Light

[Under Dizzle]

ever since elementary school art class, I was always taught something along the lines of "Black is the mixture of all colors, and white is the absence of color."
I also remember reading that black holes are "so dense not even light can pass through" color needs light, and if there is no light, wouldn't a black whole have to be white?

 

I always thought black was when their is absence of color, like
the night happens because their is absence of light meaning black vs white.

 

All colours are just the colour that reflects back so essentially red dye for example is just chemicals which do not absorb red light but do absorb other light therefore the red is reflected and that's what is seen. Light before any absorption is white it contains all the colours mixed together to prove this prisms were used to split the light (you may have done this as a kid to make a rainbow). Black is essentially when all light is absorbed and none is reflected. Different colours of light have different wavelengths therefore are absorbed differently. So to answer your question black is lack of colour, white is all of them.

 

[Under Dizzle]

I always thought black was when their is absence of color, like
the night happens because their is absence of light meaning black vs white.

Well there's two kinds of color i remember learning about. One, which was physical, and it meant that if you mixed all color, you would get something close to black. and no color at all, was white. and the other kind, means pretty much the opposite, but it has to do with computer visuals, or something along those lines, like projection.

 

[MohtasaUnique]

ever since elementary school art class, I was always taught something along the lines of "Black is the mixture of all colors, and white is the absence of color."
I also remember reading that black holes are "so dense not even light can pass through" color needs light, and if there is no light, wouldn't a black whole have to be white?

You're confusing light with pigment.
When you're talking about light, white is the presence of all colors of the visible light spectrum. Essentially green, blue, and red mixed.
When you're talking about pigment, white pigment is the absence of all color because it reflects every color of the visible colors of light. And as explained earlier, when all of the colors mix, you see white. Black pigments is the combination of all color, and therefore the pigment will absorb all the light, which is why you see black. Because no light is being reflected back at you. It's all absorbed.


Here's a diagram.

We see color because the light we see hasn't been absorbed, and instead bounces back and enters our eyes. Here's a diagram of that:

So if the leaf were black, that ray of green light wouldn't bounce off the leaf, it would be absorbed and no light would enter our eye when we look at the black object because there IS no light.



So to answer your original question, black holes are black because ALL light is being absorbed/sucked in, therefore no light is reflected to enter you eye. So you see black.