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1 results

  • Chapter 11 - The Timescale of Deep History and of Human Evolution

  • from Part II - Entangled Timescales of Visual Arts
  • Paul van Geert, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, The Netherlands
  • Book:
    A Complex Systems View on the Visual Arts
    Published online:
    20 March 2025
    Print publication:
    03 April 2025, pp 303-328

  • Summary

    Chapter 11 deals with the timescale of history and human evolution. It offers a complexity approach to the evolution of art that attempts to move beyond simplistic theories of the survival function of art, including the much-debated issue of the function of art in the context of sexual selection. After discussing the basic principles of evolution from a complex systems approach, the chapter outlines different evolutionary scenarios: the survival-enhancing function, on the one hand, and the view of art as an evolutionary by-product, on the other. By showing how both evolution and human activity are entangled, interaction-dominated dynamics, the chapter provides an alternative to simplistic gene-for-art assumptions.