SYNTHESE LIBRARY STUDIES IN EPISTEMOLOGY, LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE. JAAKKO HINTIKKA, Boston University

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1 NAMING THE RAINBOW

2 SYNTHESE LIBRARY STUDIES IN EPISTEMOLOGY, LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE Managing Editor: JAAKKO HINTIKKA, Boston University Editors: DIRK VAN DALEN, University of Utrecht, The Netherlands DONALD DAVIDSON, University of California, Berkeley THEO A.F. KUIPERS, University ofgroningen, The Netherlands PATRICK SUPPES, Stanford University, California JAN WOLENSKI, Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland VOLUME274

3 DON DEDRICK Department of Philosophy, University of Victoria, Canada NAMING THE RAINBOW Colour Language, Colour Science, and Culture SPRINGER-SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, B.V.

4 A C.I.P. Catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI / Printed on acid-free paper AII Rights Reserved 1998 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1998 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1 st edition 1998 No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permissi~ from the copyright owner

5 For the Nathalie

6 TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS IX PART ONE THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE UNIVERSALIST TRADITION IN COLOUR NAMING RESEARCH INTRODUCTION 3 CHAPTER I Colour Naming and Whorfs Hypothesis 1.1 Introduction: cultural relativism and colour naming The structure of the colour space Focal colours Foca1ity and focal effects Conclusion to this chapter 23 CHAPTER II Psychophysics and Colour Naming 2.1 Introduction Human colour vision: the opponent colours theory Psychophysics and focality Psychophysics and basic colour categories Conclusion to this chapter 47 CHAPTER III Colour Naming and the Brain 3.1 Introduction Pre-cortical physiology LGN neurons, psychophysics, and colour naming The primary visual cortex and beyond Conclusion to this chapter 57 CHAPTER IV Language, Mind, and Brain : A Summary 4.1 Introduction Regularities and generalizations Conclusion to this chapter 72 Vll

7 PART TWO COLOUR NAMING: CONSTRAINTS, COGNITION, AND CULTURE CHAPTER V Composite Colour Categories and the Evolution of Systems of Colour Naming 5.1 Introduction Berlin and Kay's order: evolutionary or epigenetic? Berlin and Kay's evolutionary order: Reformulating the ordering: the 1975 hue sequence The 1978 explanation: FNRs Basic colour terms and their distribution: a revised taxonomy The problem of linguistic composite categories Composite categories: linguistic and visual relations Interpreting the composite category rule Is there a perceptual-biological basis for composite categories? Conclusion to this chapter 105 CHAPTER VI The Non-Naturalness of Colour Categories 6.1 Introduction Similarity, colour space, and colours: the empiricist tradition in philosophy Natural and constructed nameables Conceptualizing colours The natural and the cognitive The logic and the psychology of colour naming Conclusion to this chapter 130 CHAPTER VII Culture and Colour Naming 7.1 Introduction The nature of cultural inquiry Boasian themes Cognition and colour Conclusion to this chapter 148 CONCLUSION APPENDIX NOTES REFERENCES NAME INDEX Colour Naming, Cognition, and Culture Criticism of Berlin and Kay, and Rosch viii

8 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Many people assisted me in the writing of this book. I would like to thank Frederique Arroyas, Austen Clark, Jeff Foss, Evan Thompson, and my doctoral supervisor at the University of Toronto, Ian Hacking. The psychophysicist Davida Teller commented extensively on a related manuscript-one that ended up in parts of this work. Robert MacLaury, an anthropologist and expert on colour categorization, offered detailed comments on the same material. His expertise was nicely complementary to Davida's and I thank them both for making this a better book. My greatest debt is to the philosopher Larry Hardin. He read virtually every page of the manuscript in penultimate form. He read preparatory drafts. He commented extensively. It is difficult for me to imagine what this book would be like in a possible world that did not include his ideas, criticism, and generosity. My own interest in colour began in 1988 when I opened Larry's wonderful Color for Philosophers: Unweaving the Rainbow. To have him as an advisor for my own book on colour-that is the best kind of luck. I would like to thank Oxford Journals Ltd. and the editor of Philosophical Psychology for permission to use material from my article "Colour Language Universality and Evolution: On the Explanation for Basic Colour Terms" (1996 v. 9.4 : ). Thanks also to Sage Publications Inc. and the editors of Philosophy of the Social Sciences. They permitted me to use material from another article, "On the Foundations of the Universalist Tradition in Colour Naming Research" (1998 v : ). I must also acknowledge the following persons and organizations for their permission to reproduce the figures that appear in this book. For permission to reproduce Figure 1-13 from p. 34 of Color for Philosophers by C. L. Hardin 1988 Hackett Publishing Co. I thank the author and the publisher. (This appears as Figure 1.) For permission to reproduce Figure 15 from p. 64 of Color Vision by Leo Hurvich Leo Hurvich I thank the author and the publisher, Sinauer Associates. (This appears as Figure 2.) ix

9 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For permission to reproduce Figure 3 from p. 9 of Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution by Brent Berlin and Paul Kay 1991 The Regents of the University of California I thank the publisher, University of California Press. (This appears as Figure 3.) For permission to reproduce Figure 3 from p. 19 and Figure 2 from p. 15 of "Biocultural Implications of Systems of Color Naming," Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, 1: by Paul Kay, Brent Berlin, and William Merrifield The American Anthropological Association I thank Paul Kay and the publisher. (These appear as, respectively, Figure 4 and Figure 5.) Finally: I have to thank the helpful and tolerant advisors at the University of Victoria MacLab. Producing the camera-ready copy for this book was, for me, no mean feat. I could not have done it without the help of untold assistants. Though I may not know your names I do and shall remember you. X