{"title":"Mathias Clasen. A Very Nervous Person’s Guide to Horror Movies","authors":"Coltan Scrivner","doi":"10.26613/esic.6.2.304","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26613/esic.6.2.304","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36459,"journal":{"name":"Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture","volume":"41 1","pages":"115 - 118"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86768403","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Jonathan Gottschall. The Story Paradox: How our Love of Storytelling Builds Societies and Tears Them Down","authors":"Tom Dolack","doi":"10.26613/esic.6.2.306","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26613/esic.6.2.306","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36459,"journal":{"name":"Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture","volume":"52 1","pages":"123 - 126"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73813319","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Ancient Voices, Contemporary Practice, and Human Musicality","authors":"N. Bannan","doi":"10.26613/esic.6.2.300","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26613/esic.6.2.300","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Debate continues regarding the purpose and practice of music in relation to participation, cultural origin, and education internationally. A Darwinian approach that sees musical vocalization as the adaptive bridge between animal communication and human language remains hotly disputed where such a model does not suit the prevailing political or social agenda. The two books under review present contrasting viewpoints and evidence, while their concurrent publication illustrates the rich potential for developments in this field. Friedmann’s edited book presents separate chapters by sixteen independent authors covering a range of specialisms and topics. Wood’s monograph is, by contrast, an encyclopaedic exploration of the earliest writings on musical theory from China, Greece, and India and their influence on the world’s music over the last 4,000 years. Read both separately and comparatively, these two publications offer a valuable contribution to our understanding of the phenomenon of music and its practice today.","PeriodicalId":36459,"journal":{"name":"Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture","volume":"2 1","pages":"71 - 80"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"84078967","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"J. L. Modern. Neuromatic; or, a Particular History of Religion and the Brain","authors":"Rami Gabriel","doi":"10.26613/esic.6.2.308","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26613/esic.6.2.308","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36459,"journal":{"name":"Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture","volume":"18 1","pages":"131 - 134"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82785680","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"What Nature Gave Us: Steven Pinker on the Rules of Reason","authors":"G. Harpham","doi":"10.26613/esic.6.2.302","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26613/esic.6.2.302","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Steven Pinker argues that rationality represents both a “patrimony,” a human endowment exhibited even in the behaviors of “primitive” societies, and a powerful force for good. At the same time, Pinker describes rationality as a “scarce” resource in the contemporary world, one that must be defined, defended, and deployed against the many destructive forms of irrationality to which we are prone. In order to avert a looming “Tragedy of the Commons,” Pinker proposes that rationality should be considered not just a cognitive benefit but a moral imperative. In doing so, however, he argues against the Enlightenment tradition in which the individual, rather than the “Commons,” is the final arbiter. The fundamental tension in Pinker’s argument is between a “primitive” process of collective reasoning that produces a stable but nonprogressive society and a “modern” orientation toward the individual that has brought us to the brink of political chaos and ecological disaster.","PeriodicalId":36459,"journal":{"name":"Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture","volume":"31 1","pages":"101 - 108"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80963073","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Narrative Theory and Neuroscience: Why Human Nature Matters","authors":"J. Carroll","doi":"10.26613/esic.6.2.301","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26613/esic.6.2.301","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract These two books on fictional narratives and neuroscience adopt cultural constructivist perspectives that reject the idea of evolved human motives and emotions. Both books contain information that could be integrated with other research in a comprehensive and empirically grounded theory of narrative, but they both fail to construct any such theory. In order to avoid subordinating the humanities to the sciences, Comer and Taggart avoid integrating their separate disciplines: neuroscience (Comer) and narrative theory (Taggart). They draw no significant conclusions from the research they summarize. Armstrong subordinates neuroscience to the paradoxes of phenomenology and 4E cognition. His prose develops not by consecutive reasoning but by the repetitive intonation of paradoxical formulas. The failures in theoretical construction displayed by these two books run parallel with weaknesses in the interpretive criticism with which they illustrate their ideas. The different ways in which the books fail are sometimes comical but nonetheless instructive. The failures inadvertently point toward the radical changes in humanist thinking that would be necessary for success in integrating neuroscience and narrative theory.","PeriodicalId":36459,"journal":{"name":"Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture","volume":"119 1","pages":"81 - 100"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79413675","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}