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The Beauties and the Beautiful — Some Considerations from the Perspective of Neuronal Aesthetics

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Evolutionary Aesthetics

Abstract

What is evolutionary aesthetics about, but the evolution of aesthetics? If such an evolution exists, there must be an evolutionary procedure which sorts out which aesthetic would be advantageous in evolutionary terms and which would not. It would, therefore, be reasonable to assume that such an optimizing procedure would result in something that could be described as “better”, that is, in evolutionary terms, more successful, and in terms of aesthetics, more pleasant or “beautiful”. In this study, the central task will be to describe such an optimizing procedure. Such an approach would allow us to make sense of terms such as “beauty” and “beautiful”. If it were possible to define the neuronal mechanism by which a certain pattern of beauty is selected, questions such as the definition of beautiful might be answered. Eventually, an evolution of schemes of beautiful could be outlined, providing us with the opportunity to describe the essentials of human cultural development in biological terms.

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Authors
  1. Olaf Breidbach
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Philosophy and Foundations of Science, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Strasse 10 C, 35394, Giessen, Germany

    Eckart Voland

  2. Ludwig-Boltzmann-Institute for Urban Ethology, University of Vienna, Althanstrasse 14, 1090, Vienna, Austria

    Karl Grammer

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Breidbach, O. (2003). The Beauties and the Beautiful — Some Considerations from the Perspective of Neuronal Aesthetics. In: Voland, E., Grammer, K. (eds) Evolutionary Aesthetics. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-07142-7_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-07142-7_3

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-07822-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-662-07142-7

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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