Fundamentally, it’s the same type of problem - and really more of a philosophical thing.
The term was invented; its assignment and scope were invented, too. The wavelengths themselves were discovered.
So there are two different "Blues;" signifier and signified.
The number of quarks in a proton or neutron is always 3.
There are a fair number of dimensionless physical constants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dimensionless_physical_constan...
You can choose different number systems to represent the values symbolically, but the numbers will always be the same. At least in this universe.
Wildly, parts of physics are only possible to describe adequately using imaginary numbers, which suggests that we could have chosen a better name for them: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/quantum-physics-imaginar...
The fact that particles have identity is also vague, afaiu, so existence of numbers or their non-biological origin is not as easy to prove by example as it seems.
I understand what you're saying. Occurrences like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_species demonstrate that the idea of "species" isn't firm and that what truly matters is each individual and their unique circumstances. But this seems to me to be more a limitation of language and philosophy than a repudiation of math.
As you pointed out, it's all equivalent to drawing tally lines, counting pebbles, sliding counters on an abacus, or counting fingers and toes. Despite the fractal nature of coastlines and the constant exchange of matter and energy between adjacent parts of the universe, it is possible to agree upon useful delineations. And there is not any alternative maths which happens to describe practical observations in a way which does not reduce to the maths with which we are familiar.
The term was invented; its assignment and scope were invented, too. The wavelengths themselves were discovered.
So there are two different "blues;" sigmifier, and signified.
The wavelengths may have always existed but colors only become a thing when we draw the arbitrary lines between them.
I’ve literally had an argument with someone where they insisted burnt umber was not orange or orange like.
Which, uh - maybe? But c’mon. It’s totally somewhat Orange!
