: Re: Colours of ultraviolet I need to write something from the perspective of a character who sees colours differently from humans, and in particular can see multiple shades of ultraviolet. This isn't

@Berumen699

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This whole question is the basis to any discussion of Qualia. The idea is basically that, pick a color, any color, and describe it visually without using items that are that color. For example, what does green look like? Well, we tend to say it is the color of grass, or the color of a pear, or the skin of a watermelon... but these do not tell us what green looks like, but rather what is universally accepted as green. How do we know that green is always the same color when we discuss the matter? Could my green be your purple? We have no way of universally describing color beyond items that we universally agree are that color.

With this in mind, an alien seeing the color of Ultraviolet might have a word to describe the color, let's call it Quave, but it might be next to impossible to actually communicate that the color Quave isn't the color that humans are seeing without saying Quave exists in one object and not the other. Say for example, the Alien points out that the use of Quave in a piece of alien art is one of the reasons it's considered their Mona Lisa... where as the Humans see a blank paper that looks white to their eyes.

Conversely, the Aliens would have no concept of Red... and would not see the Red Stripes on the U.S. Flag and think Americans mad for saying that there are stripes at all.

One of the best uses of describing color that is percieved differently is the book "The Giver" which creates a society that has been bred to see entirely in gray-scale. Objects have various shades of black and white. The protagonist is realized as special by the titular character because the Protagonist has an odd fascination with an apple, which is described as having something odd happen to it that no one else sees... turns out the Giver and his successor (The Receiver) still retain the ability to see in color and that the strange thing that happens to the apple is he sees it as red for the first time... and until more color is added, the protagonist has faint glimpse of red in human faces... which the Giver explains that there is pink, which only looks red because he has not begun seeing the other colors blended into a human face.

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