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Comment by unclenoriega | Hacker News Reader

Research shows that the way your native language divides colors does affect your ability to distinguish them. For example, a Russian speaker would more quickly and easily distinguish two similar shades if one is goluboy and one is siniy. However, with training, anyone with adequate color vision can learn to be as or more proficient.

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I'd argue that demonstrates that practicing distinguishing colors is learned. Some people practice distinguishing colors because their culture tends to to so, such as people who speak Russian. For others, they learn to do it by practicing visual design. Other people just pick it up over time. I mean, after all English has words for "teal" and "turquoise". So it's just a subjective matter of what's common.

This isn't evidence, for example, that language determines or enhances your ability to distinguish color.

> This isn't evidence, for example, that language determines or enhances your ability to distinguish color.

Right, language just determines which colors you learn to distinguish early in life. And it's a pretty small effect size IIRC.

I don't experience an internal monologue and don't think of any words at all when looking at colors, yet I have a very good ability to differentiate between subtle hue variants (based on tests I have taken that test exactly this).

If it's true that language affects ability to differentiate hues (I am somewhat skeptical, but certainly open to the possibility), then it seems to me that maybe language just muddies our natural ability. In other words, thinking about the word "blue" might cause you to artificially group colors together that you wouldn't otherwise group.

Maybe it's less about ability to distinguish, and more about... readiness to do so? I'm not sure how to phrase it.

I don't think 99%+ of people "think of words when looking at colors" unless they have some reason to.

I want to be clear, it's a small difference in initial ability to distinguish certain colors. If you've spent your whole life dividing colors a certain way, it's a little easier for you to distinguish colors that are on different sides of that boundary.

So it sounds like the less you grow up talking about colors, the better you are at observing them?

If so, maybe we do our children a disservice for teaching them color words.

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