There is a flash in the pan sensation going on over what color a dress looks like. The image in the middle is the original picture. Some people see it as gold and white, some people as blue and black, and I saw it as light blue and tan. Vaguely interesting optical trick, so whats all the fuss about that would lead to talking about it for a couple hours at work and hearing a story about it on NPR on the way home.
To me the interest in this has nothing to do with color. It doesn't have any thing to do with a dress. Instead this is about a fundamental question that people believe they know the answer to. Is what I see an accurate reflection of the world? The vast majority of people believe that they do see a perfect reflection of the world. Not just in terms of the objects and their color but in all aspects of their world view.
As Kathryn Schulz put in her in TED talk: On Being Wrong
As Kathryn Schulz put in her in TED talk: On Being Wrong
"Think for a moment about what it means to feel right. It means that you think that your beliefs just perfectly reflect reality. And when you feel that way, you've got a problem to solve, which is, how are you going to explain all of those people who disagree with you?"
The fascinating thing about the dress is it forced people to, in some small way, acknowledge that they don't have a perfect reflection of the world. The challenge to their idea of that perfect reflection had to come in the form of the color of a dress for two reasons.
We are faced with this truth everyday in politics, in religion, and other vitally important aspects of life. In those however, people are unable to accept that their view could be not perfect. People were forced to let go of their series of unfortunate assumptions as stated by Schulz:
- It doesn't actually matter
- People believe that it is not a matter of opinion
We are faced with this truth everyday in politics, in religion, and other vitally important aspects of life. In those however, people are unable to accept that their view could be not perfect. People were forced to let go of their series of unfortunate assumptions as stated by Schulz:
" The first thing we usually do when someone disagrees with us is we just assume they're ignorant. ...When that doesn't work, ... we move on to a second assumption,which is that they're idiots. ... And when that doesn't work, ... we move on to a third assumption: they know the truth, and they are deliberately distorting it for their own malevolent purposes."
The dress doesn't allow for those assumptions, for a moment, just one small instant in time, people are forced to admit that you can look at the same thing and simply see something different. If only this is a lesson that people would generalize maybe we could really talk to each other and fix the problems that face the world.