See What It’s Like To Be Color-Blind

Did you know that most people who are color-blind don’t even know it?

There are all sorts of “color blindness” tests, but the one I remember the most is the Ishihara Color Test. This test is the one with lots of dots. If you can read the number inside the dots, you’re not color-blind.

My father could never see the numbers inside. But one day, at a museum in downtown St. Louis, an exhibit showed us the different-colored dots, but I couldn’t read any of the numbers. Next to me, my dad jumped up and down, excited about his findings. “I can see the numbers! This is awesome!” he said.

Below the exhibit, a sign said: “If you can read this, you are color-blind.”

My father is one of the 8 percent of men of Northern European descent (compared to only 0.5 percent of women) who are red-green color-blind, which is the most common form of color blindness, according to the National Eye Institute.

And incredibly, many of these people are none the wiser about their color blindness.

Mind Warehouse has created a fascinating video packed with scientific facts about color blindness, because clearly, both the color-blind who don’t know it and those with normal color vision could use some enlightening. For instance, did you know that not all color blindness is the same? Some color-blind people can’t tell the difference between red and green, while some actually see the entire world in black and white.

To understand what the world looks like to the color-blind, you can upload your own photos to color-blindness.com to view your photos as they would appear through color-blind eyes.