40. Music

Music exists because people create it, perform it and listen to it. People are living organisms, and biology is the study of living organisms. The word music has different definitions. The most important or recognized one, taking into accounts the definitions given by the Oxford English Dictionary and the Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia, is the one that states that music is a combination of sounds produced by voice or instrument, which create a pleasant effect. There is some discrepancy in this matter though; some people bear. Music to be only instrumental and others believe it exists only when the voice is present.

During the course of the history of Western music, many have tried to formulate an answer to the question of the ontology of music. In order to distinguish between music and non-music, repeated attempts have been made to compile a list of essential properties of music along with the necessary and sufficient conditions. It is not my intention to represent any or all of the expressed views on this matter in a systematic or all-encompassing order. Rather, I prefer to paint a brief and approximate picture of some of the problems that these attempts to define, determine, or discern music have encountered.

Music is, however, different from sound, which is just something that we can hear. So, whatever we can hear conforms a sound, and music derives from sound, as well as noise does. Therefore, there are certain sounds that are music and some that are not. Which one is which? Certainly, not everything that we hear is considered to be music, or is it? Is a bug's buzzing music? Is glass shattering on the floor music? If these sounds are not music, then they are just noise. Even more if we take into account what was mentioned before about the book by John, that music can only be created by discrete sounds, and no bug, for example, buzzes discontinuously.

If you succeeded in developing a complete theory of music, you would be able to use that theory to compose strong original music, which you could then sell, and use the proceeds to purchase a luxury yacht. Be suspicious of anyone claiming to completely understand what music is who does not own a luxury yacht.

There is still another point to take into account: music is also considered to be both an art and a science. This sounds a little bizarre, since both concepts do not usually go together. But if we think about it, it might actually make sense. Many people believe that the meaning of music has been misunderstood. Nowadays, if you ask an old lady what she thinks about let us say Marilyn Manson's “music”, she would very likely say it is NOT music, but mere noise. On the other hand, many young people today might say that opera is nothing more but some weird, boring yelling. Both groups happen to have different ideas towards music, but we cannot say for sure how this meaning is misunderstood, if it actually is.