Claiming that they do not "really" have these colours is a misunderstanding of the nature of colour. — Banno

No, claiming that they really have these colours is a misunderstanding of the nature of colour.

Vision science: Photons to phenomenology:

People universally believe that objects look colored because they are colored, just as we experience them. The sky looks blue because it is blue, grass looks green because it is green, and blood looks red because it is red. As surprising as it may seem, these beliefs are fundamentally mistaken. Neither objects nor lights are actually “colored” in anything like the way we experience them. Rather, color is a psychological property of our visual experiences when we look at objects and lights, not a physical property of those objects or lights. The colors we see are based on physical properties of objects and lights that cause us to see them as colored, to be sure, but these physical properties are different in important ways from the colors we perceive.

Color:

One of the major problems with color has to do with fitting what we seem to know about colors into what science (not only physics but the science of color vision) tells us about physical bodies and their qualities. It is this problem that historically has led the major physicists who have thought about color, to hold the view that physical objects do not actually have the colors we ordinarily and naturally take objects to possess. Oceans and skies are not blue in the way that we naively think, nor are apples red (nor green). Colors of that kind, it is believed, have no place in the physical account of the world that has developed from the sixteenth century to this century.

Not only does the scientific mainstream tradition conflict with the common-sense understanding of color in this way, but as well, the scientific tradition contains a very counter-intuitive conception of color. There is, to illustrate, the celebrated remark by David Hume:

"Sounds, colors, heat and cold, according to modern philosophy are not qualities in objects, but perceptions in the mind." (Hume 1738: Bk III, part I, Sect. 1 [1911: 177]; Bk I, IV, IV [1911: 216])

Physicists who have subscribed to this doctrine include the luminaries: Galileo, Boyle, Descartes, Newton, Thomas Young, Maxwell and Hermann von Helmholtz. Maxwell, for example, wrote:

"It seems almost a truism to say that color is a sensation; and yet Young, by honestly recognizing this elementary truth, established the first consistent theory of color." (Maxwell 1871: 13 [1970: 75])

This combination of eliminativism—the view that physical objects do not have colors, at least in a crucial sense—and subjectivism—the view that color is a subjective quality—is not merely of historical interest. It is held by many contemporary experts and authorities on color, e.g., Zeki 1983, Land 1983, and Kuehni 1997.

Neural representations of perceptual color experience in the human ventral visual pathway:

There is no color in light. Color is in the perceiver, not the physical stimulus. This distinction is critical for understanding neural representations, which must transition from a representation of a physical retinal image to a mental construct for what we see. Here, we dissociated the physical stimulus from the color seen by using an approach that causes changes in color without altering the light stimulus. We found a transition from a neural representation for retinal light stimulation, in early stages of the visual pathway (V1 and V2), to a representation corresponding to the color experienced at higher levels (V4 and VO1).

Opticks:

The homogeneal Light and Rays which appear red, or rather make Objects appear so, I call Rubrifick or Red-making; those which make Objects appear yellow, green, blue, and violet, I call Yellow-making, Green-making, Blue-making, Violet-making, and so of the rest. And if at any time I speak of Light and Rays as coloured or endued with Colours, I would be understood to speak not philosophically and properly, but grossly, and accordingly to such Conceptions as vulgar People in seeing all these Experiments would be apt to frame. For the Rays to speak properly are not coloured. In them there is nothing else than a certain Power and Disposition to stir up a Sensation of this or that Colour.

No, claiming that they really have these colours is a misunderstanding of the nature of colour. — Michael

...and you go over the same undisputed physiology. Again.

The tomatoes are red. So is the pen. And the physiology is also correct.

The tomatoes are red. — Banno

The question isn't "are tomatoes red?". The question is "do objects like tomatoes, strawberries and radishes really have the distinctive property that they do appear to have?"

You have admitted before that colour terminology is used in more than one way, and I have agreed. The problem is that you are then using this to equivocate. Any meaning of the word "red" or the sentence "the tomato is red" that does not concern the tomato's appearance is irrelevant. And any meaning of the word "red" or the sentence "the tomato is red" that does concern the tomato's appearance is explained by physics and neuroscience, specifically showing that tomatoes do not have such a property.

Claiming that they do not "really" have these colours is a misunderstanding of the nature of colour.
— Banno

No, claiming that they really have these colours is a misunderstanding of the nature of colour. — Michael

If I put on a pair of color distorting glasses and the tomatoes appear white, do we need to question if the color of the tomatoes are “really” red? Or that the circumstances have changes where the reported color of tomatoes is white. And if I damage my brain in such a way where tomatoes “appear” white, so be it, the circumstances have changed. Notice no mental percepts needed, although we need a human community agreeing on color judgment.

Notice no mental percepts needed — Richard B

Of course they are, else you wouldn't be seeing anything; you'd just have light reaching your eyes and then nothing happening, e.g. blindness or blindsight.

The question isn't "are tomatoes red?". The question is "do objects like tomatoes, strawberries and radishes really have the distinctive property that they do appear to have?" — Michael

Yep. They really have the distinctive property that they appear to. They are red.

you are then using this to equivocate — Michael

Not I. I'm using it the way it has been used since well before recent developments in physiology. If you hang your argument on the difference between "Is the tomato red?" and "is the tomato really red?" then you are going to have to explain how red tomatoes are not really red, and end up looking a bit silly.

The trouble is that you take "red" to refer only to "mental percepts", and that can't be made sense of.

They really have the distinctive property that they appear to. — Banno

The science proves otherwise. They have a surface layer of atoms that reflect various wavelengths of light, but no colour, because colour is something else entirely.

The science proves otherwise. — Michael

If the science shows that the red tomatoes are not red, then the science is wrong.

But of course, it is Michael, not the science, that is in error, with an overblown claim that can't be made to work.

They have a surface layer of atoms that reflect various wavelengths of light, but no colour, because colour is something else entirely. — Michael

Yep. Red is not the surface layer of atoms, and it's also not your mental percept.

the science is wrong. — Banno

Well, if you're just going to dismiss the scientific evidence because it disagrees with Wittgenstein's nonsense story about a beetle then we're never going to agree.

I'm going to trust the science, not armchair philosophy, when it comes to explaining how perception works. You do you.

Well, if you're just going to dismiss the scientific evidence because it disagrees with Wittgenstein's nonsense story about a beetle then we're never going to agree. — Michael

But that's not what I have done. I have not "dismissed the scientific evidence". I accept it wholly. Have done, repeatedly, all the way through this thread, explicitly and repeatedly.

What is rejected is the assertion that red is nothing but a 'mental percept' - a term with a fairly specific use in certain experiments, but not in sorting tomatoes.

What is rejected is the assertion that red is nothing but a 'mental percept' — Banno

I haven't claimed that. I have only claimed that the red mental percept is our ordinary, everyday understanding of red (even if we do not understand that it is a mental percept).

I have only claimed that the red mental percept is our ordinary, everyday understanding of red — Michael

"...the red mental percept..."

There is only one?

It is very unclear what a 'mental percept" is, when you take it out of the context of the scientific papers that use it.

Hence it is rather hard to see how it could be the very same as the red used to sort tomato seeds.

It is very unclear what a 'mental percept" is, when you take it out of the context of the scientific papers that use it. — Banno

And? It's unclear what electrons are when you take them out of the context of the scientific papers that talk about them.

It's unclear what electrons are when you take them out of the context of the scientific papers that talk about them. — Michael

Yep. But we do not use electrons to sort tomato seeds.

You want to equate the colour red with a thing you call a red mental percept. But they are not the very same thing.

You want to equate the colour red with a thing you call a red mental percept. But they are not the very same thing. — Banno

Yes they are.

Yes they are. — Michael

Ok. Explain them. You said "the red mental percept". Is there only one?

There are lots of percepts, many of the same type. Every pain is a percept, every pleasure is a percept, every sour is a percept, every red is a percept.

There are lots of percepts, many of the same type. Every pain is a percept, every pleasure is a percept, every sour is a percept, every red is a percept. — Michael

Ok. So which ones are red? Only the red ones? Why isn't there a vicious circularity in claiming that red is the very same as red percepts?

So which ones are red? Only the red ones? — Banno

This isn't difficult Banno. If you understand what it means for pain to be a percept then you understand what it means for red to be a percept. If you don't understand what it means for pain to be a percept then I can't help you.

Which of the many percepts are red percepts, ?

And of course, this is only the beginning of your problems.

The red percepts are red, the pain percepts are pain. These questions are tiresome, so if it's all you can resort to then I'm going to end it here.

The red percepts are red... — Michael

Then you are using the difinendum in the definiens; defining red in terms of the red percept, with the resulting vicious circularity.

You're asking me which percepts the word "red" refers to. I can only answer such a question by using a word that refers to these percepts, and given that there is no appropriate synonym for "red", all I can do is reuse the word "red".

The word "pain" refers to pain, the word "red" refers to red, the word "sour" refers to sour.

There's nothing "viciously circular" about this.

You're asking me which percepts the word "red" refers to. I can only answer such a question by using a word that refers to these percepts, and given that there is no appropriate synonym for "red", all I can do is reuse the word "red". — Michael

Yep. So you have not explained red by equating it with a red percept.

So on to the next problem. If red is a mental percept, who's mentality is it a percept in?

Yep. So you have not explained red by equating it with a red percept. — Banno

What are you talking about? Your obsession with language is leading you to nonsense. It's incredibly simple for anyone who isn't blinded by Wittgenstein.

Pain is a percept, red is a percept. That's it. If you don't understand what pain percepts are then read some neuroscience and stab yourself in the foot.

...red is a percept. That's it. — Michael

But not only a percept.

Where are these percepts to be found?

But not only a percept.

Where are these percepts to be found? — Banno

And what is the common essence of calling these all “percepts”? I guess I can not use family resemblances, or I will be accused of being blinded by Wittgenstein.

Small steps. We might yet derail Michael's train.

Try Vision Science – Photons to Phenomenolgy if you want to know more.

Try Vision Science – Photons to Phenomenolgy if you want to know more. — Michael

I'm sure you will be able to explain your account without sending us off to such a text. It can't be that hard.

If you don't understand what pain percepts are then read some neuroscience and stab yourself in the foot. — Michael

You want to change the topic back to pain, again. But of course pain and colour are quite different.

The question that you might address is how calling red a percept helps.

So let's go back to what you said was the basic issue: "do objects like tomatoes, strawberries and radishes really have the distinctive property that they do appear to have?"

Now percepts are not mentioned in this. You want to jump to the conclusion that objects like tomatoes, strawberries and radishes do not really have the distinctive property that they do appear to have, but of course that is either nonsense, or a play on words. Your claim to disdain mere wordplay leaves you closed to noticing when you yourself play with words.

Tomatoes, strawberries and radishes really have the distinctive property that they do appear to have. They are red.