The Light Show of Illusions

[CCoburn]

The Light Show of Illusions


Isn't it weird that color is nothing but an illusion? Or, more precisely put, it's the end result of the decoding of waveform data, which I sometimes poetically refer as the serpent and the rainbow - the sine waves and frequencies of the optical color spectrum.

So if color is just some superficial illusive property created by the interactions of light energy with its material counterparts(bosons and fermions), then what other illusive properties might take root a bit deeper in forming our reality of things that at face value appear to be so objectively concrete but ultimately and metaphorically turn out to be nothing more than just another light show?

Of course, the dimension of 'feeling' does add another layer of perceptibility here.

[BeyondKnowledge]

I have often wondered if light were affected like sound by the wave form. Can you see the difference between a sine wave and a square wave light? How about a saw tooth wave?

I am going to have to look into how such waves could be generated.

[Maxmars]

I have often wondered if light were affected like sound by the wave form. Can you see the difference between a sine wave and a square wave light? How about a saw tooth wave?

I am going to have to look into how such waves could be generated.

That's an excellent question!  Please let us know of what you learn.  I would expect any difference to be too subtle for us to detect visually... but hey, you never know.

[Nerb]

What if we all see different colours but have always known our personal version by the same common name.

How do I know my Red isn't your Green, but maybe you see Red grass and call it Green.

Crazy Colours eh. I blame Rainbows, shifty things.

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I have often wondered if light were affected like sound by the wave form. Can you see the difference between a sine wave and a square wave light? How about a saw tooth wave?

I am going to have to look into how such waves could be generated.

A square wave light would appear like a pulsed light, a sine wave light would appear smoother without the pulsing and appear more constant.

I suppose the comparison would be an incandescent bulb which is a sine wave and a certain heat producing light smoothly by resistance in the wire and a flourescent light which flickers on an off very quickly to charge the gas which dissipates the heat into it...or flicker intermitently to drive you mad and make you ill.

[BeyondKnowledge]

Having googled many and various sources, I have an answer.

The simple explanation is we can't see the difference.

We are only able to see visible light in less than one octave in frequency, but we can hear sound in 9 or 10 octaves. That is, our eyes cannot see a wide enough range to see a visible effect.

I also think it isn't really possible to modulate something at light frequencies. Most light producers are just fed with power and this power is modulated to carry sound or codes like a remote control but the actual light is still just a light bulb varying in intensity instead of the actual wave form. A signal can be sent but the carrier, the light, is still just the light wave form.

We are just not capable of building a signal generator that works at light frequencies yet. We rely on the emitter to generate the light when powered.

Even the incandescent bulbs alternating at 60 times a second still produce light that is way higher frequency. The input power frequency is not really related to the output frequency but can exist on it as noise.

Basically form microwaves on up, everything is just like a whistle. You can make or louder or softer. You can tune it by adjusting it physically, changing the cavity size, etc.. You can turn it on and off. You can't make it generate a wave form from an input wave.

There are some advanced techniques of mixing different sources within a band to make a specific frequency but from what I understand, they are sign waves and not shapeable in wave form.


The fluorescent flickering is mainly the bulb failing to maintain the plasma and continuously restarting. And the loud hum in some fluorescent fixtures is most likely from being mistakenly put on the high leg of a commercial system and therefore getting too much voltage. The bulb doesn't care but the stronger magnetic field vibrates the ballast case. I found this out fixing some fluorescent lights. I moved a breaker to another phase and the buzz went away. That breaker was on the high leg originally, getting 208 instead of 120 volts.

[CCoburn]

What if we all see different colours but have always known our personal version by the same common name.

How do I know my Red isn't your Green, but maybe you see Red grass and call it Green.

Crazy Colours eh. I blame Rainbows, shifty things.

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It's true. It can be rationalized that we are all seeing the same thing, but technically color is an internal experience, and we cannot observe what is in the mind of another individual. It seems that the object itself is of key importance here.

There is a unique frequency for every color so it does seem like the same frequency would produce the same result, but it's actually the physical properties of "the object itself" that alters the frequency of the incoming light wave so that when it is reflected away from the object the frequency has been altered to represent the color of the object.

And sometimes differences in perception WILL crossover to different names e.g. sometimes I call dark gray what others call black, or what I see as very dark blue someone else sees as black. Black is absence of frequency, so either the object has absorbed all light, or the frequency change is too subtle for some to detect.

This kind of reminds me of the old Hermetic axiom "As within so without.". The color is an internal experience(incoming; within) that is projected(or perceived) as an external experience(without).

[broccoli]

isn't there a rule where if something is measured, it is then changed solely by you having measured it? I feel like that applies here.

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rules lol maybe we should come up with different wording if we always change our interpretation of the world around us

[CCoburn]

isn't there a rule where if something is measured, it is then changed solely by you having measured it? I feel like that applies here.

QM. The Measurement Problem: an object(or system function) requires an observer in order to yield a specific outcome i.e. how the object is ultimately perceived. Supposedly there are numerous possible values or outcomes for any given object, system, or function, but it is only when the object is actually observed(or "measured") that it results in one single specific observable outcome – the collapsing of the wave function.

But as Einstein once said: "I'd like to think that the Moon is there even when I'm not looking at it.".

[broccoli]

QM. The Measurement Problem: an object(or system function) requires an observer in order to yield a specific outcome i.e. how the object is ultimately perceived. Supposedly there are numerous possible values or outcomes for any given object, system, or function, but it is only when the object is actually observed(or "measured") that it results in one single specific observable outcome – the collapsing of the wave function.

But as Einstein once said: "I'd like to think that the Moon is there even when I'm not looking at it.".

lol well said

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What's the deal with blue light

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I mean, it can power things faster than red light, I think it can even travel through space. I believe one is long wave and one is short wave but, have any of you had any strange experiences with blue light?

[OneStepBack]

I recently read the brain dumbs down what we actually see as the mind would not be able to grasp it in its entirety.  This is quite thought provoking. Maybe there are other colours that complicate things from our perspective so the mind blots them out.