The Storytelling Animal by Jonathan Gottschall

Humans live in landscapes of make-believe: we spin fantasies, we devour novels, films, and plays and even our sporting events and criminal trials unfold as narratives. Yet the world of story has long remained an undiscovered and unmapped country. It's easy to say that humans are "wired" for story, but why?

Here, a provocative young scholar shows how storytelling has made our species successful and how it continues to shape us in startling ways.

http://jonathangottschall.com/

• Category

  Entertainment

[HelloAgain151]

I know probability says otherwise, but ain't no single fucking chimpanzee gonna write Hamlet on this or any infinite timeline just by mashing it's fists on a typewriter, even if it were given the opportunity and longevity to do so.

[dessertraider91]

Adding this to my readlist =)

[nochita8]

same here!

[Alan Chase]

This is fascinating. I plan to order this book now, and can't wait to read it. True story!

[UMLondon]

Working in media communications, UM London takes the art of storytelling very seriously! Very important not only for individuals but for businesses too

[ray1351]

anything that is possible within the laws of physics - so if the chance isn't an absolute 0 - anything is basically possible :P

[William Dais]

Is there such a thing then, of any event imaginable ever NEVER happening? It seems by the monkey/typewriter logic, everything will happen sometime.

[Mike10four]

One popular story was the one of our unalienable Rights. Until the recent book titled: “Scientific Proof of Our Unalienable Rights” came along. Now that once romantic story is scientific fact.

[ray1351]

heres a good way to calculate it - you calculate the probability of the event not occuring - let me use soemthing simpler like dice as an example - you have a 1 in 6 chance of getting the number you want but a 5 in 6 chance of not - if you keep multiplying the 5/6 with 5/6 - the number will eventually become very small - if you multiply it by infinity it will forever get closer to 0 this means that the chance of the opposite number occuring will forever get closer to 100% - just use a pen/paper

[ray1351]

i was talking in terms of using number combinations to represent a letter for example 01 = A 02 = B etc.. and yes - it is guaranteed because it is infinite.