We will never know what color(s) a blind person sees for the same exact reason that we will never know what colors the sighted person next to you "sees" (please note the quotes).
My interpretation of yellow could be another person's interpretation of red, etc.
So if a blind person can't tell us what they see, how can we explain to them what we see?
Similarly, how do you describe a specific color to someone who cannot see that exact color?
I have color deficiency, a mild case, of the red/green spectrum. Pure colors in those frequency ranges I can see, well more importantly identify, but when they start mixing and having various shades of different colors, my brain doesn't understand how to interpret what my eyes see.
For example, many green lights on traffic signals appear to basically be "white". As a kid I brought this up, confused why they called a white light green.
Once when driving at night through a certain intersection for the first time, I barely stopped in time when approaching what was a green light turning to red. Turns out, that "green" was an odd shade for the yellow light. That threw my head for a spin.
Some light pinks appear gray, and I am always confused on many shades of green and brown, and light green and yellow. Browns are my absolute worst because they are composed with green and red shades.
I've "learned" quite a few colors, but really it's my brain compensating for what my eyes cannot perceive correctly. Certain shades that I don't correctly apply the right name to, over time I learn that the shade I see most often is a certain actual color, whether my eyes and brain agree or not.
For instance, I might see a certain shade of brown quite frequently, but my brain wants to call it green. I learn that that shade is most often brown, even though I see it as green.
Conversely, there are quite a few shades of red or brown that appear to be the opposite. A shade of red I will call brown, because I've frequently seen a shade of brown that appeared red.
Same with purple and blue, and that upsets me because I see all shades of blue correctly. But when I've seen so many shades of purple that I see as blue, my mind wants to adapt by referring to many shades of blue as purple, taking a stab that I'll be right in identifying that shade as purple even though my eyes aren't seeing the red composition of the color.
Most often it has no negative impact on life, and is why it's never been a genetic defect anywhere close to be wiped out. Most often my problems with identifying colors really only comes up in the end as a humorous situation. I'll point and call out a description of something, and be incorrect for the color. Or I'll be drawing and find out later the colors I used were NOT what I wanted.
For instance, 7th Grade art, we had to draw a caricature on our portfolio. Turns out I colored my face some shade of green or light brown, when I had thought I was coloring it peach. Damn unlabeled cheap colored pencils.
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