TEDxSMU - Baba Brinkman - Rap Guide to Evolution

Baba Brinkman is a Canadian actor and rap artist and former tree‑planter who has personally planted more than one million trees. Baba has received international acclaim for his rap comedy theatre shows, which cover topics as diverse as evolutionary psychology, the Canterbury Tales, democracy, and civil disobedience. Last year he won the Scotsman Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Fringe for his "Rap Guide to Evolution," which is transferring to New York in 2011. When he is not on tour, Baba resides in his hometown of Vancouver.

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[DoctahDizzle]

Human beings aren't limited to the evolutionary behavior of animals dumb-ass. It's one of the reasons why evo-psych is bunk.

[Jared Whitman]

Well put.



[dogen83]

His use of violent rap is as a demonstration of evolutionary biological principles, not evidence of them. The graphs and data are the evidence. The relevant correlation is between violence and opportunity, not violence and rap. He's making commentary on broad social trends, not music trends. You got stuck on the wrapper and missed the content.

[YourSoulEmbarks]

You interpreted it

[YourSoulEmbarks]

he sounds like Zack Fair (Rick Gomez)

[sanspaylo]

Great vid! @djDedan "The Message" was not uplifting or optimistic, get your history right...hypothesis fail

[Umbriaga]

Rocks , man!

[DjDedan]

@32koala yes, i did watch the video, did you even read my comment, did YOU watch the video? he specifically states @5:40: " i listen to rap music my whole life, and all i hear is murder-murder-murder-kill a mother fucker"... he also states that evo behavior explains alot about rap music's violence @5:32... my point is, it doesn't, rap grew out of even more violent times and yet the music was uplifting, so the connection is not evo behavior, i put forth it's financially driven...

[32koala]

His hypothesis wasn't that "all rap is violent". He was trying to say that the high rates of crime, violence, and teen pregnancy in urban areas are caused by evolutionary behavioral traits. He proposed that wealth inequality and harsh conditions bring out a person's base instincts: to be violent. Par was just a fun was to deliver that message. Did you even watch the video?

[DjDedan]

too bad early rap wasn't violent - it wasn't until gangster rap became commercially viable that it became so violently themed... the birth of rap was during some of the worse times in nyc's history (the bronx was burning - remember??) and yet the rap itself was very uplifting and optimistic... the real correlation between violent themes in rap is not from the environment but from external financial machinery... hypothesis fail.