WHY do substances reflect and absorb light?

Question

When I search online for this question, I only find things about what different colors do to absorb and reflect. I need to know WHY light colors reflect and dark colors absorb light. Please help if you can! THANKS!

Answer 1

Well, there aren't too many things that could happen. When light hits an object, it either needs to:

1) keep going (get transmitted)

2) turn around (get reflected)

3) go away (get absorbed)

There's really nothing else that could happen, as anything else would just be an example of one of those three things (the light could turn into a rose, which is just an example of going away and fits #3).

Answer 2

Electron clouds around atoms or molecules are suseptible to light at cetain frequencies.  "Black" absorbs the light, and converts it into molecular motion (heat)  "White" bounces it back.  

Answer 3

Light is absorbed and reflected by objects because the electrons in a substance react differently depending on the state the electrons are in. Electrons in white objects reflect almost all wavelengths of visible light and little of the the light is turned into heat (IR radiation), while black substances absorb nearly all of the wavelengths of light hitting it. Objects that are other colors reflect light of the color the object is (ex. Orange objects reflect orange light) while absorbing the lights of other colors. And if you care, though most black objects reflect about 5-10% of light, scientists have developed a substance that absorbs 99.9% of light: http://www.solardiy.info/?p=76 (Absorbing 100% of light is technically impossible as the object would not be visible)