... The world does not consist of green trees The sound of crushed glass And the smiling faces of old women It consists of everything at once Put together by two eyes, But it is difficult to see the beauty of the pure Between black and white... Andrey I “Scientific section of pilots “The eye, an amazing invention of nature. It was formed by light for the sake of vision, and the biological laws of evolution are the means of its perfect adaptation to the needs of every living being that has this invaluable gift of evolution. The very structure of the eye is a natural prerequisite for color vision. Observing the behavior of animals, it became known that color vision occurs at very early stages of the evolutionary ladder: insects (bees, butterflies) already possess it. Many diurnal birds have good color vision. For these living creatures, color vision plays an important role during the mating season (not only females admire the peacock's tail). It is curious that color plays the same role for plants that cooperate with insects and birds. Animals that lead a nocturnal lifestyle do not have color vision at all, despite the sensory capabilities of the eye. There is simply no need for it (all cats are gray in the dark), and therefore the brains of these animals did not develop, but lost this ability. Instead of color vision, all nocturnal animals have an amazing ability for echolocation, which is completely absent in the “king of beasts” man. Apes have color vision similar to humans. In tailed monkeys, specific color vision was discovered, distinguishing only blue, yellow and gray instead of blue, red shades are absent. Color vision is a very ancient ability that arose much earlier than the appearance of life on land. The presence of color vision in humans and related species clearly indicates that none of the biological ancestors of modern humans led a nocturnal lifestyle for a sufficiently long time. Already the first prosimians had color vision and led an exclusively diurnal lifestyle. Isn’t this partly what can explain the value attitude towards “light” and the sun in mythology, religion and mysticism and such a negative attitude towards “darkness”? The first monotheistic religion that arose on earth was the cult of Amun-Ra - the Solar God (Ancient Egypt ). The northern peoples also worshiped the sun. Christianity, being a natural continuation of Judaism, or rather its secret branch of Kabalism, absorbed its specific attitude to the light (it would be nice to remember where Moses led his people from - it was Egypt). This is how P. Florensky, the canonical representative of Orthodoxy, understood that which he himself designated as the “metaphysics of light”: “... It has long been noticed that in a literary work this or that image, this or that word internally dominates... And such a place of the embryo in church works, especially in liturgical works, of course belongs to light . Everything that appears, or in other words, the content of all experience, which means all being, is light. In his womb “we live and move and exist”; it is he who is the space of true reality. And what is not light is not, and therefore is not reality.” So, physical light is the only metaphysical reality accessible to our physical vision. P. Florensky pays minimal attention to color - like paint or “darkened” or “weakened "light, in this one can see an interesting parallel with the description of the physics of light by I. Newton. According to Newton's corpuscular theory, light is a stream of particles moving from a source in all directions. The light given to us by the sun, as well as by the “Ilyich bulb” and other light-producing devices, consists of particles of the nature of all colors. Light, taken by itself, worries us little, unless it is the light of a police flashlight aimed at the face and accompanied by a convincing request to present documents. Light shows us the world, but we hardly notice the presence of light itself. Thanks to the amazing coincidences of nature, man learned that objectsThey are not colored in themselves, but the light reveals their differences by being reflected from them by their different parts. Any object appears to us in one color or another, reflecting from itself only the color in which we see it. Light itself is all the colors that are available to us and the proof of this is the rainbow. Drops of water left after rain split the light, revealing its hidden nature to us. People learned to split light into colors a long time ago; they knew about this phenomenon back in the 1st century AD. They used glass prisms for this. There is no person who would not admire the rainbow. Rainbows have always been associated with a feeling of joy and liberation. The word rainbow contains the Old Church Slavonic root "rad", which means "cheerful". It is no coincidence that in Ukraine they call it “veselka”. There is a belief that in the place where the rainbow goes into the ground, you can find a pot of gold buried by a leprechaun - an evil gnome who does not see the rainbow. The stingy leprechaun does not distinguish colors except gold, his immortal existence is devoted to collecting gold, which can only be taken from him by the person who finds the end of the rainbow. This is of course a legend, but if you think about it, true Gold can only be found by a person who fully understands his feelings. If you want to be happy, then you need to walk across the rainbow barefoot, the rainbow gives us a dream and inspiration... Inspiration is synonymous with life itself, did God breathe life into Adam or did Homo Sapiens appear as a result of evolution, is it so important? The main thing is that the state called Inspiration gives a person the perception of the colors of life - our feelings. It is not for nothing that the color scale discovered by Newton is called spectrum, from the Latin SPECTRUM - vision. Physicists admired Newton’s discovery for many years, but the outstanding German poet I. V. Goethe, the author of Faust who knew everything, did not like this technological discovery. Not everyone knows that Goethe was also a prominent natural scientist. He wrote: “Newton’s statement is a monstrous assumption. It cannot be that the most transparent, purest color - white - could turn out to be only a mixture of colored rays." Goethe believed that the light studied by Newton is no longer the light that we encounter in a natural environment, but light “tormented by all kinds of instruments of torture - slits, prisms, lenses.” Goethe urged: Friends, avoid the dark room, Where you they distort the light and bow in the most pathetic way before the distorted images. Mystics, part-time scientists and theologians, were first puzzled by the problem of color perception. Aristotle was the founder of modern natural science, the first physicist. The word Physics comes from the Greek. phesis - nature. Initially, in the era of ancient culture, science was not dissected and covered the entire body of knowledge about natural phenomena. The author of the first fundamental research work on the phenomena and essence of nature, “Metaphysics,” was Aristotle. He singled out a few colors, only three: red, green, purple. Newton first identified five, then ten colors, but ultimately settled on seven. The choice of this number is not explained by physics, but by its magical power (7 wonders of the world, 7 deadly sins, 7 days of the week). Aristotle explained the appearance of colors by the fact that, passing through a prism, light mixes with darkness and turns into different colors. Likewise, the events of our life, passing through the psyche, seem to us beautiful or ugly. A little darkness added to light produces a red light. A large amount of it is purple. This theory dominated science until the little boy Isaac Newton was born in England. Newton amazingly simply refuted Aristotle's theory. He directed red light onto the prism, and when it passed through the prism, it did not change color, and no new colors appeared. This means that the prism does not color white light, he concluded, but divides it into the simple component color parts it contains. So our mind breaks down life into actions and consequences, connecting them only by the chronology of time, but only strong experiences, joy or grief, again connect life intoa single fabric of sensations. Children don't like to go to bed because closing their eyes means darkness breaks the rainbow of their lives. People of previous centuries were similar in their feelings to modern children, their feelings and life events were directed by the omnipotent God, and God was light. Newton, having conducted numerous experiments with a prism, observing the course of rays, established that the least refraction is encountered by red rays - our passion , she is rude and straightforward. The strongest refraction is experienced by rays of violet color - a synonym for our imagination which is so difficult to break through the phenomenon of “Dispersion”, from the Latin DISPERSUS - “scattered” - the scattering of everyday desires and affairs.* * *What is it about color that evokes feelings in a person? The seeking mind sets nature. Only the eternal devil knows the truth about all matters.A. N. Animov It is difficult to imagine the relationship between colors and feelings in human behavior and manifestations for a person who is not familiar with the “Luscher color test”, and people who use it are unlikely to understand how this happens, and how it can be understood and compared ; after all, feelings are so deep inside and sometimes excite us so much, and the colors are always in front of us and only the traffic light, in our daily haste, we pay due attention, although sometimes we manage not to notice it. So who is Max Luscher, “a skilled swindler “who has confused all the psychologists of the world,” or a talented researcher who was the first to notice something that others did not notice? Color is a strange phenomenon of nature, provided by physiology. A person can watch TV while talking on the phone and not notice that the program he was seemingly interested in has already ended, but if the color of the TV disappears, this cannot go unnoticed. A strange phenomenon at first glance, there is a picture, therefore there is information that a person needed when settling in front of the TV, but something is no longer the same if there is no color. A person naturally needs information - this is a physiological need of the brain. You can get it from books, but most prefer television, and color television. And children, if a book without pictures is not an interesting book, as Alice L. Kerla said; Children themselves begin and love to read only if they have a lot and what is called reading with expression, so that the child can imagine. Imagination is the mental reproduction of a thing, without its physical presence. We can, with a sufficient amount of imagination, imagine a thing of any color, a color without a thing, but a thing without color - this is no longer possible. In the activity of consciousness there is and cannot be anything other than what was previously kindly provided by perception (feelings, perceptions, sensations) , the mind, with all its numerous rationality, should be occupied only with feelings, i.e. that which caused electrochemical activity in it. Objects are inseparable from color, the mind is not separated from feelings, based on this we can well say that we think - or rather feel - with colors, of course not literally, but in many ways this happens. A person notices a black and white image, but a color one excites him. As was said earlier, the physiological structure of the eye and brain obliges him to do this. Nature has arranged us in such a way that color does not leave us, like all other animals, indifferent because the autonomic nervous (fibrous) system leads from the eye to the diencephalon, transporting color irritation. The diencephalon, through the pituitary gland and the autonomic (the oldest, already present in the most primitive animals) nervous system, regulates the interaction and activity of organs. Orange-red intense colors give a start to acceleration and increase in functional ability (ergotropia). The dark blue color, tending towards black, tunes the autonomic nervous system to slow down, calm and rest (trophotropy) (there may be no comrades to the taste and color, but only because this “comrade” does not want to recognize himself as your comrade, but As for the nervous system and therefore perception, we are all not just comrades, but also closestrelatives).If light awakens you to activity in the morning, then color gives rise to a whole range of incomprehensible feelings, previously considered mystical. The first man drew with charcoal and was surprised to find that it left marks. Without stopping there, man began to search for paints, because a black drawing meant something, but could not express the emotional process itself. Humanity advanced even further with the invention of colored glass, passing through colored glass the light became seven times more divine. Even such a learned man as Lomonosov basked in the colored rays of divine light. Having come up with his own way of coloring glass and starting to create amazing canvases from it, he was able to get a rainbow reception at court. In the atheistic Soviet Union, color was also not ignored, knowing full well that strong slogans are of course good, and active propaganda with red flags and colorful calls is perhaps the main path to dark people. Children are usually far from adult games and shocks, but they are much closer to the natural understanding of color. Following the task, children of 3-4 years old should draw something “beautiful, pleasant, good”, as shown in the work of V.S. Mukhina, most often use light, bright colors - yellow, red, orange, blue, emerald green. As V.S. points out. Mukhina: “the color scheme of what is beautiful among children of all countries is similar: the colors in most cases are warm and certainly pure, local.” A comparative analysis of the use of “non-imitative” colors by children from different countries showed amazing consistency in the choice of color to depict the beautiful and the ugly. Children, getting acquainted with the drawings of their peers from other countries, accurately determined by the color of the drawing where the “beautiful” and where the “ugly” were depicted. In cases where children experienced emotions of joy, the preference for red, yellow and orange colors increased significantly compared to the background choices and decreased - green and blue (analysis was carried out according to color combinations). When experiencing the emotion of fear, children significantly less often preferred the combination red-blue-violet and more often preferred green-blue. The results of these works prove that color is associated with emotions at various levels of human mental activity from early childhood, and, therefore, the leading role of the learning factor in the formation of color-emotional connections, asserted by a number of researchers, cannot be accepted. As for the emotional and aesthetic attitude to color, as V.S. points out. Mukhina, teaching a child stable, objective associations of colors, as a rule, leads to a stereotypical, inert perception of colors and reduces the ability to directly feel color. Despite the fact that throughout human history the content of color symbols has undergone considerable changes - their interpretation and attitude towards them have changed - the core of color symbolism has remained unchanged. We are talking about that part of the content of a color symbol that remains even in the hypothetical case when the color is deprived of all its external, objective associations, which depend on cultural traditions and experience. But even without them, color is not deprived of its “original” meaning and does not turn into fiction. As Vincent Van Gogh wrote: “paints themselves express something.” In other words, color is not a “blank slate” on which a person is free to write down whatever he wants. As A.F. points out. Losev: “no one ever perceives color without these and similar impressions... the red color causes excitement, it is he, and not ourselves. Excitement is his objective property.” Color generates and enhances feelings, even if the mind is not aware of the excitement; feelings, if a person is healthy, never arrive in dead peace. The strongest feelings experienced by a person are a religious feeling - a feeling of mystical participation. A person experiences this feeling with the greatest strength in a temple, into the windows of which the visionary “guides to God” inserted colored glass. To experience such feelings, a child does not needvisiting a temple, the mysticism is in it. The consciousness of a child is animic, like that of early people, i.e. Reasoning by the principle of similarity, he concludes that everything around him is also alive, just like himself. We can say that for him a sunny bunny is as alive as a rabbit living in a lively corner of a kindergarten. Which of us in childhood did not amuse ourselves by putting colored glass on our eyes: here is blue glass - the world becomes serious, strict, sad; yellow - you involuntarily want to smile, everything seems festive, even if the day is cloudy. And how can you ignore a product of Soviet industry like “Kaleidoscope”, it’s cheap and not cheerful, but how much fun you won’t have a blast! But the relationship between light and color reached its apogee in the invention of the Lumiere brothers - the cinematograph. This is where there is complete mystical participation, it seems like a complete illusion, white matter, and on it colored shadows, but what an effect! And so we proved that color is an integral part of a person’s mental life, but what does each color mean, how does it affect us and what expresses. It contains our mirror. Look how similar the spiritual world and the decoration of the rainbow are. That rainbow and life are one and the same! Goethe. Faust Man is the only creature on earth with free will to express himself. Our brain, despite all its similarities with the brain of animals, has a unique add-on that gives it the ability to consciously change the environment - the ability to be creative. For humans, unlike animals, it is not enough to satisfy exclusively survival mechanisms; human natural needs also include the need for creative self-expression, and this is not necessarily literary or artistic activity. The structure of the human brain is unique - its analytical abilities literally oblige a person to a constant search for unique self-expression. Academician V.A. Engelhard wrote that creativity in its original source is the result of an innate, physiological need, “the result of a certain instinct, felt as powerfully as the need of a bird to sing or the desire of a fish to rise against the flow of a stormy mountain river.” Man, unlike animals, is deprived of natural tools of adaptation. like claws, fangs, feathers, etc. and therefore is simply obliged by nature to search for unique ways of adaptation, not given in ready-made form by nature. Man began to create everyday tools, but after a while this seemed not enough to him and he began to create non-utilitarian creations - drawings. By the way, a Neanderthal who lived around the same time and had a similar brain left us nothing but his bones, he simply died out. Is this a coincidence?! The development of human consciousness (homo sapiens) and creative capabilities followed the path from simple contemplation to a deeper knowledge of reality and then to its creative transformation. Man, as a social being, but deprived of nature, without common means of communication, was forced to invent a language and then and writing. A manifestation of the first writing was a drawing. A drawing, of course, in itself is of interest for research, but first it is worth paying attention to its nature, i.e. the color it was created with. After all, color is the first sign of matter, which we note in our perception, a stimulator of our feelings and their material manifestation. The first color that a person received at his disposal was the coals of a fire, so we will start with black. The perception of color is inseparable from emotional preferences and cultural traditions. In modern language, the color black is burdened with a lot of epithets, here you have black magic, and the black robe of monks, and black humor, and much more. Black is an amazing color, it is not just a direct contrast of white, but at the same time everything and nothing - absorbing all colors without a trace and containing everything in its infinity, it is no coincidence that the anarchists chose it as their color. Black is like the infinity of freedom, the unrevealed potential of everything, both beautiful and ugly. Black as a condensation of all colors and feelings, primitive reactions of protecting oneself fromfeelings, defensive denial, conservatism. But we should not strongly condemn the black color of the night, we need night for rest, morning always comes after night, and as Goethe said: the first color protruding from black is blue. About blue we can say that it is diluted black , but first about what it is diluted with about the second achromatic color - white. White color is usually perceived as an antagonist of black. To some extent, this statement is true; the essence of the relationship between white and black is not antagonism, but inseparability. Black and white, like the eternal law of thermodynamics, is shown to us with the greatest expressive beauty in the Chinese symbol of Tai Tzu, which has recently become a talisman for many Europeans. Two simple colors, enclosed in a circle, similar to two drops or fish, constantly change places, giving rise to all things, as Chinese philosophy says about Tai Tzu. But as an attentive viewer has noticed, Tai Tzu's black drop includes a white Yang circle and a white black Yin circle, telling us that nothing is represented uniquely. There are no absolute black sinners, black is night and peace, followed by a bright day. White color is the tiresome potential of everything that has not yet been expressed, the fear of expressing oneself, of staining white with something. So white, in contact with black, the flowing dawn, gives us blue is the color of coolness and subtle sadness, the color of reflection and pedantic orderliness. The black color, in completely ordered peace, has not yet completely given up its rights and blue is therefore the color of borderline mysticism, synonymous with astrology.K. Kaestlin, a little-known author of the last century, writes in his “Aesthetics”: “Blue is an extremely soft and cooling contrast to everything that is disturbing, bright, oppressive, tiring; it is a picture of peaceful tenderness and delightful freshness; this is fragility itself compared to all the material bulkiness and heaviness.” A little more white and light blue shows us the lightness of childhood impressions. “Charming nothingness,” that’s what Goethe told us about it. The psychological characteristic of blue is carefree fun. Light blue is the color of carelessness and carelessness, since it makes no claims and therefore does not accept obligations. And at the same time, the mystical meaning of blue is the color of the veil of Isis, among the Romans; Sophia, among Christians, this is apparently where the principle of carefree fun provided by the color blue comes from - as a guarantee of higher, heavenly protection. Dawn continues and the first red ray hits. Now about the red. Red is the most active color, leaving no one indifferent. He cuts through the night in the morning, he excites the senses... In Russia he excited everyone so much that he drove people with him for more than seventy years... Now we know very well, looking at the traffic light, that red warns us of danger. Let's add a little white and now the danger recedes, showing us pink . The dilution of the red color does not inhibit its energetic power, but frees it from destructive chaos. Pink is a free, non-binding romanticism, the charm of a girl’s dream of a bright future. We so often suggest to others: “Take off your rose-colored glasses,” but we ourselves are not in too much of a hurry to part with them... In terms of the power of its rapid spread, red is similar to yellow. The sun rising from the horizon appears red to us; as it rises, it acquires more and more yellow features. Yellow is like the living potential of the sun, from joyful naivety to annoying obsession. Yellow is the color of the living sun, the coming spring, the yellow heads of dandelions, in bright splashes, on the first green of the grass. Green, how surprisingly contradictory! Being the first new color after a dull winter, it signifies fertility and growth, but thanks to the influence of culture, looking into the green eyes of the interlocutor, we look for hidden deceit in his words, as opposed to brown - a symbol of simplicity. Brown and gray are boring colors, in them the calculation of sobriety, the onset of decline and the chilling chill of twilight. Evening - the day ends, the colors fade, the activity of the brain transforms. Spending the day actively doing business.