I haven't looked up the study in _Science_ on which this article is based
yet, but this study seems to provide strong evidence that the degree of
one's musical ability is very strongly influenced by genetic factors. What
one would need to do to decide whether music is a direct adaptation or not
is to measure other related abilities and see whether musical ability is
independent of them. If musical ability covaries with related abilities
like language ability, then it might be a by-product of adaptations
specialized for other functions. If, however, musical ability were
independent of other abilities, then this would be strong evidence that we
have a direct adaptation for music. I don't know whether the _Science_
deals with this issue. I'll try to find out soon.
Ian Jobling
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Date: Friday, March 09, 2001, 7:27 AM +0000
From: Ian Pitchford <ian.pitchford@scientist.com>
To: evolutionary-psychology@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [evol-psych] 'Musical ability is genetic'
> BBC NEWS ONLINE
> Thursday, 8 March, 2001, 19:02 GMT
> 'Musical ability is genetic'
>
> If you are not born with an innate musical ability, you may have to
> accept that music lessons may be a waste of time.
>
> Researchers have found that musical ability is passed from generation to
> generation through the genes.
>
> The team from St Thomas' Hospital Twin Unit in London also found that one
> in four adults have problems in recognising tunes and one in 20 have
> severe tone deafness.
>
> The researchers used a 'Distorted Tunes Test' that includes 26 popular
> musical tunes to compare the responses of 568 female twins volunteers
> from the St Thomas' Twin Registry.
>
> Full text:
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/health/newsid_1209000/1209186.stm
>
>
>
>
> Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day
> http://human-nature.com/nibbs/
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>
---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
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