Three Ways to See Blue

When I first began studying science, I learned that water really is blue.  I had always been told that lakes, rivers, and oceans looked blue because they were reflecting the blue sky.  But in fact, water's true color is blue.  I was delighted with this fact, and began telling others, including my family.  Everyone was fascinated except my mother.  So wedded was she to the sky reflection story, she took the new fact as a personal injury, and refused to believe what I had told her about the color of water.
     As a result, when I drive along Lake Shore Drive here in my home city of Chicago, I am always on the lookout for a day when the lake is blue and the sky is not (or vice versa).  When it happens, I murmur to Mom, wherever her spirit now hovers, "Hey, Mom, take a look!"  Today was such a day: bright gray, clouded sky above ice-blue, barely moving, rippled water.  Fresh, white snow coated the ground, and the unusually clear light enhanced the grays, rusts, and browns of the bare trees clustered all along the miles of lakefront park.
     On such a day, I can't help wondering at the beauty of the world.  At the beauty of the muted winter colors I experienced on my drive south, from home to downtown, then to the library.  What an occasion for gratitude.
     I learned still more about blue when I began studying science.  The sky is not blue because of dust as I had been told.  (And why should dust be blue?  Or is this a circular argument in which the dust reflects the water while the water reflects the dust?)  Oxygen is also blue, coloring the sky blue.  (Imagine my mother's disappointment!)
     And yet more: colors, including the blue of the sky, are actually all in our brains.  Our brains simply interpret various frequencies of electromagnetic radiation as red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.  I will have more to say about this next time!

Comments

[Mark P McGrath]

Wow, I realize you didn't say this but if I were to go to the extreme with the thoughts of, how do I know my brain isn't having a flash back? I guess because there is consensus as to what color is being absorbed. Fascinating the color blind every day, Mark

[bluess]

visitor of your websitemarc jacobs wallet
i will share it with my friends
Thanks