The Cognitive Function of Music. Part II

Abstract

Ancient and contemporary theories of the cognitive functions of music are reviewed and compared with the hypothesis (advanced in Part I) that music performs a fundamental cognitive function, helping to maintain psychic balance in the face of the diversity of the world. Considering historical evidence of the evolution of cultures and consciousness, a parallel evolution of music as a powerful and unifying emotional mechanism is demonstrated and recent cognitive experiments that have confirmed this hypothesis are summarized. The neural mechanisms of music include mental representations which unify the entire life experience. It follows that music is fundamental in making human evolution possible. The human mind and our human cultures would not exist as they do today without music. Future theoretical and experimental research directions are outlined.

Keywords:

• cognition
• music
• emotions
• evolution
• culture
• consciousness.

Acknowledgements

It is my pleasure to acknowledge the contributions of my colleagues and co-authors M. Aranovsky, M. Bar, L. Barsalou, M. Bonfeld, R. Brockett, M. Cabanac, A. Cangelosi, T. Chernigovskaya, E. Coutinho, R. Deming, T. Dudochkin, F. Fontanari, M. Frank-Kamenetskii, J. Gleason, A. Goldwag, M. Houser, D. Huron, R. Ilin, N. Katonova, M. Karpovsky, R. Kozma, L. Leibman, D. Levine, D. Levitin, L. Levitin, R. Linnehan, T. Lyons, N. Masataka, M. Mazo, Y. Neuman, A. Ovsich, R. Parncutt, A. Patel, V. Rosenbaum, J. Sloboda, V. Smolensky, D. Sontag, W. Thompson, Y. Vinkovetsky, and B. Weijers for discussions, help, and advice. This work was supported in part by AFOSR PM Dr Jon Sjogren, PM Dr Doug Cochran, and PM Dr Jun Zhang. Special acknowledgements are owing to Y. Dimitrin, who has inspired me to think about the role of musical emotions in human cognition, and to D. Vinkovetsky, who inspires me to think profoundly.