• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    Which is the point of the meme

    The point is based on a faulty understanding of creativity. It’s not a counting problem.

    Besides, how is your method creative?

    It’s not. The problem isn’t a problem of creativity. That’s the underlying flaw in the comic’s conceit. “Give me a color that’s not a composite of primary colors” is an impossible task because of how we define the concept of colors, not because an individual is incapable of coming up with a color permutation that has never been seen before.

    • lugal@sopuli.xyz
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      3 days ago

      I think you’re conflating creativity and imagination. The task isn’t about physically creating a color but about imaging it. About a mental image of a color you never saw before. Not about actualizing that color.

      It’s not a counting problem.

      You made it into a counting problem so I really don’t see your point here

      “Give me a color that’s not a composite of primary colors” is an impossible task

      Exactly. It’s even impossible to imagine. We can imagine shapes and form and stuff we never saw and will never see but for colors, this isn’t true. That’s the whole point.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        The task isn’t about physically creating a color but about imaging it.

        How on earth do you tell someone they haven’t imagined a new color? That’s quite literally impossible to assert or deny.

        You made it into a counting problem

        It is inherently a counting problem because of how sight and color recognition functions.

        It’s even impossible to imagine.

        It is impossible to for a second party tell a first party that they have been unsuccessful in imagining something.

        • lugal@sopuli.xyz
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          3 days ago

          It is impossible to for a second party tell a first party that they have been unsuccessful in imagining something.

          Looking at the last panel, I can say with certainty, that dude failed at the task.

          It is inherently a counting problem because of how sight and color recognition functions.

          It’s, again, no question of sight and color recognition but about imagination.

          You’re still looking that the comic from a very wrong angle and say “it makes no sense”. Well, from my angle, it does.

          It’s a thought experiment, reminds me of zen Buddhist koans. “What is the sound of one clapping hand?” or “What did your face look like before your parents were born?” don’t have an answer. You can tell me you know the answer and I can’t proof you wrong but that’s not the point. It’s about making people think. “Imagine a color you never saw” is the same. You can tell me you made it and maybe that would mean enlightenment for you but it’s beside the point. It’s a thought experiment obviously meant to have no answer (again, look at the last panel). The more you tell me that makes no sense and there is no answer, you’re proofing my point. The comic makes it explicit that there is no answer. You impose a very different meaning onto it that doesn’t lead to anything and say “the comic doesn’t lead to anything”.

          • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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            3 days ago

            Looking at the last panel

            The last panel is a fantasy by the artist.

            It’s a thought experiment, reminds me of zen Buddhist koans. “What is the sound of one clapping hand?” or “What did your face look like before your parents were born?” don’t have an answer.

            You can answer these questions. People just get anger when you do, because they want the question to be mystical rather than nonsensical. When they get silly-but-correct answers, it denudes the questions of their woo-woo faux-wisdom.

            So you have to fall back on even vaguer and more imprecise language, to try and obscure the original badly worded riddle.

            • lugal@sopuli.xyz
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              3 days ago

              The last panel is a fantasy by the artist.

              This might come as a surprise, but the whole comic is. If you read the first 3 panels as being historically accurate, I see where your confusion comes from.

              Anyway, you have a very unimaginative and literal approach to all this and that’s just not the layer the comic communicates on. Maybe at least acknowledge that.

              • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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                3 days ago

                If you read the first 3 panels as being historically accurate

                The first panel is a challenge by the author, which is real at least in so far as it’s a sentiment the author actually has.

                The next two are filler.

                The fourth is an invented response.