Evolution Occurs

The adaptive relevance of image projection is that we may preview our potential acts and consider potential outcomes. This allows us to colonize any environment, as we are able to project the need to put up stores for winter etc.. I think that higher concepts could be an incidental to this image making capacity but curiously they become advantageous in negotiating a persons comfort level in the world.

 

I think we need to note that the ability to create and produce quite sophisticated music with the human voice alone is strong evidence that this ability has some sort of adaptive value - if it were an accident, why would we be able to do it so well?

I think the answer must have something to do with creating a sort of group consciousness and identification. A good singer can inspire people and put them all into a similar state of mind. Singing hymns in church creates a calmer and more meditative state, and creates a shared bond within the entire congregation.

I remember something I learned years ago - I think it was in an anthropology class: Sometimes a member of a gorilla group will take sticks and start beating on a log - and all the other gorillas will gather around and watch and listen, as if they were at a concert.

One of the great evolutionary advantages humans have is the ability to work together toward a common goal. I think music is a way to give people a greater sense of commonality, which in turn leads to greater inspiration and effort to accomplish the goals of the group.

 

I don't think everything has a strictly biologically adaptive function, particularly in the case of humans.
It seems to me that we are complex enough to be relatively self-aware, and of this self-awareness an almost sort of existential suffering is born, whether it be experienced in happiness or sorrow. I've always seen most music and creative expression to be representative of that.
So for me, music doesn't help people get food, it doesn't flex the cognitive muscles to new heights that allow for expanded growth, and it isn't to impress women, it's just the bi-product of the paradox of our own existence, billions of individuals crying out in unison through a musical voice hoping it will reach the hypocrite that is the Universe.

I realize posting such a seemingly intuitive thought in the Atheist forum where all the great "scientific" minds gather probably isn't the wisest decision I've made, but oh well.

 

Chicks love the guitar player.

I think music, far from being superfluous is actually fundamental.

 

Chicks love guitar players that don't play to impress women.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYkz30RL_GU"]YouTube- Paco de lucia-solea Greaaaaaaaaaat

 

He's all fingering the fret board and stroking the sound hole. What are you talking about.

 

It seems to me at least some of us think music is non-adaptive, or at least we don't understand what adaptive function it serves. Of course, impressing women is a possibility. Peacocks put a lot of evolutionary energy into that enterprise, with plumage instead of music. But music presupposes consciousness, which is another thing that doesn't have a clear adaptive function. According to neo-Darwinian theory, aren't all characteristics that persist over time supposed to have survival value? If consciousness and music aren't adaptive, they must be epi-phenomenal--mere curious by-products of the evolutionary process. Does that seem plausible? Should we consider it to be a fortunate coincidence that we're aware of our existence and the universe around us, and can appreciate Bach and the Beatles? At minimum, I'd suggest that there's a phenomenon of emergence going on--wholes that are more than the sum of their parts.

 

What I mean of music being fundamental is that things seem to have an innate tonal quality. You stand in a room apart from let's say the kitchen with a tile floor and drop kitchen items on the floor and be able to distinguish from sound whether the article is ceramic, glass, wood, metal, or plastic.
We have an instinctive reflex to loud noise. I think this is because loud or strong vibrations displace our emotive or vibratory stability, just as strong wind would displace our tactile faculty.

 

I ain't no atheist - as YOU oughta know, neo - though I did get my education in biochemistry. But I still say - and this addresses Okiefreak's post as well: For such well-developed and sophisticated music-producing facilities as humans have to persist in the species so long and to become so well-developed, they must have adaptive value. Our musical abilities are much too complex and well-developed, and much too obviously important to us, to be a mere by-product of other traits.

Now excuse me, I'm taking my guitar out to the park and see if I can get me some chicks...

 

Now this gets to a subject that is truly fascinating and perplexing - how this interplay of sound vibrations and emotional reactions developed in the first place. It's probably impossible to know with any certainty. But I suppose at the most fundamental level, even the smallest microorganisms may be affected in some way by sound vibrations. It could be that more complex responses evolved over time based on how different vibrations affected the earlier organisms.

 

Darwin had a theory that music and language both began with adaptive primate vocalizations like those of gibbon apes or chimpanzees, to signal alarm, proclaim territory, challenge rivals and attract mates. This was often accompanied by stomping and shaking of branches. Neuroscientist Steven Brown believes that music and language co-evolved, as language became specialized to communicate mainly referential or "intellectual", and music became specialized for more emotional communication. Mated pares of gibbons actually sing duets. Hagan and Bryant relate this process to social bonding and alliances, critical to human survival. Music goes back a long way in human history. A bone flute was discovered with Neanderthal remains. According to cognitive neuro-psychologist Isabella Perez, musical cognition may be served by specialized neural networks that don't seem to be affected by loss of other brain functions like language. According to neuroscientists Pansepp and Bernatzky, music has an even stronger impact on us than visual cues because it affects the brain more directly--especially the amygdala, which is the part most closely associated with emotion,but also the dorsolateral, medial, and orbitofrontal cortex which are involved in determining appropriate emotional responses to situations. It's interesting that many of the parts of the brain that respond to music are also those that respond to rewarding stimuli, and are associated with addiction.

 

And just how do you know that they are well-developed and sophisticated?

 

I should think this would be obvious, neo...but okay, let's examine it.

Howzabout we compare the musical development of birds with that of humans? The typical bird "knows" and sings exactly one (1) song. The mockingbird would be an exception, but even a mockingbird's repertoire is limited - and purely imitative, not creative. The same is true for parrots and parakeets. By stark contrast, human beings have created thousands upon thousands of unique pieces of music - and not merely with one voice, but with many voices or many instruments in harmony and counterpoint, countless varieties of styles and rhythms.

This shows the sophisticated ability of humans to conceptualize and create music, which requires extensive brain adaptation. Do you doubt that it takes extensive brain adaptation? If so, ask yourself why other animals don't do this.

Then there is the ability of humans to sing. To sing requires the ability to control vocal pitch and quality, to have a wide tonal range, to distinguish one note from another within a very fine tolerance - requiring well-developed sound perception apparatus and brain structures. And of course there is the phenomenon of people who have perfect pitch - the ability to recognize and sing any specific note - a rare but well-known ability.

Speaking alone doesn't require this degree of tonal production and recognition. Tone-deaf people can talk and communicate just fine. This kind of ability is far above and beyond what is required for mere speech.

And again: Other animals don't do this. Why? Because they don't have the morphological and neurological development to do so.

Another approach to thinking about this would be to imagine what it would take to engineer and program machines to have these same abilities. And then think how evolution could result in similar structures without long and steady adaptive pressure. Why would such complex abilities evolve unless there were adaptive reasons for them?

Okiefreak's post goes even further to substantiate the complexities of human musical abilities.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VOkAirXO4Q"]YouTube- Paradox - Deep Sleep (Renegade Hardware)

hahahahaha

 

I stopped reading OP at the word "broccolli".
You'll have a hard time convincing me about evolution, and a harder time convincing me that this disgusting vegetable can prove anything to me other than it's disgusting taste.

 

Now there's an enlightened attitude. And you can't tell me my uncle is a monkey!

 

Well I think there's one thing we can all agree on: We will have a hard time convincing Irminsul. I think the question we all need to ask ourselves is: Do we really care whether we convince Irminsul?

 

Something that just occurred to me in review. There seems to be a spectral broadband that each of our respective senses can choose from. However I speak of "senses" in a different way. I speak of the two senses of homo sapien, "tasting" and "knowing". Sight is spectrally represented by color and contrast and is mentally represented by the power to make distinctions, the knowing part of us. Sound is auditory and tactile and is linked to our emotional or evaluative sense, the tasting part of us.

 

It never occurred that I might try. Irminsul's statement precludes any convincing that includes the broccoli as one of it's constituents. However we cannot deny the existence of broccoli and therefore the self defeating conundrum. Know when to fold em.