Need definitions of: Dark; Warm; and Bright


Throughout thousands of postings, the descriptive adjectives of dark, warm, and bright are employed.  What does each of them actually mean?  Are these meanings solely subjective, or can they be seen in displays of frequency responses and distortion across an audio spectrum?
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Showing 1 response by twoleftears

Errr, Saussure 101.

As atmasphere say, there needs to be a pretty broad consensus as to what a given word refers to, for speakers of a given language to communicate with each other.  Obviously, meaning will still be fuzzy around the edges.

When words a used *metaphorically*, this adds a whole new layer of fuzziness, but people don't realize how much metaphorical usage is part of everyday speech.

Bright/dark has to do with visual perception (light, color) not sound.
Warm has to do with touch or taste.

It works the other way too: you can talk about a loud color.

BTW, this has nothing to do with synaesthesia, it's just standard metaphorical usage.

But metaphorical usage is open to a greater range of interpretation, because it's figurative, and because a given instance will have a different range of connotations (rather than denotations) for a given individual.