There are hundreds of tones had been discovered. But, only few photographers could explain about tones. The answers I often get from them are just about favorite tones. Because a photographer loves a tone, the same use it. This kind of reason is not wrong, because there’s no certain measure of toning in arts (especially functional design and photography,) only the fittest is right (this includes taste in arts.)
Actually, editing or changing tones is not as easy as pie, because the process involves knowledge.
One of the knowledge to dissect the meaning of a tone is psychology (logos means knowledge, psyche means soul.) This could be seen on common people (not artists) when responding to a photo, “This is dramatic!” or the like. And no wonder, this is the reason my friend took an art therapy graduate program. Art therapy uses the arts (especially visual arts) to educate the future generation, and it could be used to heal mental problems. The elements used in such activities are the elements of the arts (points, lines, vertices, color, etc.)
There are more ‘surgical knife’ or fields of knowledge that makes a tone meaningful, like geography, semiotics, hermeneutics et cetera. Thus, a photographer should be held responsible for his/her use of tone from various views of knowledge.
So there, people.