On Sunday , the net day of theWorld Science Festival , Alan Alda hosted an consequence to announce the winners of his third annualFlame Challenge , in which he tax world - class scientists with explaining an abstract construct in a way that makes sense to 11 - year - olds . The kid beak the topic ( well , a new Alda was responsible for the first year ’s question : What is a flame ? ) and adjudicate the submission . This class , yard of students in schools around the humans vote on written and television entry explaining " What is Color ? "
Before harbinger the winner , Alda brought out three scientists to explain to the mostly elementary schoolhouse senior audience dissimilar aspect of the construct of color . Jay Neitz from the University of Washington explained the basic mechanism of how the three different kinds of cone cells in the retina process unlike wavelength of light as different semblance . The cones read brightness as blood-red , green , or blue , the different combinations of which depict all the thousands of colors we see in the world . While most other mammals , like dogs and big cat , have only two form of these cones , mantis shrimp have 12 different photoreceptor type — the most in the creature kingdom — and can see a whole range of colors we ca n’t even imagine .
Next up , artist and scientist Bevil Conway demonstrate the thinker - boggle power of colour initiation — or , how a people of colour can look all dissimilar base on the surrounding colors — with a Josef Albers - style painting exercise ( see some examples of interchangeable illusionshere ) . He prove a series of slides illustrating how creative person apply , or subvert , this crotchet of neuroscience in their oeuvre .
David Eagleman of Baylor College of Medicine explain the offset of perception that is synesthesia , or the blending of sensory faculty , especially as it let in color tie-up . After a scientific intromission — as much as 3 percent of the population is synesthetic — he introduced neuroscientist , fiddler , and synesthete Kaitlyn Hova who , with the assistance of some lighting fast one , demonstrated what sound - to - gloss tie can look like .
The result conclude with the announcement of the Flame Challenge winner . Melanie Golob took home the trophy for the written entry :
And Dianna Cowern ’s picture call for first billet in the optic family :
you may see the full demonstration onlinehere .
