The Science of Pleasure

I’ll keep this brief, as I should be in bed. I’m just half-watching a programme on BBC4, in which a musician argues that songbirds sing for their own pleasure. The problem with all these sorts of theories, whether or not they have intrinsic merit (which, for what it’s worth, this one may), is that they polarise the depiction and description of the natural world as either "coldly scientific" verus somehow more "holistic". Science apparently misses certain things.

Here is how I know I am a scientist at heart. Because I take personally against this view – that science is somehow blind. Science is based on balance – it is not flawless (and that is where my post-Enlightenment education kicks in) – but it tries to be balanced. But what this sort of theory attempts is to present a belief as equally valid as the results of scientific enquiry. Maybe that sort of enquiry is flawed, but it tries not to be. Belief – and theories based on it – begin with themselves, and then propose to abolish all opposition.

I have to agree with the scientist: if we find beauty in birdsong, it tells us little or nothing about the purpose or function of the song itself, and maybe something about we humans – since the concept of beauty exists solely in the observer, and not intrinsically in the object of study. I just wish these sorts of distinctions could be understood and appreciated by all.