This is not red!!

I see this red, and most probably you do too. But do you see what I see? Let's talk about it.

Colour is felt. We do not and cannot communicate the feeling of colour through our language. The above shown colour is defined red no matter how someone sees it. But anyone seeing it can be seeing something different but is bound to call it 'red'.

Suppose the first time when you could differentiate between colours, a person comes to you and says the above shown colour is red because it's been defined red by some great guy with some scientist-ish looks.He saw 'something different ' and named it red. Then somebody came who might have seen a different thing than that the scientist-ish guy might have seen but since he was told that it is called 'red', he began calling it red too. Similarly you saw this color, called it red because someone taught you that it is called red. But there's a complete possibility that all three people might have seen three different colours.

The difference in what we see and what we feel is called 'qualia'. Our inability to explain feelings in our language is called 'explanatory gap'. For example, we can tell someone that pain is caused due to firing of C-fibers, to someone who has never felt pain (suppose an alien). But still he cannot understand pain or feel it. 

Some philosophers say that the reason for an explanatory gap is our 'week' language. May be there's an alien race which communicates in such a language that allows them to feel colours without actually seeing them. May be some day our language will also be developed enough to do that. But for now there's no way to know what colour does each of us see.

I know it’s  frustrating to not find an answer but it’s okay. There are many animals that can be taught. Some  apes are even taught to use sign language. They can even communicate to  humans, but there's one thing no animal has ever done - asked a question. Asking is important. It lets us know about each other. So keep asking because it’s important.