To the Editor:
Re “Delving Into the Archaeology of Music” (Science Instances, Could 21):
Just about all our achievements as a species rely on people working collectively. One human alone, in a state of nature, is a medium-sized animal struggling for survival (and with no use for music). Working in tandem, we produce houses, cities, cities, factories and all the remaining.
Music is a crucial a part of that course of. Most conventional music is extremely useful. It’s used for non secular ceremonies, neighborhood occasions, household gatherings, dancing, courtship and labor (protecting employees in sync). Typically, as within the case of the Scottish bagpipe, it performs a job in battle.
Music is like an intangible thread tying us collectively. Something that facilitates human cooperation confers a significant survival benefit. It’s no marvel that music, like language, is common amongst us.
David Goldberg
New York
To the Editor:
I used to be to learn the newest analysis into music utilizing massive knowledge, as your article reviews. My late father, David Epstein, a conductor and a professor of music at M.I.T., did plenty of analysis into musical efficiency that pointed to how and why music faucets into some elementary human talents, throughout cultures.
His work centered on tempo/rhythm/pulse, and he uncovered some fascinating options of tempo that had been of curiosity to scientists from many disciplines. One in every of his essential findings (with the usage of a stopwatch — not massive knowledge!) was that extremely expert musicians have such a fine-tuned sense of rhythm that they’ll play with the tempo in a bit, take a phrase and stretch it out right here, after which velocity up someplace else, touchdown precisely the place they could have if that they had performed a straight (and boring) metronome tempo by way of the entire piece. Audiences reply to the drama in that playful interpretation.
I don’t assume my father ever questioned that music speaks to some deep want amongst people — for a language past phrases that permits us to tie our very heartbeats to 1 one other.
Eve Epstein
Port Townsend, Wash.
To the Editor:
Your article presents new analysis pointing to common variations between spoken language and track/instrumental music. A golden age of musicology could be upon us, with insightful, well-crafted research in ethnomusicology and new findings from comparative musicology and the sciences.
Over a century in the past my grandfather John Lomax started recording the songs of abnormal Individuals, depositing greater than 10,000 recordings within the Library of Congress. His influential work documented and celebrated America’s sui generis working-class music and id. His son Alan Lomax took the same path however went international, trying to find patterns among the many world’s musical kinds.
Music analysis factors in lots of instructions: When music adjustments, what does it retain? Do elements comparable to local weather, subsistence and eating regimen affect musical kinds? Will a warming planet, shifting migration patterns, and availability of water and meals have an effect on music? Whereas we don’t but know why music got here into being, we’ve all the time identified that it’s a direct line to the human coronary heart.
Anna Lomax Wooden
New York
The author, an anthropologist and ethnomusicologist, is co-founder of the Affiliation for Cultural Fairness at Hunter School.
Will Politicians Settle for the Election Outcomes?
To the Editor:
On the final day of the Constitutional Conference in 1787, a girl requested Ben Franklin, “What have we received, a republic or a monarchy?” He replied, “A republic, for those who can preserve it.” We’re about to seek out out if we are able to preserve it.
Former President Donald Trump is as soon as once more laying the groundwork for rejection of the upcoming election outcomes if he loses. Distrust of free and truthful elections is now firmly embedded in G.O.P. tradition, because of Mr. Trump.
Republican management is falling in line, as a rising variety of senators and representatives are declaring that they aren’t ready to simply accept the outcomes of our November election. We could have entered a time when audits, recounts and the courts will now not have the ability to resolve election challenges.
Mr. Trump and his allies not solely assail the truthful administration of elections, but additionally our system of justice and different democratic establishments. The previous president is popping the occasion of Lincoln in opposition to democracy, the rule of legislation, and the establishments that bind us collectively and guarantee order.
The query posed to Ben Franklin 237 years in the past on the start of our nation has prophetically returned.
David Pederson
Excelsior, Minn.
To the Editor:
A number of latest articles and opinion items spotlight the refusal of former President Donald Trump and different Republican politicians to say with out equivocation that they are going to settle for the outcomes of this yr’s elections. I’m a Democrat and I believe that Mr. Trump was a horrible president, however I believe these articles are unfair.
No trustworthy politician may unconditionally decide to accepting future election outcomes. What if there actually are vital election irregularities? It’s doable that such irregularities may happen this yr, though I see them as being extra more likely to come from the Republican facet. What is going to Democrats do in the event that they consider the Republican governor in a swing state improperly manipulated the election outcomes?
It’s applicable for politicians to say that they are going to settle for the election outcomes if the election is trustworthy. After all, any politician who says that ought to subsequently act in good religion in deciding whether or not the election was trustworthy, and there may be each motive to worry that Mr. Trump and another distinguished Republican politicians is not going to act in good religion. However it’s not affordable to anticipate politicians to commit unconditionally to accepting future election outcomes.
Jonathan R. Siegel
Chevy Chase, Md.
The author is a professor of legislation at George Washington College Regulation Faculty.
Honoring the Useless
To the Editor:
Re “How Ought to We Honor the Useless of Our Failed Wars?,” by Phil Klay (Opinion visitor essay, Could 26):
Mr. Klay’s shifting piece, with its deal with Iraq and Afghanistan, stirred up my all the time close-to-the-surface feelings about my technology’s catastrophic battle, Vietnam.
Whereas I used to be a younger grownup within the Nineteen Sixties, the horror and ethical chapter of Vietnam, introduced dwelling graphically by every day TV video and information, had been magnified by my very own fears that I might be drafted and dragged into the killing. Turning ideas of the battle over in my thoughts, speaking to family and friends and studying about nonviolent social actions led me to grow to be a conscientious objector.
I’m frequently astounded that our species, which is so sensible scientifically and technologically, has not discovered a solution to sublimate our aggressive and grasping impulses and handle our fears and variations in a extra simply, humane and respectful manner — as an alternative of killing each other.
Paul Goldberg
Arlington, Mass.
Concern of Crime
To the Editor:
Re “As Violent Crime Drops, Voters Stay Uneasy” (information article, Could 27):
Many crimes and cases of threatening habits go unreported, and even these reported within the statistics usually underestimate the variety of folks affected. The sense of worry is exacerbated by brazen types of violence and disruptive habits in public settings and workplaces.
The rise in gun possession and use of dwelling safety gadgets is a greater indicator. Extra necessary, most of the people’s expertise over the past 5 to 10 years speaks the reality. Public leaders lose the belief of their constituents by utilizing questionable knowledge to disclaim on a regular basis expertise.
Edward Abahoonie
Sparkill, N.Y.
