Thread: Is it possible to dream a new color?

For a short answer, no.

Is it possible you've seen it in my DJ? That's one of my far fetched goals. I honestly don't believe it's possible. You eye has cones (or rods, I dunno) that pick up three basic colors. Red, blue, and yellow (correct me if I'm wrong). I'd venture to say that we see every possible combination of that in waking life. I'd love to be able to, but I don't see any way it could happen.

I believe it is red, green and blue. Anyway, the perception of color is produced in the brain not in the eyes, so it seems possible that you can perceive a new color in your dream when you your vision is not from your eyes.

I just thought of a new question, would it be possible to see out of something other than your eyes in your dream? Like perhaps your finger? What would it look like to see out of your finger? or perhaps develop 360 degree vision?

Man I am coming up with a whole bunch of interesting questions tonight!

first off, it is red green and blue.

it could be possible, since in a dream colours arent made of light, they are just colours which you think of.

and ive heard of 360 vision, im pretty sure thats been done.

This is all theoretical on my part, but if you look at a standard color wheel you'll notice that the blue parts of the spectrum seem awfully compressed compared to the reds and especially the greens. Your eyes, you see, suck at blue. While dreaming your mind is formulating all your visuals internally, so it may be possible to create a color wheel in your dream that is evenly spread out is if your eyes were capable of perceiving equal amounts of red, green, and blue. While you're awake you're at the mercy of your sense organs, but while dreaming... perhaps not?

I don't believe this is possible simply due to the following reason:

Lucid dreaming is nothing magical. It's your brain (which is you) reproducing real life experiences or guessing what it thinks something will be like. Try to sit down for a minute and come up with a colour that is not a mixture of any colours we have today. Can't come up with something? Then neither can your brain...

none of us said anything about magical, we are all talking about what the brain can do when it sees without eyes

no its impossible... Your brain would have to have experienced a new colour before, and if a new coulour was to exist like... It would be impossible to describe because you can't say its a bluey green, or whatever cause that already exists. Unless you make yourself see x rays or something but even still we don't know what x rays would look like if our brain could comprehend them....

Originally Posted by slash112

none of us said anything about magical, we are all talking about what the brain can do when it sees without eyes

He answered the question very well IMO

We have already produce every colour possible using computers. Even some colours we can't see ouselves.

So technically, no. Since there are no new colours.

Originally Posted by Michael

For a short answer, no.

For a long answer, - fuck no!

Originally Posted by Mercen_505

Your eyes, you see, suck at blue.

Our eyes don't necessarily suck at blue it's just as blue is a result of close wavelengths, when those wavelengths become closer they stop being light and become UV radiation, which we can't see.

It's probably not possible to come up with a new colour because new colours don't exist, when they vary too much from the RGB scale the stop being colours,

definitely a cool dream goal. Only issue I see with this is describing the color later on.

Also it's important for the color to be a true color/tint and not something like say, purple-goldenish

for an even longer answer- everything in a dream is based upon your past experience, so if you haven't seen a new colour in WL your brain doesn't know what to feed your sight sense. I would say no, we can only see in dreams the colours we see in WL.

tech

you guys are all stupid, the 3 colors are red blue and yellow, and everything else is based off of them.

you couldnt see a new color because they wouldnt be colors, they would be something that our brains couldnt comprehend. i cant even begin to explain it.

Originally Posted by Banana

you guys are all stupid, the 3 colors are red blue and yellow, and everything else is based off of them.

you couldnt see a new color because they wouldnt be colors, they would be something that our brains couldnt comprehend. i cant even begin to explain it.

Seems like everybody has pretty much said that, just with more effort. And less abuse.

Originally Posted by Banana

you guys are all stupid, the 3 colors are red blue and yellow, and everything else is based off of them.

you couldnt see a new color because they wouldnt be colors, they would be something that our brains couldnt comprehend. i cant even begin to explain it.

First of all it is Red, Green, and Blue.

Red, Blue, and Yellow (technically Magenta, Cyan, and Yellow) are the primary colors for subtractive materials like paint, which absorb all of the color spectrum except the frequency of light they emit. As opposed to the additive color spectrum (Red, Green, and Blue) which is actually the frequency of light that is emitted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Additive_color
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subtractive_color

It is not an unreasonable hypothesis that you brain could come up with a new color, since it is your brain not than your eyes. I have heard of people who have had near death experiences in which their brain has produce a new color.

Ehh, the thing about each cones are green, blue and red are not entirely true.
It's a layman term.

Our cones are divided in three different types, S (Small), M (medium) and L (Large) spectral sensitivites.

The use of the RGB model is just to make it convenient.

As you see here, our cones does not peak at the RGB colours

wow...you people must not be very imaginative or something because all i see here are negatives. Unfortunately, all of you are wrong...sorry. It is possible, and several people have dreamed up new colors. I am one of these people. Also unfortunately, some of you are correct in predicting that it would be very hard for the waking mind to comprehend these colors. I believe this is because they are physically hard to see and hurt the eyes. Of about twenty people that i know of that have dreamed different colors there are only three colors that have come about and the only way to describe them is, of course, by using existing colors so it isn't very accurate. the three colors are: a dark green red (that's the one i dreamed), a grey/orange purple, and a turquoise red. now its hard for me to keep the exact picture in my head because it was so long ago but it was most definitely one of the more bizarre experiences i've had. just putting this out there to say, yes, it is most definitely possible.

Originally Posted by ray

wow...you people must not be very imaginative or something because all i see here are negatives. Unfortunately, all of you are wrong...sorry. It is possible, and several people have dreamed up new colors. I am one of these people. Also unfortunately, some of you are correct in predicting that it would be very hard for the waking mind to comprehend these colors. I believe this is because they are physically hard to see and hurt the eyes. Of about twenty people that i know of that have dreamed different colors there are only three colors that have come about and the only way to describe them is, of course, by using existing colors so it isn't very accurate. the three colors are: a dark green red (that's the one i dreamed), a grey/orange purple, and a turquoise red. now its hard for me to keep the exact picture in my head because it was so long ago but it was most definitely one of the more bizarre experiences i've had. just putting this out there to say, yes, it is most definitely possible.

If you can describe the coulors with reference to existing colours then it is not a new colour. But thanks for being polite Ok now im going to fire one of my big theories at you (I can never explain this to someone with words)

What i see as red could actually be what you see as blue and vice versa, but noone will ever no the difference because, from the day we're born or whatever your being told this is red this is green etc etc.... Please note this is purely hypothetical and in no way contributes to the conversation, i just want to get someone to understand

First: I think this should be moved.

Second: What if one could see ultraviolet? Or infrared? Wouldn't that register as a new color to us? Obviously, you can't do that in a dream, because the color you saw would be scientifically inaccurate and you can't comprehend colours you haven't seen, anyway.

Also, yeah, it's a pretty widely discussed topic, Lucid fanatic. As long as my colors are equally different to me, than from you, it would never be noticed.

So if
My red=your yellow
My yellow= your blue
My blue= your red

We'd never notice, since you couldn't hold up two different (different to you) colors to me and get me to say they are the same.

But if your yellow and red were both equal to my blue, we would notice that I am some form of color-blind. I would be convinced that a school bus and fire truck, from your frame of reference were the same color. Not that this is factually what causes color-blindness, I have no idea what causes it. You would just appear color blind.

Originally Posted by Banana

you guys are all stupid, the 3 colors are red blue and yellow, and everything else is based off of them.

you couldnt see a new color because they wouldnt be colors, they would be something that our brains couldnt comprehend. i cant even begin to explain it.

Why is everbody freaking out about this comment? It's like the guy makes a slightly under-hand comment, and then you get all of these tossers pulling out little screens with masses of scientific information trying to out-do him/her to prove some kind of point. WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

So could you all just click off wikipedia, and start being a bit more civilised.

Originally Posted by Lucid fanatic

If you can describe the coulors with reference to existing colours then it is not a new colour.

sigh..... i see i didn't explain that thoroughly enough. What i meant by my using existing colors and it not being accurate, is that it wasn't a green or red but something in-between. neither green nor red but if i had to put it on a color wheel i would guess it would go there. because no one has a name for it i can not properly explain what it looked like. just like if we had never seen a cat before and we suddenly stumbled across one we would have no idea what to call it.we would use what we already know to try to categorize it and we may call it a dog.even though it is obviously not a dog.it reminds me of when the spanish came over with horses and the native americans saw the horses but did not know what they were so they called them dogs.we try to find a place for things that we have never seen before in what we already know.that is what the people who have dreamed new colors tried to do with existing colors.hence the 'green/red', 'grey/orange purple', and 'turquoise red'.

I think it may be possible, because I do not think that dreams are just made by past experiences, I've dreamt things I couldnt have seen before or even imagined. Also, I've seen colours that at least were "new" to me during an hallucinogenic experience with mushrooms. The way I could try to describe is like a purple but with a very strange kind of glow.