RE: Offtopic Conveying with Music (was some other subject

[Guest guest]

" Why do you speak? I suppose there are times when people speak without

wanting to convey anything, but those are fairly strange cases, aren't

they? "

No - I think that factually, the great, great majority of the time there is

no intermediate stage in the process - people simply speak. This is

nitpicking, perhaps, but I think that most of the time there isn't a

separate 'wanting to convey something' and then a speaking. Sometimes there

is.

" If music is a " language " of emotion, "

I would strongly disagree with this, both literally and metaphorically.

" that is, a vehicle for creating

specific internal experiences in the listening, then the purpose of music is

to convey. "

Musician A may decide that his/her piece of music, or playing is intended to

elicit a particular experience. Whether this intention really has any kind

of consistent mapping to the actual music is really debatable. Musician B

may have no such notion that the music is intended to elicit any specific

mood, emotion, or anything related to this. In either case, I don't think

that the process and the experience is anything like language at all.

" It's part of the definition of what music is. "

That is simply not true.

" I can say that

all people who write music mean to convey something because it's already

been established that they are doing something that necessarily *must*

convey something. "

Well, yes you can say it, but it is not true.

" You say that maybe you write music just to enjoy it, "

I don't think that this is what I said exactly, but we can go with it in

this context.

" but *how* do you enjoy

it? You enjoy it because by hearing it, a recognizable emotional state is

recreated in your brain. "

False. Absolutely, categorically, false. First - you say 'recognizable'. So,

are you implying that I would compose a piece of music, say, and then when

listening back to it, I would enjoy it because I would explicitly recognize

the 'emotion' that I would feel...oooh, that's pretty because it makes me

feel angry, or sad? Would I need to feel the same thing every time? Could I

simply really be into the music, and feel something that is not

'recognizable'? Could I enjoy the music because I appreciate it

intellectually? Can some modern electronic music which does not evoke

'emotions' like, say traditional composers like Beethoven - can this even be

music in your analysis?

" This is analagous to someone saying, " Cat " and

having the image of a cat appear in your mind. A string of sounds (or in

the case of writing, a string of marks) triggers (conveys) an internal

experience (an emotional state, an image, an idea) across space from the

musician/speaker to the listener. "

Absolutely false.

" Now if you really want to get into something interesting from here, we

should go listen to Ella Fitzgerald do some scat. "

Personally, I've never liked listening to Ella Fitzgerald doing scat. But

listening to other more traditional music (say Mozart) absolutely does NOT

evoke images and ideas in my mind. It make evoke 'emotions' but not always,

and they might not be the same ones every time. I love Mozart. Beautifully

evocative music, and very intellectually satisfying also. No contradictions

here at all.

YR

RE: Re: Setting the record straight / How we kill what we eat

Well, the linguistic part is quibbling, but on the other hand I think that

it is interesting (well, maybe to some). What I strongly disagree with is

your generalization that 'the need to write music is ALWAYS to convey ... "

..

How do you know this? How can you possibly speak for all musicians? That

part is not a quibble.

And I just think that the rest of it is, well, wrong. I may simply write

the

music, or play the music, because I enjoy it. Anything beyond that is an

intellectualisation (sp?) of the process, and fills a need to 'explain'

the

process or justify it. IN some cases, sure, people may need such a

justification, and assign this purpose to the process ('I'm writing this

piece to convey or describe how I felt about x, or I'm writing this piece

about they way that cows actually understand people and resent the fact

that

they thank us that they're going to eat them').

[Guest guest]

Ah, I think I see a few places where we are talking past each other. One:

There is always a " want " to convey with speaking. That's what prompts

people to speak. We are rarely aware of that want, but if it wasn't there,

we wouldn't speak. Two: you are confusing ideas and thoughts with all

internal experiences. There are many internal experiences that have no

linguistic element. Listening to music creates a nonlinguistic event in the

brain. Three: we are probably defining emotion differently. I'm using a

physiological definition. An emotion is something like a specific

neurologic or hormonal response to stimuli that carries meaning for the

individual.

The " recognizable emotional experience " statement is probably a little too

fuzzy for you. You seem to like categorical conclusions and crisp, logical

language. I'm using that phrase to describe the mental states that have

been found in listeners of music and language through the use of pet and cat

scans and mri's. I'm sorry, I read these studies too many years ago when I

was studying music and linguistics in college, so forgive me, I have no

references. But the basic idea was that in response to hearing music, the

same parts of the brain lit up tended to light up for people listening to

the same piece of music. These parts were similar to those which lit up for

emotional states.

The process of " conveying " meaning through language functions in a similar

way. Person A has a thought, speaks, person B hears and (if the meaning is

conveyed properly) a similar thought " appears " - thinking of a brain scan

picture here - in person B's brain.

Very few people have any comprehension about how this works, and in fact,

there are some studies that show that this sequence happens so fast, it

could almost be said to be simultaneously. It's way too fast for most people

to recognize just by looking at their own experiences. It's take science

with computers and MRI machines to track this process, although Saussaure

described it in the beginning of the 20th century.

So when I say that music always " conveys " something, I'm talking about the

above. There is a drive to write music. People don't do it accidentally.

A writer may not have a concrete, consciously held idea about what they will

write about, but they have the desire to convey the music in their heads to

someone - even if that someone is just themselves. I am *not* saying that

every musician has a concious intent to express a clearly perceived emotion.

I am saying that every musician works from a desire to convey that which

music conveys. As a musician works through writing a piece of music, they

select notes, harmonies, instrumentation that does what they want it to do.

They don't just throw any notes on a page, but instead have some criteria,

whether or not it's consciously experienced or linguistically expressable,

for determining which notes stay and which go. This criteria is alway based

in the need to convey something to the listener.

And the process of listening to music *is* similar - and also vastly

different from listening to language. When a person listens to language

there are those specific areas on the left side of the brain that always

light up. These are Wernicke's area and Broca's area and a few other, less

well knows places. When a person listens to emotionally charged language,

areas of the brain related to the experience of emotion also light up. The

areas that light up are often similar to the areas that are lit up for the

person speaking the emotional language. I would say, when that happens,

that the speaker has successfully conveyed their subjective internal state

to the listener.

There is also a signature to both acts of listening that allow the listener

to recognize that the internal state they are experiencing is being received

from outside rather than their own. This indicates that in both the

experience of listening to language and listening to music, there is a need

on the part of the listener to differentiate between an internal state that

is their own (what I am experiencing internally right now is my own

thought/feeling) and one that has been triggered in a communication (what I

am experiencing right now tells me what someone else is thinking/feeling.)

When a musically untrained person listens to music, almost all of the

responses in the brain are on the right side and the responses are located

almost exclusively in those areas of the cortex that work with experiences

of emotion. And the parts of the brain that light up are often similar

between different people listening to the same piece of music. There is,

I'll grant you, much more variation in responses to music than to language,

but there is clearly a communication, a conveying from the internal state of

one person (the composer, the muscian) and the listener.

Interestingly, a trained musician listens to music differently than an

untrained person. For the trained musician, along with the areas on the

right side of the brain, we also use parts of the left brain that are

considered " pre-linguistic " . These are parts of the brain that deal with

analytical sequences rather than the more " holistic " type of experiences

that the right brain is so good at.

YR

" Why do you speak? I suppose there are times when people speak without

wanting to convey anything, but those are fairly strange cases, aren't

they? "

No - I think that factually, the great, great majority of the time there

is

no intermediate stage in the process - people simply speak. This is

nitpicking, perhaps, but I think that most of the time there isn't a

separate 'wanting to convey something' and then a speaking. Sometimes

there

is.

[Guest guest]

" Ah, I think I see a few places where we are talking past each other. One:

There is always a " want " to convey with speaking. That's what prompts

people to speak. We are rarely aware of that want, but if it wasn't there,

we wouldn't speak. "

It sounds like you're simply saying that speaking occurs within some

context. Of course - people rarely speak outside of those situations which

call for speaking.

" Two: you are confusing ideas and thoughts with all

internal experiences. "

No

" There are many internal experiences that have no

linguistic element. "

You mean, of course, internal 'mental' experiences, since certainly the

functions of my spleen have no accompanying linguistic element, though I've

heard that the overuse of certain punctuation is due to a malformation of

the spleen.

But one must be very precise in such formulations. I don't think that there

are too many human internal experiences (at least of humans that have

learned language)that do not have some kind of internal 'chatter' associated

with them, though the ability to, for instance, just listen, or whatever, is

probably an acquired skill.

I guess that what I would say is true is that there are no such experiences

that can be thought about without an accompanying linguistic element. I

believe this to be trivially true, though most people would disagree with

it.

" Listening to music creates a nonlinguistic event in the

brain. Three: we are probably defining emotion differently. I'm using a

physiological definition. An emotion is something like a specific

neurologic or hormonal response to stimuli that carries meaning for the

individual. "

This, I believe, is an error. There are several things that can be all true

without contradiction. Emotions, as do all thoughts and mental events, both

trigger and are affected by physiological processes in the brain. On the

other hand, an emotion is most certainly not a neurological event or

process. The fact that one the one thing (an emotion) does not happen

without mental activity does not mean that one could, in theory, observe the

physiological activity and derive the emotion, or, as some people would

believe, observe the physiological activity and derive the specific

thoughts. One trivial example of a physiological 'event' that some people

mistake for the mental activity is the changes registered by a polygraph.

One should NEVER make the mistake of concluding that a 'positive' result on

a polygraph MEANS that the person is lying.

Of course, the fact that listening to music results in neurological activity

is true.

" The " recognizable emotional experience " statement is probably a little too

fuzzy for you. "

Not fuzzy. Incorrect, in my opinion.

" You seem to like categorical conclusions and crisp, logical

language. "

Well, if you're having this kind of discussion, it is good to be as precise

as you can be.

" I'm using that phrase to describe the mental states that have

been found in listeners of music and language through the use of pet and cat

scans and mri's. "

I'm using the word 'red' to mean the sound that parakeets make when their

cheerios are taken away....I just don't think that you can unilaterally

redefine words in the midst of a discussion. I simply don't accept that

mental 'states' have physiological 'definitions'.

Btw, if someone were monitoring your brain activity, and told you that you

were feeling x or thinking y, and you weren't, whom would you believe?

" I'm sorry, I read these studies too many years ago when I

was studying music and linguistics in college, so forgive me, I have no

references. "

That's fine, I studied philosophy every intensely years ago, and I'm not

very precise about these issues now.

" But the basic idea was that in response to hearing music, the

same parts of the brain lit up tended to light up for people listening to

the same piece of music. These parts were similar to those which lit up for

emotional states. "

And that means precisely this - that, at least for some people, and some

kinds of music listening, the same areas of the brain register activity as

register activity in emotional states.

" The process of " conveying " meaning through language functions in a similar

way. Person A has a thought, speaks, person B hears and (if the meaning is

conveyed properly) a similar thought " appears " - thinking of a brain scan

picture here - in person B's brain. "

But when I speak to you, play you a piece of music or show you a painting,

my intention or meaning has nothing at all to do with eliciting

physiological activity in your brain. That's simply not what people mean

when they talk about art affecting people. When people talk about economics

they are not talking about subatomic activity, and, no matter how advanced

the understanding of economics and subatomic activity became, it would not

be possible to EXPLAIN the workings of economics on the subatomic level.

" So when I say that music always " conveys " something, I'm talking about the

above. "

I think that you have to go way further to make a case that all music, must

be conveying something.

" There is a drive to write music. People don't do it accidentally. "

Well, ok, but if I have accidentally left my hard disk to 'record', and

realize afterwards that I have recorded something by mistake that was the

result of accidentally loading the wrong sounds into a piece of software,

etc....and then decide to save it because I liked it, wouldn't I have

created the music accidentally?

" A writer may not have a concrete, consciously held idea about what they

will

write about, but they have the desire to convey the music in their heads to

someone - even if that someone is just themselves. I am *not* saying that

every musician has a concious intent to express a clearly perceived emotion.

I am saying that every musician works from a desire to convey that which

music conveys. "

But I just think that this is not true. Unless you are including that the

music may simply 'convey' itself. but then, if you are including this which

makes the notion of music conveying something true by definition, it really

is a vacuous notion, and I don't think, what was being talked about. I may

design an algorithmic process, set it into motion, like what it does from

minute 6 through minute 8, save it, and play it to you. Of course I want you

to hear the music, but there may simply be nothing more than that at all,

and certainly the notion of eliciting certain neurological patterns that can

light up specific areas of your brain have nothing to do with it.

" As a musician works through writing a piece of music, they

select notes, harmonies, instrumentation that does what they want it to do. "

No. Not necessarily. Sometimes. And what about music that is not built from

notes, harmonies, and instrumentation, or composed in such a linear way?

" They don't just throw any notes on a page, but instead have some criteria,

whether or not it's consciously experienced or linguistically expressable,

for determining which notes stay and which go. This criteria is alway based

in the need to convey something to the listener. "

No. This is what we absolutely disagree with, unless you simply mean that

the playing of music, or the composition of music has the intent to be heard

by someone including the listener, and that some decision making process is

made during the playing or composition. but, again, I think that this isn't

in dispute, and isn't what is being discussed.

" And the process of listening to music *is* similar - and also vastly

different from listening to language. "

Well, there is some truth to that, depending on how we are viewing

'similar', but that would sound more like you agree that music ISN'T a

language.

:When a person listens to language

there are those specific areas on the left side of the brain that always

light up. These are Wernicke's area and Broca's area and a few other, less

well knows places. When a person listens to emotionally charged language,

areas of the brain related to the experience of emotion also light up. The

areas that light up are often similar to the areas that are lit up for the

person speaking the emotional language. I would say, when that happens,

that the speaker has successfully conveyed their subjective internal state

to the listener. "

So, if you listened to a piece of music, and you didn't like it, but a

neurologist told you that you did, would you believe him?

" There is also a signature to both acts of listening that allow the listener

to recognize that the internal state they are experiencing is being received

from outside rather than their own. This indicates that in both the

experience of listening to language and listening to music, there is a need

on the part of the listener to differentiate between an internal state that

is their own (what I am experiencing internally right now is my own

thought/feeling) and one that has been triggered in a communication (what I

am experiencing right now tells me what someone else is thinking/feeling.) "

I lost you on this one.

" When a musically untrained person listens to music, almost all of the

responses in the brain are on the right side and the responses are located

almost exclusively in those areas of the cortex that work with experiences

of emotion. And the parts of the brain that light up are often similar

between different people listening to the same piece of music. There is,

I'll grant you, much more variation in responses to music than to language,

but there is clearly a communication, a conveying from the internal state of

one person (the composer, the muscian) and the listener. "

Not sure of your point, though. While I find it interesting how music and

other things might affect the brain, I don't think that neurological study

gives us any insight at all into music, or our reaction to it, that is

interesting in a way that is explanatory on the musical or philosophical

level.

" Interestingly, a trained musician listens to music differently than an

untrained person. For the trained musician, along with the areas on the

right side of the brain, we also use parts of the left brain that are

considered " pre-linguistic " . These are parts of the brain that deal with

analytical sequences rather than the more " holistic " type of experiences

that the right brain is so good at. "

Ok, but isn't that obvious anyway? Most people who are schooled in something

experience it differently, applying more of an analytical component to their

understanding.

YR

" Why do you speak? I suppose there are times when people speak without

wanting to convey anything, but those are fairly strange cases, aren't

they? "

No - I think that factually, the great, great majority of the time there

is

no intermediate stage in the process - people simply speak. This is

nitpicking, perhaps, but I think that most of the time there isn't a

separate 'wanting to convey something' and then a speaking. Sometimes

there

is.