White

White is a color (more accurately it contains all the colors of the visible spectrum and is sometimes described as an achromatic color—black is the absence of color) that has high brightness but zero hue. The impression of white light can be created by mixing (via a process called "additive mixing") appropriate intensities of the primary color spectrum: red, green and blue, but it must be noted that the illumination provided by this technique has significant differences from that produced by incandescence (see below).

Usage, symbolism, colloquial expressions

In general, since white is opposite of black, it is often used with positive connotation. Many negative expressions with "black" have an equivalent positive expression with "white". For example, whitehat describes a person who is ethically opposed to the abuse of computer systems, in contrast with blackhat. White has also many other meanings:

Related Topics:
Black - Whitehat - Computer system - Blackhat

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• The term white is often used in the West to denote "race" for so-called Caucasian people, i.e. people of European/West Asian descent with light skin color, whose skin color actually ranges from pink to pale brown, and overlaps with some people that might be classified as "Blacks". For more details, see Whites.
• White noise, in acoustics, is a sibilant sound that is often a nuisance, although it can also be deliberately created for test purposes.
• Whitewash, figuratively, means an attempt to obscure the truth by issuing a blanket of lies. See propaganda.
• Whiteout is a weather condition in which visibility is reduced and surface definition lost in snowy environments.
• In Chinese and Indian tradition, white is the color of mourning, death, and ghosts.
• In English heraldry, white or silver (color) signified brightness, purity, virtue, and innocence. (The American Girls Handy Book, p.369)
• White is the traditional color of bridal dress in both western (European) and Japanese weddings. In Western weddings, a white dress is symbolic of purity (the bride has not engaged in pre-marital sex)
• White is often associated with Conservatism (as opposed to Communism), particularly in the years following World War I, with civil wars fought between "Reds" and "Whites", for instance the Civil War in Russia and the Civil War in Finland.
• A white flag is an international sign of either surrender, or truce, that is, it is a sign of peaceful intent, typically at time of war.
• A white paper can be an authoritative report on a major issue, as by a team of experts; a government report outlining policy; or a short treatise whose purpose is to educate (contrast position paper) industry customers. It is called white paper because it was originally bound in white.
• The white ribbon is worn by movements denouncing violence against women and against queer youth. It is also worn by some feminists and was a symbol for peace in Quebec, in the beginning of 2003, as part of the popular opposition to war on Iraq.
• To "show the white feather" is to display cowardice. In cockfighting, a white feather in the tail is considered a mark of inferior breeding. In Victorian England a purported coward would be presented with a white feather.
• White is also one of the two opponents in many board games of abstract strategy, such as go, chess, and checkers.
• In both the French and Russian Revolutions, white symbolized royalism. Arthur Charles Fox-Davies has argued that white can be considered a tincture in heraldry separate from its use to represent argent, and in fact the labels borne on the arms, crests and supporters of members of the British Royal Family other than the reigning sovereign are invariably shown as white. The color is also used extensively by the Roman Catholic pope.