Evolutionary Perspectives (Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennet, Steven Pinker, Jared Diamond and Douglas Adams) 3of4

[fairiebee]

Justin Timberlake is attractive? I guess that depends on whether you're asking a woman with an (evolved) brain.

[CytherLynx]

dawkin's and pinker are my favorite. but only because i have read their books, i'll get to the others.

[doctorfreakus]

So, wow, yeah. They sound so progressive and intelligent until they talk about music. Bad habit? That's like asking why do people use English or German. Music is a language that can transfer info faster than words. A stupid tune is like a stupid sentence, not a bad habit(altho for some...)Like I said below, didn't Douglas address this unfortunate shortcoming of clinical scientists/researchers in HHGTTG? I just don't see how bellydancing is going to help prolong the species...

[CytherLynx]

@doctorfreakus please don't just assume because most of these people are 'left' of politics (i think), that 'left' politics is the correct choice.

i read the selfish gene, and it affected my view of life profoundly.

but i also hold positions like Austrian economics to be analogical to being the 'evolutionary theory' of economics, with communism holding the position of creationism

don't be a liberal (US defined) OR conservative. be a classical libertarian. Bastiat, not Marx.

lol rant much?

[677boston]

I can't believe that Pinker says:

"It may be that some future analysis shows that music serves some reproduction function - I can't see that it does"

Aren't the reproductive benefits obvious?Justin Timberlake doesn't seem to have a hard time attracting ladies.

The reproductive function of art/music/creativity was argued pretty persuasively in Miller's Mating Mind. Is Pinker not aware of the theory or is he just rejecting it? It's a lot more parsimonious than his ideas, I think.

[theinquisitor]

Well to be fair, that book seems to have been published years after this video was recorded (1998).

Also, he's not rejecting the idea, he says that it may be true, but that he hasn't been convinced yet.

I think the argument from Justin Timberlake might be a bit thin though, as it could just as easily be the fame and fortune that is attractive. Popularity in sports and movies seems to attract similar attention. Without isolating the variables, it's difficult to draw conclusions.

[Zando24]

@theinquisitor Well I am more attracted to musicians that actresses. Mostly because I am a musician myself, and just find them alot sexier lol. I suppose in that sense, what one appreciates, they will appreciate in other people. That could be music for alot of people

[doctorfreakus]

@677boston I think Douglas Adams answered this in reverse(as usual). Isn't there a line towards the beginning of Hitchhiker's "...but mostly because the scientists never got invited to those kind of parties..." -LOL

[marcotenshi]

@677boston Music =/= creativity

Music is a byproduct of evolution. As is writing and reading.

[Tuppington]

does anyone know if pinker is aware of the maternal immune hypothesis for homosexuality and the hormonal theory of sexuality? it seems to me that a quick survey of them suggest an optimum configuration of hormones could be calculated.

[TheObnubilators]

Dennett always pauses in mid sentence, struggles the find the right words, and the queefs out the most confusing verbiage.

[hhiippiittyy]

imho ... dennet's 'confusing verbiage' is a byproduct of his field, philosophy. agree perhaps?

[doctorfreakus]

@hhiippiittyy tell that to Ayn Rand(she might bitecha

[xSilverPhinx]

Conflicting multiple thoughts, perhaps.

[TheObnubilators]

Giants of the mind

[Tapecutter59]

I'm surprised that none of them mentioned musics powerfull connection to proto-languages that communicate emotions rather than concepts.

Identifying patterns in sound and translating them to emotional responses would seems to me a very handy thing for survival, birds and whales are good examples.

The fact that Pachabell's cannon can induce tears of joy just means we have learnt how to target the response with musical technology for our own pleasure as opposed to our survival.

[Tuppington]

plus, music is often used in propaganda such as newsreels and campaign commercials. it would seem that hijacking the emotional centers of others' brains would be extremely beneficial in an evolutionary sense.

[Phi1618033]

Too much brilliance in one room.

[eod4me]

Thanks for posting this inquisitor. Despite the poor video, the audio comes through well and the message is conveyed well. Anyone who dwells too much on the visual is probably not listening as well as they should.

[anything4ai]

Bad quality video is far better than no video at all. I listen to these without looking at the screen much anyway.

[adorianvlad]

inquisitor, the quality of your last videos (the ones that I'm aware of) are very poor.

youtube videos are as bad as they are when working properly, now on top of that you have all this noise and bad image? Sorry but I am just giving you a tip here my friend

[theinquisitor]

Unfortunately the source video was bad quality to start with (link to source in description box). It was recorded back in 1998 in real media format when video compression was poor and bandwidth was low, and so the resolution was about 192x144 and blocky. Converting it to divx video for editing and then youtube upload conversion further degraded the image. It was either this or just a slideshow while they're talking. My other videos not from this source are of good quality.

[CocoMac877]

thanks very much for the upload, ignore this^ prick