/sci/ - Science & Math

>posting anything besides this

>just graduated high school
>still have no idea how we see purple light

Since elementary school everyone is always taught that when you mix two primary colors on a paint wheel you get a secondary color. Red and yellow give you orange, and every time you mix them that will be the case with paint. We learned that light however has green light as one of its primary colors, and when green light and red light are shined on a usually white surface (which naturally reflects all colors), those two colors are shined into your eye and your mind puts them together as one color.

In physics, chemistry, and general science however, they are always telling us that purple light is on one end of the visible spectrum and red light is on the other, which makes sense because of the theory of electromagnetic waves, with frequency changing the color of it.

Which is it though? Why is it that when we see purple light we are always told "that means your cones are receiving blue and red light," yet purple light also is accepted as a thing? The high school I went to isn't the top in the world or anything, but it seemed like a pretty good education. I can't be the only one who is confused by this.

>>10543638
the colored part of this spectrum is the part of light that your human eye can see, everything else is either too small or too big for our eye aperture.

>>8552645
Are you dumb, look at the entire left half of the light spectrum