this post was submitted on 07 Apr 2026
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Given that color theory works the same for anyone that isn't some variety of colorblind, I'd argue we probably see colors the same way or very very close to the same.
the logic might be the same, the perception may not
The logic is based on perception, though. Colors either clash or go together because of how we percieve them and which colors go with which is pretty consistent between cultures and time periods.
But perception is for a large part embedded in memory, which differs individually. For me steel foundries smell amazing because I used to play on the beach near a steel foundry, to the point I need to put effort into understanding that it's actually kind of acrid. So am I still "having the same perception" as someone who doesn't have the lived experience?
This can happen at a society-wide level too. Liminal beige and seafoam green were not intended to create a feeling of disquiet, but of calm neutrality. Modern audiences perceive them as disquieting because they have been systematically used in our society to impose a sense of calm on un-calm situations, such as operating rooms or hallways in sketchy buildings.
I honestly don't know how much of the commonality of associations across cultures comes from instinct and how much comes from the fact that all children learn to live on the same planet with the same physical laws. I would bet that for 99.9% of children, their first experience with a strong sulphur smell is going to be from rotten eggs (or similar rotten goods) that others act disgusted by. So the fact that sulphur smells disgusting to the vast majority of adults is not evidence for instinct over memory. The same goes for green plants, red blood, blue skies, etc.
But not everyone agrees on which colors go together and which clash
Yeah, that wasn't a good example since taste is weird. A better example would be that most people would agree that the pink background on this sprite sheet is almost painful to look at while other, more luminous, elements are fine. If our perception significantly varies, then simple mid-luminance color blocks shouldn't have consistent effects from person to person. Parts of that yellow gradient on the right should cause more strain to someone you know than the magic pink field if perception is strongly variable.
The relative perception of things may be similar while the absolute perception of something differs wildly for everyone
Perception is pretty much always different, but that doesn't mean the underlying thing being experienced is itself different.
If you cut a pickle in half, and give each half to a different person, and one liked it and one didn't, you wouldn't say the pickle tasted different, just that both people perceived the taste differently.
Yes but for all we know one person perceives the pickles in a way i would consider tart or sour while the other may perceive them as sweet. but relative to everyone's individual perception this fits along the broader categories that people may experience. the relatuvity may be the same while the absolute nature is not
colour theory works the same to everyone because it works entirely with how colours relate to each other
if you saw colours rotated on a colour wheel 180° - so that your green is my purple - we wouldn't know
the only difference would be in the hue (difference between green and purple), which isn't all that important. there are plenty of videos on youtube with artists drawing using random hues but with correct values (difference between black and white) and once they switch their work to colour it all just looks, good, a bit abstract for sure but still good
besides, colour theory picks colours that go together well based on their relative position on the colour wheel. teal works well with orange because they're complimentary, opposites on the spectrum. neutral colours are neutral because they're desaturated regardless of hue, neon colours are very saturated regardless of hue
maybe in objective reality we all like the same exact hue of colour, but in our brains we all call it a different word, we'll never know
Kinda true but kinda not. Language alone can affect our perception. Some don't have a word for green or blue, and orange is indistinguishable from light brown given context.
Even when we are almost definitely seeing the same things, there's a lot that can differ.
Your language doesn't change your perception of color.
The primary colors being Red, Yellow, Blue. Is made up. There's no reason those should be the three primary colors.
Magenta, Yellow, and Cyan could be the primary colors if you were taught that.
In that color wheel orange is an intermediate color. The intermediate color between green and yellow can be called chartreuse.
Did you know chartreuse as a color or did you just know it as yellow-green?
Do you not preceve the color chartreuse the same as someone that just knows that name?
You can perceve all the difference colors on this wheel without needing an official word.
As you can see "Brown" is just a darker orange.
Here's the standard color wheel set to Red, Blue, Yellow as primary colors.
You'll notice that magenta is represented as almost a whole different color. It's light red in the CMYK, light purple in RGB.
And
Cyan, baby blue, sky blue, etc. isn't represented. Instead you get a blue-purple they call violet.
Light Red - Magenta
Light Blue - Cyan
Blue-Purple - Indigo
Light Purple - Red-Purple - Fushsia
We as a whole can't decide what constitutes purple/violet in RGB model
Even if someone doesn't know what a true "Indigo" looks like they are still experiencing that color for what it is. They will just call it Bluish-Purple or Purplish-Blue. And unless it really was the exact mix of 50/50 blue and purple it wouldn't be indigo. It would be a equivalent to a Redish-Orange. A Bluish-Indigo or Purplish-Indigo.
Sorry for the walls of text I was learning and thought I might as well share.
Everyone sees colors slightly differently, this is perfectly illustrated by the old blue black/white gold dress. Depending on how your brain has learned to perceive color determines what colors you see.
Your phone screen only uses three colors to represent all colors.
If you printed out the photo of the dress the "illusion" wouldn't work.
The 3 colors used to make the blue dress in warm "gold" light is what allows your brain to interpret it as yellow.
If anything it helps prove that people basically see in the same way. Just if your brain adjusts for the backlight tone. You either saw blue or yellow. No one was saying purple or orange.
If you took mushrooms and saw purple you'd be hallucinating. Your brain is giving you false information.
Seeing it as yellow isn't false information but a different interpretation of the given material
Yeah, I'm in agreement with you, my point is that we have proof that people perceive reality slightly differently, in general it's pretty standardized, but there are slight variations. That's all my point was.
You have things like grapheme-color synesthesia where people really do experience things different. They might see 2s as blue and 5s as green. So if they ever saw a 2 it would be blue. Like 5 5 5 5 2 5 5. Even though the numbers are all the same color to us someone with the synesthesia would see those numbers there in the color their mind associates them with automatically.
We have proof that people don't see colors the same way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_dress
That was horseshit with multiple different pictures being used with different levels, confusing people to death about what others had reported seeing. It's easy to white balance the blue back to white which with the yellow orange lighting reflections on the black, saturated up the yellow lighting to look more gold. Nobody with normal vision both looking at the same original picture claims the blue part is white.
Wow. You are just proving my point. It looks white and gold to me.
What color is the wiki page around it then? Ultra white? Or even in dark mode the blown out lighting on the right side is white as well. It's surely not the same as the dress. Just go get a crayon from the box to compare.
Doesn't matter what context I view the original image. I've never seen it as blue and black without manipulating the image.