The Origin of Song

[Mr Skeptic]

There is a large number of animals that sing: crickets, birds, whales. You might consider visual rhythms to be related as well (luminescence, dance, etc) to be related as well. I was wondering, which branches of the animal kingdom do this, especially those in our line? And how does it relate to our communication? We can communicate in song as well as in speech, and singing and speaking use different parts of the brain. Since most song is related to communication (or mating), I was wondering if song could have been what we built our language from.

[iNow]

I often wonder if all of the vibrations at the atomic level could be interepreted by microscopic organisms as "song," but I'm not sure if that relates to discussion you are attempting to have.

[Psycho]

What you class as birds singing would be the equivalent of our talking, they are one and the same thing, they have just been classified differently by humans.

[CDarwin]

There was a good article in the New Scientist about this. I'd have to find it. Unfortunately I don't remember enough to really communicate anything I 'learned' from it. I do remember that dolphins and whales actually have 'signature' songs that they use to identify themselves. I found that interesting. Oh, and generally primates don't like music, and the quieter and slower the better.

 

Primates make very few noises that don't encode something specifically in their social setting. They are warnings or designed to elicit comfort, play, some other specific idea. That might be an important context to understand human singing. Where birds may sing simply to impress a mate or rival, primate sounds seem much more geared toward illiciting emotion in conspecifics, and that would seem to apply our songs as well.

[Mr Skeptic]

I often wonder if all of the vibrations at the atomic level could be interepreted by microscopic organisms as "song," but I'm not sure if that relates to discussion you are attempting to have.

 

I'm aiming wide, but I think the signal would have to originate from a living thing to count as song, and having neurons might also be a prerequisite. Rhythmic chemical secretions might count and are probably the only way microbes could be involved. (This seems very unlikely.)