Reality Is Relational: How Our Senses Shape the Properties of Light, Sound, and Matter

What if the colors, sounds, and measurements we rely on aren't inherent properties of the universe—but artifacts of how we’re built to perceive them?

Core Idea:

The measurable properties we attribute to things like light or sound (wavelength, frequency, color, pitch) do not exist independently. They emerge entirely from how our sensors—eyes, ears, scientific instruments—interact with these phenomena.

In other words:
We’re not measuring external reality itself. We’re measuring how our sensors relate to it.

Key Concepts:

1. Wavelength & Color Depend on Sensor Structure

Traditional science says light has an objective wavelength, which we perceive as color.

But what if:

  • The wavelength isn’t an intrinsic property of the light itself?

  • It’s simply how our specific eye structure (cones, angles) interacts with light?

Change the sensor’s structure, change the measurement.

2. Surface Reflection Is About Interaction, Not Objectivity

Objects don’t possess color in isolation.
Color is how reflected light interacts with our eyes.

A different sensor might see a totally different “color”—or none at all.

3. Beyond Light: Sound, Depth, Particles

  • Pitch & Frequency: Depend on how ears process vibration.

  • 3D Vision: Emerges from how eyes interpret angles.

  • Quantum Particles: Appear as waves or particles depending on observation setup.

Every measurement reveals a relationship, not an absolute.

Measurement Tools Are Extensions of Us

Even complex instruments like spectrometers or oscilloscopes are bound by:

  • Their construction

  • Their orientation

  • The principles we program them with (which reflect how humans sense things)

They don’t reveal the "true" reality—they show us the result of their interaction.

Philosophical Implications

This aligns with:

  • Phenomenology: Reality appears through perception.

  • Kantian Epistemology: We can't know the “thing-in-itself,” only its appearance.

  • Relational Quantum Mechanics: Physical properties depend on observers.

What This Suggests:

  1. Alternative sensors could perceive different "realities."

  2. Change the sensor, change the data.

  3. Reality isn’t fixed—it’s relational.

Final Thought:

All measurable properties—wavelength, color, frequency—aren’t inherent in the universe. They are co-created by the observer and the observed. Reality is relational.


Location: Malaysia

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