spectrum?

EDIT: I just realised, other animals do see different parts of the spectrum.. snakes!

How Snakes See Two Ways

Squirrels use infrared against snakes

what does infrared look like to a snakes mind?

However, it would be impossible for us to see this colour anyway, because the eye is sensitive to mixtures of red, green and blue light.[/b]

I see that you used the words 'see', 'eye' and 'light', even though none of them are present in a dream, unless you make it.

I believe that you could perhaps imagine new colors. Seeing as colors are dependant on perception, the color would have to be custom. Obviously you wouldn't be able to see it in life, and others would never see it how you do. You would never be able to describe it.

The only real way to find out for sure is to try it. Maybe it will work, maybe it wont.

I don't think that any of that is possible, b/c we cannot imagine colors we know nothing about![/b]

Yes we could.

Ramble ramble

and here's something else i know: no two people see colours in the same way...our eyes register it differently, so the shade might be slightly different.
Example: My friend and i were looking at a metal panel. She said it was grey, I said it was greenish-gray, with more emphasis on the green.

Originally posted by dreamboat
How would one go about describing them ?.

I have had three or for dreams where I have become lucid. When the dream seemed to have a color based theme to it, I focused my attention on color. When I did, they became much more intense and vivid.
It had seemed that I was seeing colors outside the color spectrum we know.
It was most likey an illusion.
But aside from the primary colors, the pallette of colors that can be created with secondary colors seems andless so who knows.
All i do know is that in the dream it was so visually stimulating that it felt pysical as well.

Do we dream in color?
Dreamboat, Thought that you might find this topic intersesting too.

I see no reason why not to be able to see a new colour in a dream, but it would be impossible to describe. It would be complete illusion of course, but then that's what a dream is to start with

How do you explain the colour green without pointing to examples? (for example)

I am glad to see indications that this might be possible, because I have been hoping to accomplish this for a long time. I really did not know how I could go about visualizing a new color, but I had hoped that lucid dreaming could be helpful. Howetzer's and dreamboat's experiences are very encouraging to me! :happygolucky:

It is true that other colors do exist. Many fish and birds have four primary colors, and some hummingbirds have five. Many mammals only have two, but some mammals, including primates, have three. Usually, the fourth color receptor (called a cone) picks up ultraviolet light. In fact some women have a genetic mutation that allows them to see four primary colors. This has been proven by some experiment I don't completely understand involving the person making different colors by blending primary-colored lights.

Also, there is something else that has puzzled me. The three cones that we see color with are not sensitive to light of one specific frequency, but to a wide range of frequencies that peak at red, green, and blue wavelengths. These ranges overlap. This means that if you see green light, your red and blue cones are also activated to some extent. This means that the color green is actually kind of paled compared to what maybe it ought to be. So I have been wondering what would happen if only the green cone was stimulated: would we see a green more intense than green? This has made me reevaluate the meaning of red. Since the green cone is somewhat receptive to the frequency where red peaks, that hue is not a true primary color. I have looked at the part of the spectrum where nothing really registers except red, and it seems to be a very dark burgundy or something. So maybe the primary color red is really like a super-intense burgundy.

Maybe tour brains get used to faded green and just interpret it as vividly as it can. But then I wonder why yellow looks so whitish. Sometimes I wonder if the idea of primary colors is not real, but just a trick of the mechanics of the eye. Maybe our mind just takes the information from the three cones and just applies them to its own color feild in a way that makes sense to it. Maybe the way to add colors is not to add a new primary color, but to slowly stretch your color field to expand it . I'm not really sure. Interestingly, it seems as if Dreamboat added a new primary color and as if Howetzer expanded the color field, but I dunno !


Also, it would be fun to do this with hearing and try to find new pitches. I would not dare try to do this with something as complicated with smell; I am overwhelmed by even trying to isolate primary smells . Maybe LD could be helpful for that as well...