Timbre is a property associated with the shape of a sound wave, that is, the coe

Question

Timbre is a property associated with the shape of a sound wave, that is, the coefficients of the discrete Fourier transform of the corresponding signal. This is why a violin and a piano can each play the same note at the same frequency yet sound completely different. Now for light: if you mix red and blue light, the resulting wave has on average the same frequency as green, but a different shape. Is this why we observe it as magenta instead of green? So can we say light has timbre?

But other colours mixtures don't work! Red+green is yellow, but yellow is a pure colour, so apparently red+green has no unique timbre in this case; the shape of the red+green wave is identical to a pure yellow wave.

Explanation / Answer

Your visual range includes roughly one octave as compared to roughly twelve in your aural range. Further your visual system uses only four types of light sensors each with limited frequency discrimination, while your hearing has fine frequency discrimination.

So while light spectra could have harmonic structure your visual apparatus is ill equipped to detect it.

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