Why is uplifting music uplifting Music? How is it uplifting? Why/how is “sad music” sad? We normally simply take it for granted that music can affect our moods and emotions, as people took for granted that apples fell before Newton asked “Why do things fall?” I’m not a musician, but I am a cognitive science guy, so this is a question I am addressing in a chapter of Discontinuities: Love, Art, Mind, which is 80% complete but already for sale on Leanpub in this form.

To answer the above questions we need to have answers to the more general questions: why do humans create and consume art in its various forms. The Discontinuities book will review several answers and argue for a specific explanation.

For now, I refer to the answer given by Brian Boyd in his book, On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition, and Fiction which I’ve illustrated below:

That is our primate ancestors (before homo sapiens) developed the ability and propensity to play. This led homo sapiens to develop the ability and inclination to produce and consume stories and music, which evolved in parallel or in series in order to (a) attract and manipulate attention, and (b) bond in groups. Play, story telling, story consumption, and music playing and consumption also evolved because they helped humans sharpen their beliefs and cognitive capacities.