Why do people make music?

[John B]

Some people tried to figure it out.

Why Do People Make Music?
In a new study, researchers found universal features of songs across many cultures, suggesting that music evolved in our distant ancestors.
By Carl Zimmer
May 15, 2024

Music baffled Charles Darwin. Mankind’s ability to produce and enjoy melodies, he wrote in 1874, “must be ranked amongst the most mysterious with which he is endowed.”

All human societies made music, and yet, for Darwin, it seemed to offer no advantage to our survival. He speculated that music evolved as a way to win over potential mates. Our “half-human ancestors,” as he called them, “aroused each other’s ardent passions during their courtship and rivalry.”

Other Victorian scientists were skeptical. William James brushed off Darwin’s idea, arguing that music is simply a byproduct of how our minds work — a “mere incidental peculiarity of the nervous system.”

That debate continues to this day. Some researchers are developing new evolutionary explanations for music. Others maintain that music is a cultural invention, like writing, that did not need natural selection to come into existence.

The rest of the article in a Gift Link.

[Dub]

Nice. I haven’t read the link yet but I remember reading somewhere that some experts think music came before speech.

[Cornflake]

Arfa, a lovely young cave woman, is seated near the evening fire with Uggh and Blimpf. Both want her for a mate. Uggh begins to sing a song about his last hunt for aurochs. Arfa follows raptly. She enjoys the rhythm and the story. Blimpf, meanwhile, only burps and passes gas. Will Arfa choose the man who interests and entertains her? Or the one who only burps and farts?

(If music preceded speech, nothing changes except that Uggh just grunts his song. The rhythm and the variations in pitch are still there.)

Every adolescent male knows that it's better to be Uggh than to be Blimpf. That's why I started playing guitar.

[epaul]

May 18, 2024 10:54:16 GMT -5 Cornflake said:

Arfa, a lovely young cave woman, is seated near the evening fire with Uggh and Blimpf. Both want her for a mate. Uggh begins to sing a song about his last hunt for aurochs. Arfa follows raptly. She enjoys the rhythm and the story. Blimpf, meanwhile, only burps and passes gas. Will Arfa choose the man who interests and entertains her? Or the one who only burps and farts?

If survival matters, and it does across all species, mates are chosen first and foremost on their perceived ability to enhance survival, of self and of offspring. On that basis, a caveman who burps and farts around the fire will likely be perceived to be very well fed, and thus fairly concluded to be a good hunter/gatherer. In short, a good provider and a desirable mate.

The skinny guy singing pretty songs around the campfire? Forget about it.



(I'm not really this tall, I'm just sitting on my billfold)

[theevan]

I mean, who among us didn't include "a way to get chicks" as a reason for taking up guitar?

[epaul]

I had far more luck with my golden retriever, Woody, than I ever did with my guitar.

[Russell Letson]

The problem I usually have with evolutionary-pressures explanations of human behavior is that they tend to be a bit one-dimensional or straight-line--"Humans make music because it enhances survivability/breeding advantage in X or Y ways." In the NYT piece, it's represented by the "Maybe music was needed to improve group cohesion" remark.

This kind of accounting-for works pretty well for things like why we have kidneys or the sense of smell or fingernails, but for complex behavior patterns that require the interaction of several neurophysical systems, it gets tricky. I suspect that music is like language in that speech itself is an overlaid function*--it depends on physical and neurological structures and traits that have other, more fundamental jobs to do, but get adapted and elaborated to support new functions**. And, to be sure, if those new functions turn out to be useful, then the supporting structures and abilities can be selected for in the survival/breeding machinery. My suspicion is that while music might "improve group cohesion," it's also a mighty source of pleasure. And, for the relentlessly pragmatic, exercising the various abilities required by language or music or dance keeps those abilities in good working order, so (as with sex) the pleasure of exercising the machinery is part of the system that keeps it functional--and sometimes the pleasure gets pursued for its own sake.

Another set of considerations: What speech- and music-like behaviors can be found in other species? Certainly birdsong is central to all kinds of bird behavior, and insects, cats, dogs, and primates use vocalization or sound-production among themselves. If creatures as far from us as insects deploy controlled sound production, reception, and interpretation in primal activities, then that set of traits is clearly a template for all kinds of useful extensions. And it's not surprising that we humans have extended and elaborated our physiological and neurological assets in similar ways--some of them not crucial to survival and breeding, however they might be adapted to those needs.

*A term I learned more than fifty years ago in my intro-to-linguistics reading. Conceptually, it's a cousin to the notion of an epiphenomenon.

** All human groups possess language, but not all human groups invent the same kinds of language or the enormously complex things language can be used to build, like contract law or Ole and Lena jokes.

[Hobson]

May 18, 2024 11:45:14 GMT -5 theevan said:

I mean, who among us didn't include "a way to get chicks" as a reason for taking up guitar?

Some of us don't swing that way.

[RickW]

I'm not sure it has anything to do with mating, at least on the male side. I know quite a number of men who can't sing, dance or play a note, who never seemed to lack company. I, on the other hand, was single through most of my youth.

On the other hand, having been in a couple of bands with female lead singers -- they tend to get the male blood temperature fired right up.

[Marshall]

How many female singers does it take to change a lightbulb?

[billhammond]

May 18, 2024 14:28:21 GMT -5 Marshall said:

How many female singers does it take to change a lightbulb?

just one. She holds the bulb, and the world revolves around her.

[millring]

We seem to underestimate sentience. We have to.

[Rob Hanesworth]

The consensus is that I don't.

[dradtke]

So Ole says to Lena, he says, "Hey, Lena," he says, "you wanna make sumtin complex?"

An Lena, she smiles an she says, "Oh, Ole," she says, "you know I gotta study contract law!"




Hey, I never said it was going to be funny.

[TKennedy]

I think our early ancestors made music because there were no record stores so you couldn't buy it.