LibriumArcana.Games

As you probably know, televisions and computer monitors can make any color by emitting various intensities of red, green, and blue light, which our eyes pick up, and is combined into the intended color in our brain.

It is my understanding that the primary colours are not an effect of physics, but rather of biology (though I might be wrong on this, please correct me if I am).

Now, consider if there was an alien species (or even, an animal species here on earth, if one exists) looking at our monitors or us looking at televisions they engineered for themselves. Is it feasible for them to have different receptors in their eyes or different brain structure so their primary colours are different than ours?

Keep in mind that different colour lights, such as when gases have electricity put through them, is determined by physics and chemistry, so these can be used as a constant color reference.

If their eyes or brains are different, if they were asked to create a TV emit yellow (if yellow is defined as the color of sodium burning, so we have an impartial constant to which to compare), might we see it as an entirely different color?

Is this possible biologically speaking? If so, what effect would this have on us looking at their technology or art?

Short answer: yes. Other races may not see colors the same way we do, and they may have extended or shortened ranges of spectrums. The only common reference we'd have is by the scientific measure of the light, not the name or the definition. We may know 340 nm as a specific color, associate that color with something, and associate other things with it, but the aliens will see it as completely different.

As far as culture, it's going to depend largely on evolution. Does healthy skin reflect what we would see as purple? Is the rarest dye something that on their world, reflects green, but under Earth's Sun, reflects blue? It's somehting that can become incredibly detailed and can seriously impact relations between species. When a human becomes angry and flustered, they would tend to turn red. Another species might see that color as a sign of sexual arousal, which would lead to interesting initial speculation as to our mating rituals.

Given that there's humans who see colours differently than 'we' do (colourblindness, people who can't tell red and green apart) I find it entirely possible that aliens might do so, too.