Do cats see in color?
Entry posted by kramsey
1,168 views
There has often been the question of wether cats see in color or not. Many believe, simply from myths they hear as children, that cats only see in black and white. This statement is in fact not true. Similarly to humans, cats have rods and cones in the back of their eyes, rods for seeing black, white, and grey, and cones for seeing colors. So based solely on the biological aspect of the cats eyes, they should be able to see color. It is their perception of color that is different from humans.
In order to see color, light waves must travel through the air and reflect off of different objects. With different frequency, different colors are created. When light reaches an object, the surface of that object reflects one color and absorbs all of the others causing us to only see that color. People can see three separate types of light, red, blue, and green. The combination of each of these colors creates the large array of colors that we experience daily. Cats, however, only see blue, and green. This causes them to see less of the color spectrum than we do, and only part of the visible light spectrum. Despite their inferior cones, cats have superior rods, which allows them to see better in the dark and distinguish between a multitude of various shades of grey. The video bellow helps to explain how cats see color and what colors they do see.
In conclusion, cats do see in color, but not the same colors that we see, and their perception of color is vastly different.
1 Comment
Recommended Comments