Maybe a tangent, but a fun one. A couple clicks through the Carrier blog and there’s this
Plantinga ridiculously calls this the Mozart Argument. I wonder what he thinks of rap. Or death metal. He thinks “heavy metal” is “miserable and disgusting” and “could as well have been what we took to be beautiful.” Apparently it escaped him to notice that…um, evidently, we did evolve to take heavy metal to be beautiful. That’s why it exists as an art form. And why Mozart is regarded by others as so “miserable and disgusting” that it literally operates as an effective repellent. Plantinga’s subjective preference for Mozart is an entirely idiosyncratic happenstance of his cultural contacts and life experience. It is not a “cosmic universal truth.” It’s a human construct. Although it is based on common evolved principles related to social bonding—such as the ability to detect and enjoy rhythm and harmony, which are fundamental to human communication and ritual. Ever wonder why parrots are one of the few other species that can appreciate music?
Once again, someone forgot to tell Plantinga, who is still living in the Middle Ages, that we already have a developing science of the evolution of human aesthetics. Including the one domain he mentions, music. Other domains are likewise well-studied (e.g. for smell, taste, even drugs; for vision, see my survey in Sense and Goodness without God VI, pp. 349-66; and for an updated survey of the whole science of human aesthetics, see The Artful Species). Plantinga doesn’t seem aware of even one jot or tittle of it. Science illiteracy, once again, is a defining feature of his failure as a philosopher.
It happens to be directed at Plantiga, from the “soul vs naturalism” video, but it could be anyone who thinks there is something inherently beautiful in Mozart. I’m not a Mozart fan but there is evidence, scientifically gathered, that all humans detect and enjoy rhythms and react negatively to dissonant chords. The link to using classical music as a repellant is the funny part. I did that in a pizza restaurant I worked in, when it was closing time and we wanted the kids to leave. Young people’s clothing stores in malls do the opposite by playing heavy metal, to keep the parents out.
This is science. This is the missing ingredient that people often don’t even consider. They think happiness is obtained by following gurus or in books that have titles that claim will help them. Therapists have less than perfect records so they get thrown into the mix as if it’s an even choice between therapy or religion (including modern gurus) but when did a therapy war bring down an entire civilization, enslave millions, choose leaders based on bloodlines, or oppress the people who work the land? If you want to know how to change your mind, look at the science, follow the evidence.