WEBVTT - From the Vault: Minds of Musical Emptiness 0:00:05.880 --> 0:00:07.640 Hey, you, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:10.840 name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and it's Saturday. 0:00:10.920 --> 0:00:13.119 Time to go into that old vault. And this is 0:00:13.160 --> 0:00:17.000 going to be an episode from July that you actually 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:19.720 did with our old friend Christian Seger. Yeah, this episode 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:22.320 gets into the topic of a museum and some related 0:00:22.320 --> 0:00:26.799 conditions in which an individual does not get music. And 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:28.440 I don't mean in the sense that, like you know, 0:00:29.000 --> 0:00:30.960 they just don't get funk or they don't get this 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:35.320 particular genre. Don't understand why everybody likes Eric clapton solo career, right, 0:00:35.360 --> 0:00:38.240 But yeah, the idea that music could just not be 0:00:38.720 --> 0:00:42.400 connecting with certain brains, uh, the way that it does 0:00:42.479 --> 0:00:45.479 with the rest of us, that sounds very interesting. I'm intrigued. 0:00:45.560 --> 0:00:48.440 Maybe I'll give it a listen. All right, well, let's 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:56.200 go ahead and dive into minds of musical emptiness. Welcome 0:00:56.240 --> 0:00:58.880 to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff Works 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:08.440 dot Com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:01:08.480 --> 0:01:12.480 My name is Robert Lamb and my name is Christian Seger. Hey, Robert, 0:01:12.720 --> 0:01:16.279 have you ever met a person who doesn't like music? 0:01:17.000 --> 0:01:19.360 I do not think I've ever met anyone who just 0:01:19.440 --> 0:01:22.680 across the board doesn't like music. I've certainly met plenty 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:27.520 of people who seem to dislike music in certain scenarios 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:30.320 because I'm the kind of type of types of music, 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:33.120 you mean, well, types of music, but also music in 0:01:33.160 --> 0:01:36.880 certain situations, like I've certainly known people who don't like 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:40.959 music while driving. I'm of the mindset I want music 0:01:41.000 --> 0:01:44.520 on all the time, just about music of my own choose, 0:01:44.760 --> 0:01:47.520 but music. I know a lot of our colleagues have 0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:51.440 difficulty writing while there's music on. I don't have that problem, 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:55.480 although I do like sort of cultivate playlists of stuff 0:01:55.520 --> 0:01:58.600 that helps me to write, you know, mostly instrumental stuff 0:01:58.600 --> 0:02:00.760 that sometimes there's certain music that I can listen to 0:02:00.840 --> 0:02:03.800 that has vocals that I can listen to all writing. 0:02:04.240 --> 0:02:06.200 But yeah, so you know, I know, like you like, 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:09.080 I've known like various sort of iterations of people who 0:02:09.160 --> 0:02:11.839 can't listen to music during certain times. I've only met 0:02:11.840 --> 0:02:14.000 like one or two people in my life who just don't. 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:17.680 They literally say I don't like music, and that's so alien, 0:02:17.840 --> 0:02:20.440 so difficult for us to comprehend, because it's like hearing 0:02:20.480 --> 0:02:23.360 someone say, oh, I don't I don't like food, Like 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:26.200 I don't like drinking liquids. It almost seems in human 0:02:26.240 --> 0:02:27.919 in a way. And I think like when you hear that, 0:02:28.800 --> 0:02:32.679 at least in my experience, people will kind of think like, oh, 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:35.880 that's the trade of a psychopath, right, But it's not. 0:02:36.200 --> 0:02:39.440 It's actually not. We've talked about psychopaths on the show 0:02:39.440 --> 0:02:41.600 and that hasn't come up as one of the symptoms. 0:02:41.600 --> 0:02:44.320 But also, as we're going to talk about today, this 0:02:44.400 --> 0:02:47.680 is a real brain condition. Yeah, at least a couple 0:02:47.680 --> 0:02:50.040 of different conditions we're going to discuss, and I think 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:55.160 they both serve to remind us just how tenuous our 0:02:55.480 --> 0:02:59.000 sensory experience of the world really is. Yeah. Absolutely, I mean, like, 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:01.600 think about you and me, right, Like, the audience probably 0:03:01.680 --> 0:03:04.720 knows if they don't already, that you are really into 0:03:05.240 --> 0:03:08.359 electronic music, and you cover it for stuff to blow 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:13.600 your mind, i'd say weekly, right, Yeah. And um, and I, 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:16.400 as many people have heard on other episodes, grew up 0:03:16.400 --> 0:03:18.440 in the punkin metal scene and still listen to a 0:03:18.480 --> 0:03:20.720 lot of that stuff, which a lot of people find 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:25.560 unlistenable and dissonant, including you know, my wife, and um, 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:28.600 I'm okay with that, but it's interesting because dissonance plays 0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:31.919 into these diseases as well. Well, here's a quick question 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:33.919 for you, and I think this helps to sort of 0:03:34.120 --> 0:03:37.640 this helps a lot of us, uh try and comprehend 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:40.080 what some of these conditions are. Like, Like what what's 0:03:40.080 --> 0:03:42.400 the type of music that you just really don't get 0:03:42.440 --> 0:03:46.280 that you just you can't really listen to, you don't understand, 0:03:46.760 --> 0:03:49.600 and and you're just willing to say, yeah, I that 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:54.120 is not from me usually like NPR style jazz. I 0:03:54.120 --> 0:03:56.720 don't want to just say jazz in general, because there's 0:03:56.920 --> 0:03:59.200 plenty of stuff that's being done in that area that's 0:03:59.560 --> 0:04:02.480 interesting and I like, but like that kind of like 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:06.520 background elevator music jazz, you know what I mean? Like 0:04:06.600 --> 0:04:09.240 that that drives me crazy. It's like fingers on a chalkboard. 0:04:09.600 --> 0:04:12.080 For me. It's I have to say jazz as well. 0:04:12.200 --> 0:04:14.760 And part of this could be I mean, the view 0:04:14.800 --> 0:04:17.400 I guess is that jazz takes some getting used to. 0:04:17.520 --> 0:04:19.400 You have to be you have to immerse yourself in it. 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:22.320 And I like some jazz, and I like jazzy elements 0:04:22.320 --> 0:04:24.040 and some of the music I listened to from time 0:04:24.120 --> 0:04:27.839 to time, But it's that jazzy jazz that spacey jazz 0:04:27.880 --> 0:04:32.799 that that completely unhinged jazz that just kind of gives 0:04:32.800 --> 0:04:34.919 me the shape something. We think of this joke on 0:04:35.000 --> 0:04:36.720 Parks and Rack. I don't know if you remember this, 0:04:36.800 --> 0:04:39.760 but the their local MPR station, they had a show 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:47.440 and they would say jazz plus jazz equals jazz. Whenever 0:04:47.480 --> 0:04:50.839 I hear something like that, I'm like nope. During the channel. 0:04:51.160 --> 0:04:53.760 I often think about it that it's maybe like a 0:04:54.320 --> 0:05:00.760 like a strong alcoholic property. You know, something strong liqueur 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:02.600 that you would never drink on your on its own, 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:05.320 but you would use in a recipe or you would 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:08.640 certainly used in using a mixed drink. So I often think, well, 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:12.400 that is that is the strong, undeluded stuff that is 0:05:12.440 --> 0:05:14.720 not for me. Yeah, but you can put a like 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:17.080 a shot of it, or like I will. I don't 0:05:17.120 --> 0:05:20.080 drink clearly so shots a lot, but you know a 0:05:20.120 --> 0:05:23.320 little bit. It's like adding grenadine to your to your 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:26.480 soda or something like to drink and given a little flavor. Well, 0:05:26.480 --> 0:05:28.080 like punk is is one of those things. I think 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:30.839 about this sometimes it's like pure punk. I've just it's 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:33.919 not my scene, it's not what I dig. But I 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:36.240 have certainly loved groups that have elements of punk in 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:40.200 their sound. They neither come out of punk or find 0:05:40.240 --> 0:05:42.240 some of their musical genre to combine it with, Like 0:05:42.400 --> 0:05:46.400 um oh the Poges come to mind. Yeah, like a 0:05:46.400 --> 0:05:48.440 little bit of Irish music, a little bit of punk music. 0:05:49.000 --> 0:05:51.159 It's really I would be hard pressed to want to 0:05:51.160 --> 0:05:53.440 listen to Irish or punk music on their own, but 0:05:53.480 --> 0:05:55.760 when these two come together, then I you know, I've 0:05:55.760 --> 0:05:58.600 always enjoyed it. Yeah, No, I can definitely see that, 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:03.279 even like having spent many a year in basements watching 0:06:03.360 --> 0:06:07.480 just like crusty punk bands just hammering out four chord songs. Uh, 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:11.279 I can understand where you're coming from, and that that 0:06:11.400 --> 0:06:13.159 sort of has led to like what a lot of 0:06:13.160 --> 0:06:16.840 our I guess, like popular alternative music is nowadays. Right, 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:19.800 it's sort of like a fusion of punk and jazz 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:23.000 or punkin metal, or where Joe and I were just 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:26.400 talking the other night about SKA like nineties and how 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:29.279 that was sort of something like that. Yeah. Well, okay, 0:06:29.400 --> 0:06:33.159 enough about our musical interests, but so clearly we're human 0:06:33.200 --> 0:06:35.800 beings who love music. We've got opinions about music. We 0:06:35.880 --> 0:06:37.480 like to talk about it, we like to listen to it, 0:06:37.520 --> 0:06:41.240 we go to shows um. But there's people out there 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:44.680 who don't. And it's not just because you know they don't, 0:06:44.680 --> 0:06:46.479 they don't go to things like that, or they're just 0:06:46.520 --> 0:06:51.039 not it's because there's literally something going on in their 0:06:51.080 --> 0:06:54.880 brain that makes it so that they're incapable of enjoying music. Right, 0:06:55.400 --> 0:06:59.039 something's wired differently, Some systems are online in a slightly 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:02.039 different array, and we will get into into these in 0:07:02.040 --> 0:07:04.440 a moment, but before we do, without would be helpful 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:06.279 to just go ahead and give a nice overview of 0:07:06.279 --> 0:07:10.560 the cognitive experience of music, just basically what's going on 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:14.800 when we process it. So music is of course a 0:07:14.920 --> 0:07:17.920 deep part of our cognitive architecture. It changes our mood, 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:21.960 it heightens our emotions, it summons and banishes memories, It 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:25.000 affects the manner in which we preceive perceived time. Even 0:07:25.520 --> 0:07:27.920 we can actually use it to treat illnesses of the 0:07:28.040 --> 0:07:31.440 mind and body. So it's powerful stuff. It's potent stuff 0:07:32.240 --> 0:07:34.600 that's not even just with human beings. There's been research 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.360 done on plants that music affects plants, so we're talking 0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:41.720 about some serious magic here. There are parts of the 0:07:41.760 --> 0:07:45.600 brain that respond to music that that don't respond to language. 0:07:45.800 --> 0:07:48.160 There are separate parts of the brain that respond to melody, 0:07:48.320 --> 0:07:50.800 to the melody of language, different than these different for 0:07:50.880 --> 0:07:52.640 the parts of the brain the respond to the melody 0:07:52.640 --> 0:07:56.640 of music, they're parts of the brain that deal with movement, attention, planning, 0:07:56.640 --> 0:07:58.960 and memory, and these all respond to music even though 0:07:58.960 --> 0:08:03.280 they don't have anything to do with the actual auditory process. 0:08:03.280 --> 0:08:05.440 So there's a lot going on behind the scenes. Yeah, 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:07.840 and and we don't fully understand it yet. I mean, 0:08:08.000 --> 0:08:11.400 I would say this research well, you know, we'll talk 0:08:11.440 --> 0:08:13.640 about it later, but really, only in the last century 0:08:13.640 --> 0:08:16.240 have we even been aware of this as a medical condition. 0:08:16.320 --> 0:08:18.480 But only in maybe the last twenty or thirty years 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:21.800 has there been like real deep research into what this means. Yeah, 0:08:21.880 --> 0:08:24.360 and certainly there's a lot of wonderful research out there 0:08:24.400 --> 0:08:26.920 about our relationship with music, and we can't cover it 0:08:26.960 --> 0:08:30.280 all here, but just a couple of i think illuminating 0:08:30.560 --> 0:08:34.400 studies to to touch on here. Um In in recent years, 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:36.760 we found that you can look to the brain via 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:39.360 f m R I, and specifically you can look at 0:08:39.400 --> 0:08:43.240 brain activity in the nucleus incumbents. This is involved in 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:47.600 the formation of expectations, and we can actually tell if 0:08:47.600 --> 0:08:50.800 a person is enjoying the music they're listening to. By 0:08:50.920 --> 0:08:54.880 looking at at brain activity in this region, if it's 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:57.920 meeting their musical expectations and matching up with the stored 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:00.839 templates of what you've heard before, then you see stuff 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:03.920 light up. Um yeah, I could absolutely believe that given 0:09:03.960 --> 0:09:06.920 my experience with music. Yeah, Like if you're just like A, 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:10.160 I don't know, Like here's an example, Like I walk 0:09:10.200 --> 0:09:12.600 around sometimes and I'll just have like my entire music 0:09:12.640 --> 0:09:15.120 library on shuffle on my phone or something like that, 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:19.000 Like one like really great song for my high school 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:21.840 days will pop up, and it's like I can feel 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:24.640 like whatever those lights are that are going on in 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:28.840 my brain just activate, you know. Yeah. Yeah. The expectation 0:09:28.920 --> 0:09:31.280 plays such an interesting role in our experiencing music because 0:09:31.320 --> 0:09:34.240 on one hand, there's there's something that happens when a 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:36.600 when a melody or a tune or the lyrics take 0:09:36.600 --> 0:09:39.120 you to that place you're expecting it to go. But 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.720 then also when it goes to a slightly different place 0:09:42.080 --> 0:09:43.920 where it kind of you think it's going to turn 0:09:44.000 --> 0:09:47.160 left and it turns right, like that animates you as well. 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:51.680 It's it's it's almost like narrative without words, really ah, yeah, 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:54.320 that's a really interesting way to put it. I um, 0:09:54.559 --> 0:09:56.679 I'll just do a little bit of subjective experience here 0:09:56.720 --> 0:09:58.880 to throw in here. I'm not like, personally a big 0:09:58.920 --> 0:10:01.160 fan of The Cure, but a friend of mine is, 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.680 uh and if he's listening her, this is your story. 0:10:05.360 --> 0:10:07.720 So The Cure just played in Atlanta recently, like I 0:10:07.720 --> 0:10:09.200 think like two weeks ago. Did you know about this? 0:10:09.320 --> 0:10:11.000 Oh yeah, I have. I have some friends who are 0:10:11.040 --> 0:10:13.920 really they went to this show. So the way that 0:10:14.000 --> 0:10:16.640 he told me was that, like, apparently this tour was 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:18.440 like you know, they're going to be playing all their 0:10:18.480 --> 0:10:20.240 greatest hits or whatever, but that was sort of like 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:23.280 a different arrangement of the musical instruments. So he was 0:10:23.320 --> 0:10:25.880 really excited because he's like, well, I'm gonna hear the 0:10:26.000 --> 0:10:28.240 songs that I love, and it's gonna be played by 0:10:28.240 --> 0:10:30.440 the guys who wrote them, but they're going to be 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:33.200 playing them in very different ways than I'm used to 0:10:33.280 --> 0:10:36.360 and that's a wholly new experience. Oh yeah, I've had 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:40.600 that experience with I guess tool has been. It seems 0:10:40.640 --> 0:10:42.160 like the kind of band that would do something like that. 0:10:42.400 --> 0:10:44.520 They'll play with the intro on something and so the 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:46.480 live version, at first you're not sure what it's going 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:48.680 to be, but then then you realize, oh, it's it's 0:10:48.720 --> 0:10:52.480 this track, it's that track, whatever the particular track may be. 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:56.600 And there's this, you know, a physical experience of excitement 0:10:56.640 --> 0:10:59.960 to when I was, you know, still involved in the 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:01.960 music scening just go into a lot of shows. The 0:11:02.000 --> 0:11:04.120 thing that was always the most impressive to me, and 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:07.840 that just showed like a real class act, professional touring band, 0:11:08.320 --> 0:11:11.800 was when they could play an entire set without stopping, 0:11:12.320 --> 0:11:15.200 Like they would just start and their songs. They had 0:11:15.240 --> 0:11:17.760 figured out ways to weave their songs in and out 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:19.680 of one another, so they would just play like a 0:11:19.800 --> 0:11:22.560 really tight thirty forty minutes set and then boom they 0:11:22.600 --> 0:11:24.440 were done, got off on stage. And that is the 0:11:24.480 --> 0:11:27.520 kind of thing that just floors you. It's just like 0:11:27.800 --> 0:11:30.079 you don't have time to stop and breathe and kind 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:33.959 of judge them, uh for other factors like whatever they're wearing, 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:35.959 or what they say in between songs or something. You're 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:38.560 just like bombarded. Well, that's one of the reasons that 0:11:39.080 --> 0:11:43.840 I've been so into DJ mixes over the years that, uh, 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:45.839 it's not quite the same as a as a band 0:11:45.880 --> 0:11:48.760 performing the entire set without stop. But this the idea 0:11:48.760 --> 0:11:51.920 that you can take various musical elements and and a 0:11:52.000 --> 0:11:56.240 talented DJ can create a seamless tapestry of sound. I 0:11:56.280 --> 0:11:58.800 love that, and certainly you get those six surprises. Those 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:03.880 expectations net Or skewed throughout that sonic narrative as well. 0:12:04.200 --> 0:12:07.520 So all right, we're clearly establishing that we're music nerds. 0:12:07.559 --> 0:12:10.600 We love music, and whatever parts of the brain that 0:12:10.679 --> 0:12:13.320 don't work for for some of these people, they're they're 0:12:13.400 --> 0:12:16.480 lighting up like fireworks for us. Now. Another key point, though, 0:12:16.640 --> 0:12:20.840 is certainly you've been to a concert or performance and 0:12:21.000 --> 0:12:23.880 you've been experiencing the music, and maybe you've seen somebody 0:12:24.160 --> 0:12:27.680 like clearly their significant other drug them here and they're 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:30.360 not enjoying it, or they got When you said drugged them, 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:33.080 I thought like ruderally gave them drugs so that they 0:12:33.120 --> 0:12:35.440 would just sit put. But yeah, that's that's that's possible, 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:38.680 depending on the because I've seen you both. Yeah, so 0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:41.680 you've seen people that are not into it, or they're 0:12:41.559 --> 0:12:45.800 they don't they're clearly the first time, or maybe they 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:48.400 you don't feel like they could possibly be enjoying the 0:12:48.520 --> 0:12:51.559 music on the same level as you are. Yeah, possibly 0:12:51.840 --> 0:12:54.679 and certainly like and I have to applaud my wife again, 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:57.880 like she's indulged me by you know, sometimes I can't 0:12:57.880 --> 0:12:59.480 get a friend to go with me to a particular 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:02.640 kind of thing. She's like, all right, you know, let's 0:13:02.720 --> 0:13:05.720 I'll go with you. You know, we'll go see Converge 0:13:05.760 --> 0:13:08.000 and High on Fire. And she's just sitting there like 0:13:08.040 --> 0:13:11.800 shaking her head while I'm like really into it, you know, Um, 0:13:12.080 --> 0:13:15.679 so yeah, I get that. Well. It's interesting because despite 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:18.480 all of our very musical taste, in our varying levels 0:13:18.559 --> 0:13:22.520 of engagement with particular types of music, particular performances, the 0:13:22.640 --> 0:13:27.480 brain experiences that we have are actually pretty consistent among 0:13:27.559 --> 0:13:30.640 most people. There was a two thousand thirteen study publishing 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:32.960 the European Journal of Euroscience, and they found that if 0:13:33.000 --> 0:13:36.959 two people listened to the same track, one inexperienced fan 0:13:37.120 --> 0:13:38.920 of the music and another not the other one just 0:13:38.960 --> 0:13:41.760 like a newcomer, you know, there's been dragged in there 0:13:41.920 --> 0:13:45.720 by their spouse, you're still going to see the same 0:13:45.760 --> 0:13:51.680 synchronization in several key brain areas and similar brain activity. 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:53.640 So as much as you you know, might like to 0:13:53.679 --> 0:13:56.680 think you're experiencing your favorite band and an entirely different 0:13:56.720 --> 0:13:59.520 cognitive level than the you know, the dumb guy next 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:03.280 to you with the glories on his fingers. Um, that 0:14:03.320 --> 0:14:05.960 doesn't seem to be quite the case. We're still engaging 0:14:06.000 --> 0:14:09.520 like the same networks. I wonder if this is similar 0:14:09.600 --> 0:14:13.800 to like research that's been done on depression and anxiety 0:14:13.840 --> 0:14:16.520 in that like, Um, the more you listen to the 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:19.200 songs over and over again, right, Like, it's maybe it's 0:14:19.240 --> 0:14:23.600 like a like writing over the same pathway of the 0:14:23.600 --> 0:14:26.040 brain over and over and over again, so it makes 0:14:26.080 --> 0:14:29.680 it easier for that experience to happen. It's happening in 0:14:29.720 --> 0:14:32.160 the same way for everybody, but it's just kind of 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:34.440 going through the brain. I don't know how to describe 0:14:34.440 --> 0:14:36.680 this other than with like road metaphors, right, Like, it's 0:14:36.720 --> 0:14:38.960 like going down the same road, but it's just like 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:43.200 going down faster for for us or something an expectation, 0:14:43.280 --> 0:14:45.320 right yeah, where the road is going to turn, where 0:14:45.360 --> 0:14:49.120 it's gonna split, etcetera. Yeah, interesting, huh. I wonder if 0:14:49.120 --> 0:14:53.479 anybody's done research on that, Like the the the experience 0:14:53.800 --> 0:14:58.040 of having music encoded to the brain as being similar 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:03.480 to the sort of expectations that encode anxiety into people. Yeah, 0:15:04.000 --> 0:15:05.640 we'll have to follow up on that, because I know 0:15:05.680 --> 0:15:07.920 there have been a number of studies that have looked into, 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:12.160 you know, the potential therapeutic aspects of music as well 0:15:12.200 --> 0:15:16.480 as the role of music and in various emotional states. Yeah. Right, 0:15:16.520 --> 0:15:18.280 and you think about it, like some of the emotional 0:15:18.320 --> 0:15:21.200 states that are created by listening to music have very 0:15:21.240 --> 0:15:25.360 similar symptoms to anxiety. Huh. All right, maybe that's a 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:27.240 future episode. We'll have to dig deep for that one. 0:15:27.760 --> 0:15:29.880 But let's take a quick break and then when we 0:15:29.920 --> 0:15:32.720 come back, we're going to talk about the condition of 0:15:32.960 --> 0:15:43.520 a musia or tone deafness. All right, we're back. So 0:15:43.560 --> 0:15:46.600 this first one, tone deaf deafness amusia. I feel like 0:15:46.600 --> 0:15:48.000 this is going to be the one where we're going 0:15:48.040 --> 0:15:52.320 to see far more listeners who can share experiences with this. Certainly, 0:15:52.320 --> 0:15:56.200 we've probably all encountered people with varying levels of tone 0:15:56.240 --> 0:15:59.320 deafness over the years, and it seems like tone deafness 0:15:59.360 --> 0:16:04.880 has variations on it, like extremes or you know, some 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:07.720 people have it to to less an extent than others. 0:16:08.400 --> 0:16:13.560 The term congenital amusia is what we use to denote 0:16:13.680 --> 0:16:16.840 tone deafness that you're born with. It's been described in 0:16:16.920 --> 0:16:20.840 medical literature for more than a century, and it manifests 0:16:20.880 --> 0:16:26.120 basically as a severe deficiency in processing pitch variations. Now 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:30.440 this extends to impairments in musical memory and recognition, as 0:16:30.480 --> 0:16:34.120 well as what we traditionally think of his tone deafness 0:16:34.160 --> 0:16:36.920 as like bad singing or the inability to tap in 0:16:37.000 --> 0:16:40.480 time with music. Right. Um, everybody's right now is probably 0:16:40.520 --> 0:16:43.280 thinking of like the person who I don't know was 0:16:43.320 --> 0:16:47.840 inquired or something like they just couldn't hit the notes. Yeah. Um. 0:16:47.920 --> 0:16:52.840 Some literature also refers to a musia as dis melodia 0:16:53.280 --> 0:16:58.160 or dismusia, but the term amusia is generally agreed to 0:16:58.160 --> 0:17:01.400 be preferable because it acknowledged just the possibility that there 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:06.119 exists as many forms of congenital amusias as there are 0:17:06.160 --> 0:17:09.040 forms of acquired amusias. And what I mean by that 0:17:09.200 --> 0:17:13.560 is accidental brain damage, So you can hurt yourself a 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:18.119 variety of ways that will also produce this effect. Now, 0:17:18.640 --> 0:17:23.040 to clarify, congenital means present from birth, but it is 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:27.119 possible to acquire a musia through brain damage in life. 0:17:27.400 --> 0:17:29.760 The very first study that looked at. This was done 0:17:29.800 --> 0:17:32.640 in eighteen seventy eight by a guy named Grant Allen, 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:35.760 and he was investigating a thirty year old man with 0:17:35.840 --> 0:17:40.119 a neurological lesion that gave him this, as he referred 0:17:40.119 --> 0:17:44.280 to it then severe musical handicap um. And maybe some 0:17:44.359 --> 0:17:47.240 of you out there wondering right now, like I can 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:49.359 relate to this, is this me? Well it could be 0:17:49.760 --> 0:17:52.359 a recent study found that out of a hundred people 0:17:52.359 --> 0:17:55.760 who self declared themselves as having a handicap for music, 0:17:56.280 --> 0:18:01.040 only twenty two So actually, exhibit did the traits of 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.880 a musea after they were tested with a formal questionnaire 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:07.480 and the way that this questionnaire worked. It tested your 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:12.280 aptitude for scale, interval, and contour information as well as 0:18:12.520 --> 0:18:19.520 melodic organization dimension, rhythm and meter, and temporal organization dimension. 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:25.920 They also tested memory recognition ability connected to music. Now, 0:18:25.920 --> 0:18:29.359 those who are tone deaf are generally unable to hear 0:18:29.400 --> 0:18:31.639 the differences in pitch and tone that the rest of 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:34.320 us here we joke about this, right you know that 0:18:34.400 --> 0:18:37.000 there's always like uh, and I imagine with like movies 0:18:37.040 --> 0:18:39.199 like Pitch Perfect or TV shows like Glee, like there 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:41.840 must be tons of joke about jokes about tone Definitely. 0:18:41.880 --> 0:18:44.520 It seems like every long running show ever has had 0:18:44.520 --> 0:18:47.080 at least an episode where, oh, it's the person who 0:18:47.240 --> 0:18:49.600 can't sing, but they don't realize they can't sing it. Yeah. 0:18:49.640 --> 0:18:51.000 So it's a common enough of a thing that it 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:53.040 shows up in some pop culture narrative and we all 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:57.160 recognize it. Uh. We use the phrase really to describe 0:18:57.160 --> 0:19:01.840 people who don't understand simple commun unication strategies to write, 0:19:01.840 --> 0:19:04.040 like like even outside of it, we've turned into this 0:19:04.160 --> 0:19:08.120 metaphor for like, ah, well, he's tone deaf, so that's 0:19:08.119 --> 0:19:10.560 why he doesn't understand what we're talking about here. It's 0:19:10.600 --> 0:19:13.200 not even we're using it on a on a level 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:18.240 beyond like its actual medical application. Right at its most extreme, though, 0:19:18.680 --> 0:19:23.040 people who are tone deaf are unable to even perceive 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:25.119 music the same way that the rest of us do. 0:19:25.200 --> 0:19:27.840 And it comes down to an actual difference in their 0:19:27.880 --> 0:19:31.919 brain structure. Uh. And it's different from those like you know, 0:19:32.080 --> 0:19:36.600 Robert and myself for whom music comes naturally. Okay, it's 0:19:36.640 --> 0:19:40.119 actually defined as a learning disability. There's a team from 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:44.000 the University of Montreal who have first published an empirical 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:47.520 study on it, and that's their delineation. So, for instance, 0:19:47.840 --> 0:19:50.359 most children, and I didn't realize this, but this is 0:19:50.359 --> 0:19:53.000 probably a common experience for you. Most children learned to 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:55.400 sing at the same time that they're learning to speak, right, 0:19:55.720 --> 0:19:58.439 so they're like kind of like singing words. Like I 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:00.840 was a babysitting a friend of ours four year old 0:20:00.880 --> 0:20:03.080 the other night, and he was singing constantly. But then 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:05.359 he would just kind of talk to himself too. Oh yeah, 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:08.560 that's my experience with my son Bastion is um. There's 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:10.600 a lot of a lot of talking at this point 0:20:10.720 --> 0:20:13.359 he's four, but there's also a lot of singing. He 0:20:13.400 --> 0:20:17.320 will just burst into song about the silliest things, to 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:19.159 the point we're just like, all right, you just you 0:20:19.200 --> 0:20:22.800 can't sing about butter anymore. I just just eat, don't 0:20:22.840 --> 0:20:25.080 play with the butter, and don't sing about the butter, 0:20:26.200 --> 0:20:30.119 just consumed. But well, that sounds like he is not 0:20:30.200 --> 0:20:33.439 tone deaf, because tone deaf children don't do this singing 0:20:33.800 --> 0:20:36.520 when they're younger. Uh. And this is where this this 0:20:36.560 --> 0:20:39.280 woman seems to be like the expert on this, Like 0:20:39.359 --> 0:20:41.800 every study I was looking at she was somehow involved in. 0:20:42.119 --> 0:20:45.160 Her name is Isabelle Perette's. And that's when she gave 0:20:45.200 --> 0:20:49.880 it the official disorder congenital amusia. It's innate in these 0:20:49.920 --> 0:20:56.000 people's brain, the lack of musical perception, and it's also hereditary. Uh. 0:20:56.040 --> 0:21:01.560 They found that congenital amusia is genetically transmitted. Thirty of 0:21:01.600 --> 0:21:05.160 the people who have first degree relatives with this cognitive 0:21:05.200 --> 0:21:09.080 disorder also have it. However, if you look at control groups, 0:21:09.119 --> 0:21:13.600 only three percent habit and control and control group families. However, 0:21:14.080 --> 0:21:18.520 congenital amusia doesn't seem to result from any particular family environment. 0:21:18.560 --> 0:21:22.200 It's not like, I don't know, uh, you can somehow 0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:25.240 connect it to like alcoholics or something like that. Right, Like, 0:21:25.280 --> 0:21:28.680 there doesn't seem to be an environmental source that's causing this. 0:21:28.880 --> 0:21:33.480 It seems to be genetic. Remember, though genes don't specify 0:21:33.600 --> 0:21:37.680 cognitive function, they actually influence brain development. So the next 0:21:37.720 --> 0:21:40.560 step that these researchers are looking at is, let's identify 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:44.600 the genes that relate to these neuroanatomical anomalies that are 0:21:44.680 --> 0:21:49.400 found in the brains of people who have amusia. Now, interestingly, 0:21:49.560 --> 0:21:52.520 that three percent control group almost lines up exactly with 0:21:52.640 --> 0:21:55.359 what they've found to be the percentage of people in 0:21:55.359 --> 0:21:58.679