Relevance for the driver’s license
In fact, a color sense disorder rarely leads to a restriction of participation in traffic. Color-blind people are allowed to obtain a driver’s license and drive a car. Color blindness primarily comprises red-green vision deficiencies.
Only a complete loss of color sense (achromatopsia) leads to restrictions. In this case there is also a reduced visual acuity and increased sensitivity to glare. People with a green weakness usually have no problems.
In the context of a red weakness it looks somewhat different. In this case the retina only reacts to stronger red tones. Poor light conditions, thunderstorms, fog or dirty taillights of a car driving in front are dangers here.
Are cows or birds color-blind?
Humans have sensory cells, the so-called cones. There are three types, each of which can perceive red, green or blue colors.All other colors result from different compositions of these colors. The genus of the cattle lacks the sensory cells for the red light.
Therefore they can only perceive colors from the green-blue color spectrum. Birds even have four receptors instead of the three color receptors as in humans. They can also recognize ultraviolet light. At dusk, however, their sense of color fades much faster than in humans.
Summary
In most cases of congenital color blindness, the complete failure of the cones results in an inability to perceive colors. However, this is usually the least of the problems for those affected, as they have only known the world in shades of gray since birth. The main symptoms are reduced visual acuity and extremely increased sensitivity to glare.
All articles in this series:
