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Understanding Realism
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Understanding Realism
A human being is sometimes wrong in their decisions or thoughts because reality is not always so clear in black and white. Mistakes are not unique to one person, but may at times be reflective of universal errors. Indeed, they are a human predicament. In reference to Parmenides, Byrne (1) claimed that human thought is characterized by change. Things which humans have laid and believed to be true are changing, one of them being color. Our ordinary beliefs that snow is white or lemon is yellow have been challenged by Parmenides as a mortal mistake. He presents an opinion that snow is not necessarily white, an argument accepted by many color scientists. Color realism is the view that objects have a color that they look to appear. Perception is one of the factors influencing color choice. When you see a lemon and its yellow human eyes take the perceptible form of the lemon, the transparent jelly of the eye becomes yellow (Byrne 1). Further studies on color found that different colors are producing through mixing together different primary-colored lights. Also, the perception of the different colors in the eye is used to address color mixing. I argue that Byrne’s presentation on appearance and reality are well informed especially in addressing color determination and how variations, species, and microscopes influence the color.
Color vision is the ability to differentiate diverse wavelengths of electromagnet radiation relying on the brain perception mechanism. The human retina has millions of photoreceptors comprising of rods and cones. The rods are used mostly at night as they are sensitive to low light, while the rods are sensitive to the visible spectrum. Color insensitive photoreceptors respond to the existence or absence of light only and do not differentiate between definite wavelengths. When light is stimulated to the cone, it produces the same response despite the light composition of the light. Wavelength closer to closer to the cones is more likely to be responded to due to peak sensitivity. The crucial to recovering wavelength information and having a color vision is the brain as it compares the output from diverse cone types. Material objects such as lemon and snow are mental entities collection of ideas that exist only when perceived. Therefore, color things are perceived to have might be wrong since the color is in mind rather not in reality.
Variation influences color. Under different conditions, the object can appear to contain different colors without actual alteration of the object. For instance, candlelight affects the color of an object in comparison to what they appear in daylight and red and purple colors on yonder clouds disappear when one gets closer to them. It is true that objects can look to have color that they do not have perception cause the astray when the light circumstance is poor or when we are in the long-distance apart. Moreover, colors are created through mixing different pigments that produce new colors; for instance, mixing yellow and blue paint creates green color (Byrne 7). Reflection of the pigments is different among different people due to factors such as normal visioning and light sensitivity pigments inside the cones. Hence individual color perception may be different depending on the view of the pigment’s reflection.
Species also influence color. How do other species different from a human being, with different textures of eyes view color? They do not view colors in every object as humans do. Color visioning is diversely distributed across mammal’s fish, insects and reptiles. Their chromatic photoreceptors are turned differently and distinct in numbers, and birds have four receptors while mammals have two (Byrne 5). Most species have a photoreceptor type that is sensitive only to near-ultraviolet outside the seeable spectrum. A study done on shrimps found that they have a great ability to recognize light compared to human beings and the ability to differentiate colors more than people. Do honeybees see colors the same as humans see or have different visioning, or could a human have a correct perception of color while other species have the incorrect one? Animals are believed to detect light that human beings are not able to see, for instance, the ability to detect UV part of a spectrum. None between humans or animals perceive the collect perception of the actual color.
The influence of microscopes on color also add to the argument that what we see may not necessarily be the reality. Things under inverted microscopes look different compare to the human eye. The device provides accurate and closer inspection of things than normal eyes. Also, microscopes discover new colors from those perceived-on objects, and under enough magnification, things appear to have no color at all. Microscope argument proves that objects are colorless, and most of the time, the apparent color is not the real color, and objects may be multicolored or colorless (Byrne 4). Further analysis of the microscope argument reveals a flaw. When a tiny red is viewed on a yellowish flower, apparently, it is discovered that the flower has red parts. The discovery does not show that the larger parts are not yellow. Also, with naked eyes objects looks smooth but with the microscopes, the texture changes and roughness are seen and all kind of aspects that are not invisible to the naked eyes. From the findings of close examination of objects, it is noted that smooth things can comprise parts that are not smooth; hence parts may contain colors different from what we view with naked eyes.
The realism of color is different among people, and the position that snow is not colored would affect the position that snow is cold or tasteless. Color perception is greatly affected by the mind and the response the receptors have to create a color perception or view. The prevailing conditions affect the perception of color factors such as light affect the color perception. Also, some species notice more colors efficiently than human beings due to the existence of different preceptors, but in general, they have the same perception of colors; they all view objects with the same color. Microscopes affect the perception of objects’ color as they are investigated more closely, noting the different textures and parts of an object. There lacks an agreement on color realism by different philosophers, and this reflects the difficulty on the subject; hence more work should be done regarding color realism.
Works Cited
Byrne, Alex. “Is snow white?” (2005).
The Differences of Native American Cultures
The Differences of Native American Cultures
The cultures of Native American tribes varied greatly from geographical region to region. The tribes in the Pacific Northwest had plenty of time to be involved in intricate forms of art. Great Plains tribes believed in magic buffalos and were nomadic. Easten Woodlands tribes made some pottery. Great Basin tribes worshipped the different seasons. Southwest tribes valued peace and wisdom. California and Baja tribes prized staying in one place and didn’t like change. The geography of the area in which a tribe lived determined the kind of culture that each tribe developed. The surrounding environments of the different areas often changed the beliefs of each tribe. Things such as food, plants, animals, weather, etc. were often a factor in determining culture. Take the Plains tribe the Cheyenne, for instance. They originated from the area around Wisconsin. There, they fished, hunted, farmed and gathered like any other Eastern Woodlands tribe. Later on, they moved to the Great Plains, where they had the buffalo hunt and the sun dance. Geography affected Cheyenne culture in this way. The buffalo hunt was created so, since the Great Plains lacked much food, the Cheyenne could get enough food to survive. Before they arrived at the plains, the buffalo hunt was unnecessary because of the bountiness of food. The Inuit people (known incorrectly as eskimos) were, of course, affected by their geography. Their language consisted of over 50 words for ice. They had to live in igloos, because of the lack of building resources. Shamans were popular and had a lot of power because, since food was so scarce, they were believed to have powers that could help find it.
Pacific Northwest people were obviously affected by their geography.
Food and resources were so plentiful they didn’t have to spend too much time farming of gathering food. This gave them time to form very complex art such as totem poles. Also, since they had so many resources, every year a potlach was held. A potlach was a celebration where people gave their possessions to others to distribute the wealth. The tribes in the Northwest believed in sharing wealth because of its bountifulness.
These are just a few examples of tribal differences due to geography.
Knowing a tribe’s geography is the first step to knowing about a tribe.
Sonny Blues
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Role of Suffering in the Story Of Sonny Blues
Suffering is an unavoidable aspect of a person’s life. This aspect is vital in shaping the person we become and how we interact with others in society. The narrator in James Baldwin’s story Sonny Blues, describes the inevitability of suffering and its resulting agony. Suffering begins early with the narrator’s experiences in school, where he was teased and ridiculed for his complexions and labeled an imbecile. This state of being then led to a lifetime of rejection as he was not accepted by anyone, including his own family. The first half of the story ends with the narrator saying this, “So don’t be surprised…you act so sweet….” (Baldwin 104). These are the raw emotions that a person who has suffered through tragedy would feel. The narrator is trying to speak these emotions into existence; he wants to warn people of what suffering feels like. In this essay the role of suffering in the story of Sonny Blues and its effects on the narrator will be discussed.
Suffering plays a significant role in shaping the person that others say we are. Suffering was a constant companion for the narrator throughout his childhood. Examples of this include being labeled an imbecile and being mocked at school for his complexions, never being accepted by his family. With his mother’s rejection, the narrator decides that he cannot live with her. He leaves his mother and goes back to his neighborhood where he had suffered so much ridicule. That night, the narrator meets a man named Sonny, who suffers from alcoholism and mental illness. Sonny is able to give the narrator some wisdom about suffering through life (Baldwin 105).
This is the most important passage in the story because it reveals the narrator’s feelings about suffering. When Sonny says, “You act so sweet….” The narrator feels that he has been let down by others. When he was young and being teased at school, his mother was not there to comfort him, she only saw him as another child out for her money. That night at Sonny’s house, when he saw what all eternity is like and experienced the complete lack of hope and despair, he felt that everyone had been lying to him his entire life. He felt alone and confused.
This feeling of being betrayed is present throughout the whole story. Everyone in the story has played a role to give the narrator pain in one way or another. The narrator’s mother was seen as someone who cared only for her own financial gain. Her actions towards her son are horrible and unjustified with the intent of making him feel like she had let him down. Sonny is also very questionable, as he is almost out of his mind with alcoholism and mental illness. This man is not taking care of himself and is losing his life to substances and desires (Baldwin 117).
Essentially, Sonny Blues’ main message was that suffering is an unavoidable aspect of a person’s life. This aspect is vital in shaping the person we become and how we interact with others in society. Throughout the story the narrator failed to see why he was supposed to suffer and what purpose his suffering served. Sonny tried to explain that suffering is inevitable, but this did not make any sense to the narrator at all. While suffering is the theme of Sonny Blues, suffering and its effects on the narrator fade into becoming secondary to the story. It becomes a benign aspect that holds no significance in the ending. The focus of Sonny Blues is clearly on Sonny’s love for jazz and free life, not his suffering.
The ending of Sonny Blues is very abrupt. After leaving Sonny’s house, the narrator decides to go back to his neighborhood knowing that he will be ridiculed by everyone for having been there in the first place (Baldwin 110). The characterizations throughout the story are questionable and sometimes seems as though there was not much love amongst the characters. The reason for this is that there are some people who only have themselves to care about; they will do anything to make life work for them (Davis, Robin 2021). The story ends with James coming to the conclusion that perhaps, life isn’t as bad as he thought it was.
Work Cited
Baldwin. “Sonny Blues”. (1924-1987)
Davis, Robin. “Memory and Emotional Estrangement in James Baldwin’s” Sonny’s Blues”.” (2021).