It has long been said that black is not a colour, it is simply and absence of light. This is a lie!

It has also been said that white is not a colour, but conventional scientists see white as the source of all colours. This is also untrue! There are many colours that are not of white origins.

The Myth

Light is white. That is the colour that light is. Light of any other colour is made by taking white light and taking bits away from it.

When white light is split using a prism¹ we see a range of colours that are commonly known as the rainbow. These colours are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet² but they are all simply steps along the same scale, the scale of white light.

Black is what happens when there is no light around. It is an absence, a lack. It cannot have any of the nuances or subtleties of the white colours. If you see differences in the levels and shades of black you are obviously deviant, strange, weird and generally unsavoury.

The Truth³

Black appears not simply because of the absence of light, but because of the presence of dark. Some may wish to call this dark "black light" but in others it may cause confusion⁴, so we will use "dark". There is no word that can be found in the dictionary to describe this phenomenon, because They do not wish for its existence to be known.

Dark fills all the places that light does not, and vice versa. There is no place where there is neither light nor dark, and equally there is no place where light and dark can both be found. Therefore logically there are places where light and dark meet. On these edges, at the borders of light and dark, strange things may happen.

The many colours of black can be found by sending a ray of dark through a prism. The black colours are more numerous and, some say, more lovely than the white colours. There are, of course, black-red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple⁵, but there are also colours such as black-pink, black-turquoise, black-maroon and black-octarine.

The human eye can detect an astonishing number of shades of green, but the shades of black in existence are even greater in number. Unfortunately, the number of people who can see all of these shades is few. Most people can see only as fraction of the possible number of colours created. Animals such as cats utilise the many shades of dark present to allow them to see at night. Night-vision goggles work by translating the shades of black into shades of green, visible to all humans, but if one could see all the black colours one would not need them. Myths about infra-red radiation being detected by these goggles is a results of mistakes, misinformation and deliberate lies. Another myth is into the workings of lightbulbs, saying that they give out light when really they take in dark. Have you ever really looked at a lightbulb? Where, exactly, does it purport to keep this massive store of light?

The last person proven to have been capable of seeing all the known colours of black disappeared under mysterious circumstances. If you have this ability, it is in your best interests not to reveal yourself to the world, instead contact The Minister⁶ and he may be able to arrange protection for you, or at least to guide you in deciding how best to use your gift.

And remember, black is the opposite of white, not merely its absence.

¹Or a drop of water.²"Ah, but what about pink?" I hear you cry, and therein lies one of the imperfections in this very imperfect plan.³And the truth shall set ye free! (sorry, got a bit carried away there)⁴And memories of drug-addled adolescence.⁵Who knew which was indigo and which was violet anyway?⁶