I was listening to a lecture about the physiology of the human brain last night on the radio and the lecturer supplied a quick experiment to illustrate a point. This is related to the fact that some people have a problem whereby they see colours for particular audio tones (or colours for particular integers etc). This experiment should prove that we all have a similar function in our brains but at a less intrusive level. I couldn't think of a better place to try it out:

So, imagine two objects in front of you: one is a piece of broken glass with sharp jagged edges and the other is a large green amoeba. One of the objects is named 'Booba' and the other 'Kiki'. Which is which?

You need an RX-8 to fill your day.

The same can be said for smells, particularly in perfumes, where different notes in a perfume's bouquet suggest different colors to the brain.

Well it's kind of working. There's a higher percentage for one name as predicted although not quite as high as I expected. It's because the sound of the word links to the shape of the object in the brain apparently. I do need an RX-8 to fill my day but nevertheless it was a fascinating radio show (honestly).

Lensman

How do you know it's not simple word association? Booba isn't too far from boob, and that's a lot more soft and round like an amoeba than like a sharp glass object.

Sometime in the not too distant past, I read something similar having to do with language sounds. Hard sounds (k, t, p, d etc.) go with hard objects and bright colors and soft sounds (vowels, m, v etc. ) soft objects and pastels.

So... What object does "RX-8" conjure up? Something bright red and very fast, in my mind! ;)

All of you 'Boobas' are just plain perverse! ;)

Thanks for taking part everyone. It's been interesting.

Here are the lectures from Radio4 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/reith2003/lectures.shtml) if anyone is interested.

yeah...
it's in the pronounced labial sound (the "buh" of "booba") that we get that mental imagery of soft and round... green, hey, i dunno about that...

so, the sharp (forget the right name for it) "kih" sound, emphasized by the repetition, gives it the pointy mental association...

...btw, i'm one of the 13 jackasses that voted the other way just to screw up your graph ;) ahahahaha!!

neat stuff Lensman!! :D

...btw, i'm one of the 13 jackasses that voted the other way just to screw up your graph

Another Jackass here.