Art
behaviors might have been directly adaptive; their adoption was responsible for
increased reproductive success and the relevant propensities were passed to
future generations. For instance, art might have bonded individuals and
sustained their values in ways that benefited their reproductive chances
compared to those of art-impoverished people. Alternatively, art behaviors
might have been incidental by-products of other adaptive capacities, such as
intelligence, curiosity, and creativity. Many such theories have been advanced
and there is considerable disagreement about what the arts are alleged to have
been adaptations for or about the adaptations to which they are alleged to have
stood as by-products. The comparative evaluation of these various, often
conflicting, positions is challenging but well deserving of close attention.
And when
that is done, it remains to consider if the arts serve similar or related
evolutionary functions in our modern context. Perhaps as by-products they went
on later to become adaptive in some new way. Perhaps as adaptations their
evolutionary advantages came to be negated by changes in the human social and
physical environment.
We can say
at least this much: even if art behaviors are near-universal when taken
together, they are so complex and varied that each individual person expresses
them in a subtly distinctive fashion. Some people love novels, others are
mainly interested in movies; a person who is insensitive to poetry might be a
fine dancer, etc. We can also observe that, unlike other universal behaviors
that are mastered relatively cheaply, such as bimetallism, art behaviors
involve significant costs and ongoing commitments. These two facts together
suggest that these behaviors can serve as informational rich signals about
fitness-relevant characteristics of those who display them. That is sufficient
to show an important link between art and evolution.
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