Animal Origins of Aesthetics

Kallol Bhattacharya

More than one and a half centuries have passed since Charles Darwin put forward the theory of evolution through natural selection and backed it with numerous examples. The once sacrilegious theory of godly beings like us evolving from base animals is firmly rooted in evidence and is largely accepted by humankind. From this premise it is only logical to ask if some of the higher faculties we possess, for example, our aesthetic sense, is unique and god gifted to our species, or whether it does also have an animal origin. The first serious study related to the animal origins of aesthetics was taken up by none other than Darwin himself. After ages of purposeful neglect and ridicule, Darwins detailed works relating to this are being re-evaluated in the light of modern biology. Let us for a moment digress into the life style of an average modern man who has to earn his living the hard way. Day in and day out he has to struggle for survival. Aesthetics, the subject of beauty and its appreciation, is a luxury to him. Yet, on his first date he tries his best to look beautiful, perhaps selects a useless but beautiful gift and is all of a sudden appreciative of the beauty of the quiet sunset or a moonlit night. There is no denying the fact that aesthetics has much to do with selection of a mate. In the animal world selection of a mating partner means serious business and justifiably so since the best genes have to be passed on to the next generation. A common pattern that permeates through all the three principal methods of mating behaviour of animals is the male competition for the female. In larger animals the competition is in the form of rivalry for the female. Males engage in duels and may kill the rival to win a mating partner. Darwin terms this as exhibition of power. In some other animals it is the exhibition of weapons. Males with the longest, largest antlers and horns and tusks, that may have outdid their purpose in defense, stand the best chance of winning the female. Finally, in some other species, it is the most civilized strategy of impressing the female, by charming her with his beauty. This according to Darwin, is the staring point of aesthetics. How does the charming the female principle go about? The female simply falls for most brilliant colours, the best love songs, or the wildest antics exhibited by the males. There is no fight, no brute force is involved. The loser simply tries his charm elsewhere. Competition turns into courtship. This is especially true among birds, the most aesthetic of all species according to Darwin. The exotic dance of the peacock and the birds of paradise is to impress the female. Through this process of sexual selection it is ensured that beautiful males with elaborate colour schemes or the loveliest love songs or the most attractive odour (as in musk deer) proliferate across generations. In certain cases the ornamental beauty reaches such extremes that it poses a hindrance

to survival. Darwin cites several such examples. The elaborate antlers of the deer may excite the doe but it prevents the animals free passage through the woods. Similarly, the flowing tail of the peacock may fascinate the peahen, but it is indeed a hindrance to flight and makes the bird an easy prey. In most cases, however, natural selection imposes limits on sexual selection. The highly developed ornaments that evolved through sexual selection and serves no other purpose is what Darwin termed as purposiveness without purpose. When selection of the mate is through charming the female principle rather than rivalry, it is always the competing male beauty and the females sense of beauty that comes into play. The time and energy nature had expended to beautify the male would go to waste if the female does not have the capacity to appreciate beauty. Nature may not have composed music for the deaf. The male beauty and the female sense of beauty must have evolved together and in course of time reinforced each other. Darwin says, herein lies the source of aesthetic sense in animals. The question still remains whether the female does indeed exercise an aesthetic judgment or simply looks for the signature of the fittest male. Biologists have found that the fittest males are indeed the most colourful, vibrant and decorative. Is sexual selection therefore analogous to survival of the fittest? It is observed that a slight deviation in male ornamentation drastically reduces his chances of being selected, although it is no way connected to his reproductive fitness and vigour. The male with the most developed ornamentations and the best symmetry is almost always the chosen one. A recent study of peacock-peahen mating shows that the male with the largest number of eyespots in its tail wins the mating game ten out of eleven times. In the only odd case, the male had one spot less! The female indeed seeks beauty before anything else. The motive is sexual selection and beauty is the yardstick. Beauty for the sake of beauty is a luxury to Mother Nature. The convergence of animal and human aesthetics adds another dimension to the evolutionary process. In Darwins words the same colours and the same sounds are admired by us and many of the lower animals and birds have nearly the same taste for beautiful as we have. Why is it that the high standard of taste in animals generally coincides with our own standard? The answer lies in the fact that at some point of time in the distant past, our brains shared the same common path of evolution along with birds and animals. Sense inputs that derived pleasure millions of years ago may not derive displeasure millions of years hence. In the animal world, is it always the male who display beauty and the female who respond to beauty? An example to the contrary would prove to be an important step in evolution. The transition from animal aesthetics to human aesthetics would therefore require the development of aesthetic sense in males too. This transfer of aesthetic sensibility from females to males should express itself, maybe in a primitive

form, somewhere along the evolutionary line. The Bowerbird is an example of such a transfer. Bowerbirds are native to New Guinea and Australia. These ordinary looking birds derive their name from the bower-like structure the males build. Made of stems and twigs, years of experience are needed to build a perfect bower. Not only does he build the bower, he decorates it lavishly. The floor of the bower is laden with moss. He collects colourful and shiny objects like berries, feathers, seashells, beetle wings, stones, ornamental leaves and fresh flowers. These are then used to decorate the bower. Similar objects are neatly and orderly arranged in groups. Fruits, flowers and leaves that are discoloured with time are routinely replaced by fresh ones. Some even go to the extent of colouring the bower walls with berry juice. The architecture of the bower and its colour scheme varies. Some like it blue, some pink or yellow, some white. Without a doubt, the bower is the most aesthetically pleasing zone on the floor of the forest. The female bird visits bower after bower. If the aesthetic sense of the male impresses her, she mates and builds a nest nearby. If not, she simply flies away. Males with highly ornamental bowers may have as many as ten different mating partners in one day whereas owners of amateurish bowers receive few or none. The bowerbird represents an important phase in evolution for several reasons. The male of the species do not rely on its own beauty, it creates beauty in tune with his aesthetic taste and freedom. The female exercises her aesthetic judgment as before, but in a higher form since beauty is no longer predefined. Unlike that of the peacock or the Argus pheasant where there is a fixed pattern executed to perfection that the female seeks, no two bowers are identical. It is the overall aesthetic quality of the bower that she will judge and in the process ensure that the best genes will pass on to the next generation. Recent research has shown that the complexity and ornamentation of the bower is related to the brain size of the builder. Among the other species of birds in the bowerbird habitat is the Australian catbird (so called because its call resembles the meowing of a cat). Although they belong to the same family Ptilinorhychidae and resemble the bowerbird in many respects, the catbird is not a bower-building bird and the size of its brain is almost half that of the bowerbird! Indeed, one needs brains to create and appreciate beauty. From the multitude of evidence gathered by Darwin and his successors, it clearly emerges that human aesthetics is not a god-gifted attribute; it is for sure an evolved trait that has reached its pinnacle in humans. We are a species where the transfer of aesthetic sensibility, both in creation and appreciation, is not only complete, it has overshot the male-female barrier. In its purest form, human aesthetics has no ulterior motive except mental pleasure. Why is it that we enjoy a beautiful sunset? Why is a moonlit night aesthetically pleasing? Why does Venus de Milo in Louvre attract

millions of visitors from across the globe? Why do the best singers, dancers and musicians always find an appreciative and encouraging audience? And why is it that our sweetest songs are those that tell us our saddest thoughts? All we know is that certain forms and colours, odours, sounds and ambience arouse pleasure, others do not. The neurological and biochemical processes are known, the reasons are not that clear. Or, is it the remnant of the charming-the-female gene that manifests itself in a different form? Who knows!