Abstract
Despite being a trove of lively observations and stimulating ideas, The Art Instinct does not succeed in its stated purpose of showing that art has been evolutionarily adaptive. The book is more about aesthetic experience or response (pleasure and beauty) than art making or participation , and the author’s twelve “cluster criteria” are too general for understanding why a particular behavior (or behavioral predisposition) of art might have originated and evolved. Advocacy of the sexual-selection argument is inadequate: participation in the arts is good for everyone, not just a few (male) virtuosos.
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