What if I can't sing?

[Monk of Funk]

Originally Posted by Bern

Here are my 2 cents...
Personally, I believe talent is an innate characteristic we all have. In some cases people go through life not even being aware that they have it, because of their lifestyle nothing has triggered it to become part of them. Others, staying with music right now, discovered at an early age that they do have it by quickly adapting to an instrument, for example.
Talent, if discovered, developed and tweaked, gives one the ability to see right through things without effort and without distraction (for some people this can be burden or a curse, though).

I am certain I perceive music differently than others, and it is immediately obvious when I encounter even a child that is similar to me. especially easier with a child in fact, because I know they didn't train in such a way that it creates an illusion.

For rhythm it is easy. You just look at how they move when music plays. It is easy to see somebody that is making themselves move, and trying to be on rhythm, or not, and somebody that just naturally moves on the beat without thinking about it.

Very easy to distinguish the difference. Not everybody is born with that. You don't need training to move your head when you listen to music. It's not something you can miss from childhood, or not unlocking it, unless you've never heard music in your whole life.

Some people feel rhythm differently than others. I promise you that.

It is strange to me, the idea that talent might not exist. Not everyone can do anything. The world is full of people that want stuff enough, and try hard enough, and don't make it. Ideal conditions, but don't stand out. In many fields. People often have to concede and change direction. It is not always because they didn't try enough, or start young enough, or stuff like that.

Some people have large advantages over others. It is not sufficient for success, but some stuff is just easier for some people than others.

That's why IQ tests can be a thing.

[Bern]

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

I am certain I perceive music differently than others...

Luckily we all do...
I still believe that talent can be missed in childhood. Too many people are not aware of their inner self and take the opposite direction.
BTW, IQ tests have nothing to do with talent, IMO.

[JonPR]

This is a really long response, because I'm enjoying the debate - I agree with maybe 99% of what you're saying, but there's the critical 1% that keeps niggling...

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Talent is a different sort of perception.

I agree. But then I'd look for a different word than "talent" to describe it, because "talent" tends to get attached to specific pursuits. The problem with the word, IMO, is that the pursuit is clearly a learned one (worked on, honed to perfection), but the "gift" is supposed to be innate; it's as if the person was born with a refined skill that only had to be uncovered, which I think is nonsense.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

I think intelligence is part of it, but not a "sort" of intelligence. I hate it when people say that. Intelligence is intelligence. The word doesn't mean aptitude. I know that psychology likes to say this sort of intelligence and that sort of intelligence, but that's all misuse.

Well, there are differing views. There was one view a while back that there were different kinds - seven altogether IIRC. It made sense to me, because it was about more than aptitude; it was ways of applying one's thought to a situation or problem.
However, I still don't know whether that sort of differentiation is inborn - it's easy to imagine how it might be developed through particular experiences, as the brain adapts to what it finds, rather than what it chooses.
But I do think it's possible for an overall level of intelligence to vary genetically, so it could make sense for certains kinds of disposition or personality to vary. But there are so many complex environmental and developmental factors involved, right from birth, that only identical twin studies could offer insight - and maybe not even then, seeing as the cohort would be on the small side.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Talent is innate natural born properties a person in their physiology that makes them more gifted at performing particular tasks.

Yes, that's the view I'm disputing. I don't believe anyone is born with that much differentiation.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

This can be intelligence. This can be perception. This can be body shape, though for me, personally, I like to separate that one, except in some ways, like the shape of a body in terms of voice I would consider talented. Shaquil O'neal being monstrously huge, I don't find is talent, because it just makes him huge, not necessarily "better at basketball" Like more skilled at the sport, but a huge asset to the sport because he is just huge.

Well yes, but body size - height at least - is not something one can change! The brain is "soft", it changes and learns; that's what it's for - it's a learning machine.
You may be right that people's brains at birth may be "wired" in slightly different ways, enabling different ways of learning. Some ways of learning - or perceiving the world - may well lend themselves more to particular activities than others.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Talent also needs to be an uncommon thing.

Of course. But it still doesn't need to be inborn.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

For music, to me, there are 3 major deciding factors of talent. There is ability to hear relative pitch.

Everybody has that to some extent. So yes, in that sense it's innate - in everyone!
Musicians simply refine and develop it, learning to focus it and name what they're hearing. It's like a muscle you can train.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

The innate ability, where it is obvious, without training. explaining it is ambigous, like explaining colour to a blind person. You can't do that. It would sound like "differentiating objects by different properties they have, from a distance." Or something like that. So, don't confuse being able to hear the interaction of notes with the ability of being able to identify the interval between two notes being played.

The difference is simply one of degree, of training.
Everyone can hear whether one note is higher or lower than another, and also differentiate between big and small differences. A musician learns how to focus their hearing so that they can discriminare more finely, and learn to recognise and name those differences.
It's comparable to all kinds of learned tasks involving perception.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Like, here. Imagine this. I flash an image before your eyes that has 3 dots on it. You see immediately there are 3 dots. Now I flash 13 dots before your eyes. You cannot tell me how many there are, because you couldn't count them. You'd have to ball park it.

Right.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Now, it is conceivable, that another could see and distinguish exactly 13 when the card is flashed. This would be an impressive person, but it is plausible. Now, you would say that person just had training at a young age and can count fast, or something like that. But it is not by virtue of counting that you recognize 3 dots immediately. It is something innate.

Well, this is a tricky example. I'm not sure it's relevant. It's about the amount of information one can perceive at once, to hold in the mind and assess - which I guess you could call "intelligence", and which might be at least partly innate.
Relative pitch is not like that. (Perfect pitch might be, but let's not go there .)

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

but for complex math, it is required that one learns concepts of math. However, the person that can recognize 13 so easily, is different in some way that would probably make math much easier to them, even though work is required.

I see your point. It comes back to "intelligence" - the capacity of the brain to hold information and assess it; to not only perceive but to process the perception.
I'll agree that differences in that skill could be at least partly innate. But that's a general skill, applicable to many situations.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

So there is hearing intervals of pitch, without "learning to count" just hearing it, as a seeing person sees colour.

It remains to be proved that there are innate differences in precision of hearing intervals. Eg, where one person might be able to tell the difference between (say) a minor 6th and a major 6th (without knowing what they are), while another less "gifted" person would just hear two big intervals, not being sure which was bigger or smaller (and not much caring).

In fact, I just read yesterday about experiments conducted with newborn babies who'd had a simple tune played to them while they were still in the womb. The experiment showed they recognised the tune (eg twinkle twinkle) when it was played to them after birth; their brains responded in ways other babies didn't when played the same tune. Moreover, they only responded when the tune was played correctly: meaning they recognised the intervals, as well as their pattern in time.

This is more evidence for the idea that we are ALL born with this gift: the ability to perceive - and remember - musical intervals. (Or it could be evidence for musical gifts arising only among those who hear music while in the womb...?)
The difference between the "talented" and the rest, then, is that somehow those few manage to retain and develop that capacity, while in most people it fades or dies through lack of use. This is the scenario that makes most logical sense to me, because childhood development is as much about jettisoning unused capacity as it is about enhancing useful capacities. The brain's potential is sharpened and narrowed, according to environmental pressure: "I need this, so I'll get better at it; but I don't need that so I'll drop it". For most infants and young children, music would fall into the latter; it may be nice stuff, but it's not essential to survival.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Then there is rhythm. Not learning to count. Not practicing with a metronome. Just the feel of rhythm. the innate feel of it. Not something you need to practice, just something you know and feel with your body. It is just.. right. easy. without training.

Of course. Again I think we all have that. Rhythm in music comes from breathing, walking, heartbeat, etc.
Learning to count is just an imposed system, a way of translating an intuitive thing into words and numbers.
Again, I think the difference between those who are good at it and those who aren't - once they reach an age where we see such differences (eg in music lessons) - is down to a continuity of experience in childhood; whether or not a child has maintained that innate musicality, or whether they've lost it.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Then there is intelligence/creativity.

These are the 3 basic innate talents of music, as I see it at this point in time. I can think of no more, nor less.

OK: relative pitch perception, rhythmic sense, creativity, yes?
I agree they are all innate. But I don't agree that the kinds of differences we see between people are innate. It's possible that some kinds of difference are inborn. But I believe all the differences can be explained by environment: experience, upbringing, etc.
It doesn't have to be down to deliberate encouragement by parents. There can be totally accidental combinations of experience that end up making one child stand out.
Sometimes, musical skill runs in families - that much is well-known (and could support either nature or nurture, so is evidence for neither). But sometimes a musical genius springs from an apparently unmusical family. If it's innate (genetic), where did he/she get it from?
Of course, that might also suggest it can't be nurture (if the skill seemed to spring from nowhere, from no outside influence). But those cases bear closer examination. I'd contend there's always some kind of outside influence, even if it's not immediately obvious; eg some personal private inspiration at a significant moment in life.

[cont. below]

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Now, none of these have anything to do with playing guitar. Nor piano, nor drums, nor any other instrument.

The body must work with an instrument to get comfortable with it, to turn it into an extension of their body. To meld the instrument and the mind together. Now, this will take a lot of practice, and learning theory is useful for this also.

But, all of that will be much easier with a person with talent. The creativity will be much better also because they feel it much better.

But this is still not an argument. All you're saying is that some people find it easier because they find it easier! And the fact they find it easier is called "talent". That's fair enough - giving a label to the phenomenon.
But a label is not an explanation. You can't conclude from that that the difference must be innate. The phenomenon remains to be explained.
I find it much easier to speak English than a French person does. That's not "talent", even though speaking English feels totally natural to me - as if I was born able to do it. (It feels much more innate than my musical or artistic "talent".)

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Some, in music, look to theory as being information to help them what to play.

Well, most of us do that to some extent. In fact, all musicians even the most illiterate and self-taught, have some kind of abstract conceptualisation of what they do, which we could call "theory" of a kind. It might not match the jargon in theory books, but it would deal with the same practices and patterns.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Like band in a box, or some computer software learning to play music. Computers can improvise. We can program all of what we know about theory in to them. But they are missing something. They will not make great improvisations, or great melodies. They cannot.

True, but only insofar as we don't understand the mechanisms behind how composers arrive at great melodies. It's not magic, but the rules are subtle and largely subconscious.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Some people use theory this way. They might get exceptionally good at the instrument, but that does not mean that they will make great music.

No, but if they get exceptionally good at their instrument, people will still call them "talented"!

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Talent is innate, it is a gift,

This is what you keep saying, and I will keep denying it!
I'm not sure why it's so important to you to claim it's innate. But then I guess it's important to me (for maybe similar reasons) to claim it isn't.

You've clearly thought about this a lot, and I don't think we're actually in disagreement about much, in terms of what "talent" actually consists of. You've explained it very well. What you've not done is give any reasoning for why you regard it as innate; you just seem to accept that it must be. That's the only thing that grates with me.

It might look like a duck and quack like a duck. And that might mean, to all intents and purposes, it is a duck. (We may as well behave as if it's a duck.) To all intents and purposes, in practical terms, what you and I both call "talent" may as well be inborn. We can't go back and change our childhood upbringing, any more than we can change our genetics.
But common sense observation is not scientific enquiry - that's my beef. I want to know how much of this phenomenon (clear difference in skill/creativity) - if any - is actually genetic. And how much is down to childhood experience; and maybe even experience in the womb (such as that twinkle twinkle experiment).

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

What you're talking about starting at a young age and all that, to me, that is only physical.

Not at all! At a young age is when the brain is at its most receptive, when it is learning everything. If anything, the physical stuff comes later.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Someone with lots of talent does not have a body that learns exceptionally more quickly. They still have to put hours in to train themselves. They still have to know the instrument so well, so that every thought they have transmits straight to it.

Sure.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Talent doesn't mean you can just pick up a guitar and play like tommy emmanuel.

Of course.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

But, it does mean, that a talented person will pickup an instrument for the first time, and outperform less talented people with it. The first time. It also means that they will progress with it at a much faster pace. The "drive" as you like to call it is more there also because of how they perceive, because of the feel of it.

Actually I agree with you here, at least it matches my own experience.
With hindsight, I progressed quite fast on guitar. I remember, before I had a guitar of my own, a friend showed me the riff to Smokestack Lightnin', and I found I could play it. Probably not perfectly right off, but it wasn't rocket science. You put your fingers here, and here, and played it. No difficulty, no problem. (It's only my recent teaching experience that has revealed to me how oddly difficult some people find this kind of thing.)
That didn't feel like a special "talent" at the time, but then my close friends were all musicians anyway. I didn't hang out with the sports dudes, or the math, science or language dudes. The music dudes were obviously the cool ones! (and they had a better sense of humour too.)

IOW, my explanation of what made me get into it so easily and quickly - having had zero experience before - was (a) peer influence, (b) a love of listening to a particular (new) kind of music, and (c) the kind of introversion that lends itself to hours of quiet study (I had no social life or girlfriend at the time).
If you want to call that combination "talent", fine with me. I guess it produced the effect of talent. People were impressed at what I could do after a year or so.
But there was nothing inborn about (about my speed of progress I mean). Otherwise it would have emerged before. I would have developed a much earlier interest in music whenever I heard it. It took that special combination of circumstances in my mid-teens - whereby music acquired a personal meaning - to persuade me that I really wanted to do it; it became my purpose in life from that point.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

But this is not magic. These people are perceiving the world differently. the experience of music is different. We cannot see from the perspective of the mind of another, we assume we are the same. But we are not. I promise you.

And that is what talent is.

I agree. But it still makes more sense as a learned phenomenon than an innate one. Our whole personalities can be learned, to a large degree. Our brains are shaped by experience right from the start. They may be "wired" for certain things such as language, the perception of pattern, etc. And there is enough capacity there for all kinds of imprinting to occur. In a sense, the infant brain evolves. It reaches out to the world, but is shaped by stimuli, by what comes back. All kinds of potential may not be required, so are relegated to he background in favour of day-to-day requirements. Eventually that unused potential either atrophies, or is re-assigned to what's needed.
In computer terms (crude analogy), we begin with an operating system, but the environment loads the programs. If music is part of what we encounter from the start, then we'll get wired for that. If not, we miss out, and get wired for other stuff. Musical capacity gets squeezed to the back, and maybe squeezed out altogether

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Bern

Here are my 2 cents...
Personally, I believe talent is an innate characteristic we all have.

My view too.

Originally Posted by Bern

In some cases people go through life not even being aware that they have it, because of their lifestyle nothing has triggered it to become part of them. Others, staying with music right now, discovered at an early age that they do have it by quickly adapting to an instrument, for example.
Talent, if discovered, developed and tweaked, gives one the ability to see right through things without effort and without distraction (for some people this can be burden or a curse, though).

Agreed.
Use it (at an early age) or lose it. Or at least, if it's not used (kept alive) at an early age, it's harder - but not impossible - to re-awaken later.

[K-vegas]

Originally Posted by Bern

... most amateure vocalists sing with a closed throat, have problems projecting vocally, and therefore have a lack confidence. Basically, meaning that, if you can hold pitch, you need to look into the technique of singing seriously. As with playing any instrument, including singing, confidence is a key here.

Sometimes if I haven't sang much in a while I can slip back into singing thru my nose. Partially or fully. I can sing that way reasonably ok but tone and pitch control becomes a constant struggle.

One way I'll check to see if I am falling back into nasal singing is to slighty pinch my nose with one hand and sing. If I am projecting correctly I can still sing pretty normal with nose blocked. If my voice immediately changes to sound like I've inhaled helium I'm singing thru my nose.

[Monk of Funk]

Originally Posted by Bern

Luckily we all do...

I'll agree with that, but I notice that I am similar to some in some ways, and not others.

I still believe that talent can be missed in childhood. Too many people are not aware of their inner self and take the opposite direction.

The talent never goes away. But childhood is a time where the body will develop easily, so childhood can be taken advantage of to shape the body in order to take advantage of the talent. Also learning concepts at a younger age is helpful, I mean, the longer you know anything, the better it is, as it internalizes a lot better.

BTW, IQ tests have nothing to do with talent, IMO.

The tests themselves don't. But they are designed to test intelligence. Intelligence has to do with everything.

[Monk of Funk]

Originally Posted by JonPR

This is a really long response, because I'm enjoying the debate - I agree with maybe 99% of what you're saying, but there's the critical 1% that keeps niggling...
I agree. But then I'd look for a different word than "talent" to describe it, because "talent" tends to get attached to specific pursuits. The problem with the word, IMO, is that the pursuit is clearly a learned one (worked on, honed to perfection), but the "gift" is supposed to be innate; it's as if the person was born with a refined skill that only had to be uncovered, which I think is nonsense.

Ok, but you are giving talent a definition it doesn't have, and then saying it doesn't exist because of the definition you gave it. When people say that one is talented, they are not saying that they are a guitarist. They are saying that they have a sort of gift that helps them be good at guitar. Now, sure, I will agree, people say "he has a real talent for x" and that could be anything, and most of the time, that person actually has a real talent for a whole bunch of crap, x being one of those things, but the fact remains that they have a talent for x. I don't think anybody believes though that we have evolved a "guitar gene" or a "motocross gene" or anything like that, I mean that would be ridiculous. And sure, some people think talent is too big of a chunk of someone's skill. Like the music might be talent, but the skill is still tough. But people think that way for everything. They don't notice how much programming goes into a game, or how much time making cool special effects in movies takes. That's normal.

Well, there are differing views. There was one view a while back that there were different kinds - seven altogether IIRC. It made sense to me, because it was about more than aptitude; it was ways of applying one's thought to a situation or problem.
However, I still don't know whether that sort of differentiation is inborn - it's easy to imagine how it might be developed through particular experiences, as the brain adapts to what it finds, rather than what it chooses.
But I do think it's possible for an overall level of intelligence to vary genetically, so it could make sense for certains kinds of disposition or personality to vary. But there are so many complex environmental and developmental factors involved, right from birth, that only identical twin studies could offer insight - and maybe not even then, seeing as the cohort would be on the small side.
Yes, that's the view I'm disputing. I don't believe anyone is born with that much differentiation.

But, people are born blind, deaf, with extra fingers. With different intelligence, as you noted, which you don't really know what it is, meaning what difference in perception different intelligences are. People are born with, I forget what it's called, but with the "ability" to see sounds as colors and stuff.. synesthesia I think it is actually. People are born colorblind, people are born with 20/20 vision, or better, and others have blurry vision. All of these things, you will admit to. Right? but for no real logical reason you choose to believe that in music this is not possible. People cannot have "blurry hearing" or anything like that. Like I said. I watch people walk into walls, and since I can plainly see the wall there, and seeing as how all of us are trying to avoid walls, then my only conclusion can be that they cannot see them, and so my sight must be somehow better.

Well yes, but body size - height at least - is not something one can change! The brain is "soft", it changes and learns; that's what it's for - it's a learning machine.
You may be right that people's brains at birth may be "wired" in slightly different ways, enabling different ways of learning. Some ways of learning - or perceiving the world - may well lend themselves more to particular activities than others.
Of course. But it still doesn't need to be inborn.

yes it does. Your brain learning doesn't make your eyesight better. Your brain may learn, and you may be able to accomplish more difficult tasks as it does. But your brain does not get smarter, the hearing doesn't learn how to improve, or anything like that. Nobody is denying that learning doesn't happen when people play an instrument. The question is, whether people are different, genetically in such a way that some have an advantage over learning skills than others do.

Everybody has that to some extent. So yes, in that sense it's innate - in everyone!
Musicians simply refine and develop it, learning to focus it and name what they're hearing. It's like a muscle you can train.
The difference is simply one of degree, of training.
Everyone can hear whether one note is higher or lower than another, and also differentiate between big and small differences. A musician learns how to focus their hearing so that they can discriminare more finely, and learn to recognise and name those differences.
It's comparable to all kinds of learned tasks involving perception.
Right.

Some musicians do it that way. I don't do it that way. I just hear the sound that results from the two notes. It took me some time and training to be able to get much better at earring stuff out, like knowing exactly how many notes apart are one note that follows another, but the sound that any given interval makes when two notes are played together has always been the same. Nothing to do with figuring the distance between them.

Bur, I am not denying that there is theory and that people can learn skills. You, for some reason, seem to think that the fact that a skill can be learned, must mean that there are not others that don't need to learn the skill.

I mean, yes, I know that people can train themselves to do things, but there are people that don't have to. They have that advantage. You have not shown any reason why that should not be the case. You have only shown that people can make do without the talent to some degree.


[quote]Well, this is a tricky example. I'm not sure it's relevant. It's about the amount of information one can perceive at once, to hold in the mind and assess - which I guess you could call "intelligence", and which might be at least partly innate.
Relative pitch is not like that. (Perfect pitch might be, but let's not go there .)[quote] Lol. is it not? it is like that to me.

I see your point. It comes back to "intelligence" - the capacity of the brain to hold information and assess it; to not only perceive but to process the perception.
I'll agree that differences in that skill could be at least partly innate. But that's a general skill, applicable to many situations.
It remains to be proved that there are innate differences in precision of hearing intervals. Eg, where one person might be able to tell the difference between (say) a minor 6th and a major 6th (without knowing what they are), while another less "gifted" person would just hear two big intervals, not being sure which was bigger or smaller (and not much caring).

Intelligence has not to do with hearing the intervals. It has to do with how much the brain can process at once and understand. This means listening to the progression, predicting where it will go, hearing all of the instruments, bearing in mind what the musician has played, predict where the music will go, and what to play in order to complete a nice phrase by the time you get there. Stuff like that. But ya, hearing a minor 6th and a major 6th, is part of it. I am certain that some people can't do that. Some people can't sing a unison. You found it difficult to understand "sing this note" because the timbre confused you. That could never confuse me. The tone is so strong to me. That would be something I have often done already without anyone asking me. Tone compels me to do that.

Remember. Music came before theory. First we made music, then we analyzed it. It has to be that way. So, theory cannot be necessary to music.

In fact, I just read yesterday about experiments conducted with newborn babies who'd had a simple tune played to them while they were still in the womb. The experiment showed they recognised the tune (eg twinkle twinkle) when it was played to them after birth; their brains responded in ways other babies didn't when played the same tune. Moreover, they only responded when the tune was played correctly: meaning they recognised the intervals, as well as their pattern in time.

That doesn't mean that at all. I hate it when people do experiments like this and then over state the conclusion. When your brain hears something, the brain processes it. It makes a memory in your brain. right? it doesn't matter how you perceive that, whether you perceive it as a mush of notes, or whatever. Like if you show a person with blurred vision a face, and one without blurred vision a face, and then showed them the face later on, that will still trigger a memory for both of them, and the brain will light up exactly as you described. But one sees blurry and the other does not.

Babies don't "recognize" anything anyway. They are not self aware until later on in life. That's why nobody ever has any memories of being a ababy.

[Monk of Funk]

This is more evidence for the idea that we are ALL born with this gift: the ability to perceive - and remember - musical intervals. (Or it could be evidence for musical gifts arising only among those who hear music while in the womb...?)
The difference between the "talented" and the rest, then, is that somehow those few manage to retain and develop that capacity, while in most people it fades or dies through lack of use. This is the scenario that makes most logical sense to me, because childhood development is as much about jettisoning unused capacity as it is about enhancing useful capacities. The brain's potential is sharpened and narrowed, according to environmental pressure: "I need this, so I'll get better at it; but I don't need that so I'll drop it". For most infants and young children, music would fall into the latter; it may be nice stuff, but it's not essential to survival.
Of course. Again I think we all have that. Rhythm in music comes from breathing, walking, heartbeat, etc.
Learning to count is just an imposed system, a way of translating an intuitive thing into words and numbers.
Again, I think the difference between those who are good at it and those who aren't - once they reach an age where we see such differences (eg in music lessons) - is down to a continuity of experience in childhood; whether or not a child has maintained that innate musicality, or whether they've lost it.

Dude you're not getting it. Humans have hearing. I know. workarounds exist. I know. You think that everybody is doing workarounds though. And people that start younger have an easier time with workarounds. I'm telling you. I watch people walk into walls. I see that happening. It's not like I learned not to walk into them. It's just obvious all my life, that the walls are there. I didn't have to train to avoid them. Other people might develop some workarounds, maybe a stick to probe the ground, or even making loud noises to hear reflection. And some of those people will even tell me, how I can't be good at what I do unless I employ their techniques. And it's like, no, you don't get it, I can see the walls. But this makes no sense to them. What is a sense that you don't have? explain to me colour as though I'm blind. I'm telling you. I can see. Dude, listen. I can see. And I watch you bumping to stuff all the time. And I'm like, "how could they be bumping into stuff like that?" ooooh, man, they must not be able to see. And you and others teach each other your techniques for avoiding walls, thinking everybody is that way, and there are many that cannot see. But some people walking around among you, can see. It's true.

OK: relative pitch perception, rhythmic sense, creativity, yes?
I agree they are all innate. But I don't agree that the kinds of differences we see between people are innate. It's possible that some kinds of difference are inborn. But I believe all the differences can be explained by environment: experience, upbringing, etc.
It doesn't have to be down to deliberate encouragement by parents. There can be totally accidental combinations of experience that end up making one child stand out.

Wow, wait a minute, now I'm confused. Obviously mozart could be talented but without a piano, would suck at piano. His ability at piano is not a piano gene. But he had abilities that helped him be really good at piano. " relative pitch perception, rhythmic sense, creativity" These things are huge. That makes so much difference. It makes a difference on how into it you will be. It's like, imagine if food always tastes sort of bland to one person, still flavour, and they still love food, but to another it's like way more vibrant, that would be a lot of reason for drive to stick to an instrument, and stuff like that. The things you stated are not skills. They are like perception, emotions, you know? in the realm of like happiness and hunger, and the feeling of goose bumps, flavour, stuff like that. It's like more of those. It is feel. It is like having extra senses that are useful to music.

That makes a big difference in how a musician will develop. In what the results will be. But talent is not the entirety of results, and people with less talent can get great results also. I mean, there are all sorts of varieties, and as you said, different upbringings and all that which all play a part also.

Sometimes, musical skill runs in families - that much is well-known (and could support either nature or nurture, so is evidence for neither). But sometimes a musical genius springs from an apparently unmusical family. If it's innate (genetic), where did he/she get it from?
Of course, that might also suggest it can't be nurture (if the skill seemed to spring from nowhere, from no outside influence). But those cases bear closer examination. I'd contend there's always some kind of outside influence, even if it's not immediately obvious; eg some personal private inspiration at a significant moment in life.

It is a necessary feature of evolution, that there are genetic mutations. I can name you albert einstein, and Isaac Newton, and Plato, and Tesla, but I cannot name you either of their parents, nor their children.

My family is my family. The same for my whole family. I am musical. It was that way since the beginning. It was easy for me. When I was young, I also needed glasses. I remember the day I wore some for the first time and looked up at the stars. That day, the universe changed for me. Up until that day, stars were blurry dots, and there were less of them. It is tough to know if you perceive differently than others. I didn't know it then, but I don't perceive music like my sisters do. It is different. We had the same upbringing. But they were more studious in character, and studied more than I did. I dropped music because I didn't like the studying aspect of it. They took lessons longer than I did.

But then when I got older I picked up again, without lessons. without study. That was much better because I could actually make music instead of do drills.

Seeing the difference between talent and lack of it is tough though. I have trouble myself. Sometimes I see what some people do, and I wonder whether they perceive differently than I do, or whether it was something they learned or upbringing. It's hard to see. But definitely talent is there. I am certain of it. Some people have different tools for learning music than others do. It is just that way.

[Monk of Funk]

Originally Posted by JonPR

But this is still not an argument. All you're saying is that some people find it easier because they find it easier! And the fact they find it easier is called "talent". That's fair enough - giving a label to the phenomenon.
But a label is not an explanation. You can't conclude from that that the difference must be innate. The phenomenon remains to be explained.
I find it much easier to speak English than a French person does. That's not "talent", even though speaking English feels totally natural to me - as if I was born able to do it. (It feels much more innate than my musical or artistic "talent".)

Talent is the name that of that thing that is innate aptitude for something. That's what the word means. It is not ability. You can't say that talent isn't innate. If you say talent isn't innate, then you are saying that talent doesn't exist.

Being able to do something easily is not to say you have talent at it. Talent is the innate ability to do something that some have and others don't. Everybody can learn a language so it is natural, and write so that it is natural, and walk so that it is natural. Mastering a tool, is not talent.

Just because english is easier to you than french doesn't mean you are talented at english. But the fact that english is easier to you than french is not evidence that talent doesn't exist. You are distinguish ability to do a task, with innate propensity at doing certain tasks.

Any human might be able to speak english. But what some say, and others say has to do with "talent" right? I speak english and you speak english, but neither of us came up with relativity.

Well, most of us do that to some extent. In fact, all musicians even the most illiterate and self-taught, have some kind of abstract conceptualisation of what they do, which we could call "theory" of a kind. It might not match the jargon in theory books, but it would deal with the same practices and patterns.

that might be true. But some of us will be able to invent theory where there was no theory before, and others need theory to tell them what to do.

True, but only insofar as we don't understand the mechanisms behind how composers arrive at great melodies. It's not magic, but the rules are subtle and largely subconscious.

no, it's not rules. It's feel. You begin with the assumption that talent does not exist, and then try to justify things based on that principle. Perception is different. One can create great melodies without any theory whatsoever, just by singing. Certainly what people hear influences that, but it is not a theory thing, or rules thing. It is a feel thing. There are no rules that write great melodies. If there were, then that program would exist, and we'd all have bought it.

No, but if they get exceptionally good at their instrument, people will still call them "talented"!

Some people might not understand what talented means. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

This is what you keep saying, and I will keep denying it!
I'm not sure why it's so important to you to claim it's innate. But then I guess it's important to me (for maybe similar reasons) to claim it isn't.

It's not important to me to say that it is innate. I just know that it is from experience. Remember. I watch people walk into walls, when they are obviously there to me. That's not a learned thing. It's just obvious. I'm just trying to show you that. I have no preference for the world being one way or another. I just care to know what it actually is. If you are that way, then I'm telling you, talent exists. If you are not that way, then no matter what I say won't change you, because you like to think talent does not exist. For some reason.

You've clearly thought about this a lot, and I don't think we're actually in disagreement about much, in terms of what "talent" actually consists of. You've explained it very well. What you've not done is give any reasoning for why you regard it as innate; you just seem to accept that it must be. That's the only thing that grates with me.

I have given you the explanation. if you have night vision in a dark maze, and people are walking into stuff. You conclude that they don't have night vision also. That's just simply obvious. It's not some logical process I derived. It's just obvious, because people around me are walking to walls that I can plainly see that are there. Therefore, the conclusion must be that they do not see the walls, and I can. Ergo, talent exists. People have often asked me in things "how do you do that?" like there was some lesson I could teach them. But the answer is, "I don't know" I just can. When you have an idea, and someone asks you, "how did you have that idea?" you don't know. The thought happened to you. The answer must be that perception is different.

It might look like a duck and quack like a duck. And that might mean, to all intents and purposes, it is a duck. (We may as well behave as if it's a duck.) To all intents and purposes, in practical terms, what you and I both call "talent" may as well be inborn. We can't go back and change our childhood upbringing, any more than we can change our genetics.

changing your childhood can change your ability to do something, but it cannot change your talent.

But common sense observation is not scientific enquiry - that's my beef. I want to know how much of this phenomenon (clear difference in skill/creativity) - if any - is actually genetic. And how much is down to childhood experience; and maybe even experience in the womb (such as that twinkle twinkle experiment).

How much is difficult to say. It is hazy. But there is talent.

Not at all! At a young age is when the brain is at its most receptive, when it is learning everything. If anything, the physical stuff comes later.

My ability to learn has only increased with time.

Sure.
Of course.
Actually I agree with you here, at least it matches my own experience.
With hindsight, I progressed quite fast on guitar. I remember, before I had a guitar of my own, a friend showed me the riff to Smokestack Lightnin', and I found I could play it. Probably not perfectly right off, but it wasn't rocket science. You put your fingers here, and here, and played it. No difficulty, no problem. (It's only my recent teaching experience that has revealed to me how oddly difficult some people find this kind of thing.)
That didn't feel like a special "talent" at the time, but then my close friends were all musicians anyway. I didn't hang out with the sports dudes, or the math, science or language dudes. The music dudes were obviously the cool ones! (and they had a better sense of humour too.)

There is no way I could have escaped music. Music is a part of me. Maybe if I'd never heard it before, that might be different. But I feel as though if music had never existed, then I would have invented it.

Sorry, I don't have time to respond to the rest.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Ok, but you are giving talent a definition it doesn't have, and then saying it doesn't exist because of the definition you gave it.

Aaagh! I'm not saying it doesn't exist!

As for definition, the Oxford dictionary simply says "a natural aptitude or skill"

I'm fine with that. But of course that leaves open the big question as to what "natural" means.

Simple observation: some people find learning music easier than others. (Whatever you call it, no one can deny it exists. Call it "talent" if you like, most people do, that's fine with me.)
Simple conclusion: it looks natural, so they must have been born with it.

Nope, false logic. Not a valid conclusion at all.

Question: were they born like that (ie different from the majority from the beginning), or did they learn it? Or some combination of the two?
How do we find out?
Ask them?
If they say they've always had that ability, supposing they learned it - or essential elements of it -before they remember doing it (like we learn to speak)?

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

But, people are born blind, deaf, with extra fingers.

Those are physical things. The brain - or at least the mind, the activity of the brain - is mutable. It evolves and grows, it changes.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

With different intelligence, as you noted, which you don't really know what it is, meaning what difference in perception different intelligences are.

Your grammar is starting to collapse...

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

People are born with, I forget what it's called, but with the "ability" to see sounds as colors and stuff.. synesthesia I think it is actually. People are born colorblind, people are born with 20/20 vision, or better, and others have blurry vision. All of these things, you will admit to. Right?

Yes. Those are physical disabilities; malfunctions if you like. Not mutable - although there may be an argument about blurry vision.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

but for no real logical reason you choose to believe that in music this is not possible. People cannot have "blurry hearing" or anything like that.

Of course they can. Blurry hearing is what most people have until they train their relative pitch - learn to focus it - as musicians.
I've certainly "de-blurred" my hearing over the years, I can discriminate between - and identify - sounds I couldn't before.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Like I said. I watch people walk into walls, and since I can plainly see the wall there, and seeing as how all of us are trying to avoid walls, then my only conclusion can be that they cannot see them, and so my sight must be somehow better.

How often do you really see sighted people walk into walls? It doesn't happen, not unless perhaps they're distracted by something else, not actually looking where they're going. I suppose you may be using it as an analogy, but I think you need a better one.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Your brain learning doesn't make your eyesight better.

Who says it does?
Bad eyesight is a result of physical factors.
A poor musical ear is not. (Tone-deafness, amusia, is physical and unchangeable, but that's not what we're talking about.)

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Your brain may learn, and you may be able to accomplish more difficult tasks as it does. But your brain does not get smarter

Depends how you define "smarter", I guess, but I think a lot of people would disagree. IMO, it gets smarter all the time, until dementia or other physical degeneation sets in.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

the hearing doesn't learn how to improve, or anything like that.

Of course it does! Otherwise what's ear training all about?

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

The question is, whether people are different, genetically in such a way that some have an advantage over learning skills than others do.

Exactly!
That's what remains to be proved. I've read quite a bit of research on this, and seen no conclusive evidence.
There's certainly plenty of evidence of learning, and of environmental factors, but AFAIK the jury is still out on genetic factors.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Some musicians do it that way. I don't do it that way. I just hear the sound that results from the two notes.

What makes you think other musicians don't do it that way? It's certainly how I think I hear intervals.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

It took me some time and training to be able to get much better at earring stuff out, like knowing exactly how many notes apart are one note that follows another, but the sound that any given interval makes when two notes are played together has always been the same. Nothing to do with figuring the distance between them.

Right, I'm not saying anything different. We all hear the combined sound, the character of the interval.
It's those with perfect pitch who will hear the individual notes, and might work out the interval from that. The rest of us don't do that.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Bur, I am not denying that there is theory and that people can learn skills. You, for some reason, seem to think that the fact that a skill can be learned, must mean that there are not others that don't need to learn the skill.

Right. All skills need to be learned. A newborn baby has none.
That doesn't mean the brain is a blank slate. Certain universal predispositions (instincts) seem to be in place.
The question is whether specific differentiations, specialisations (such as musical ability), are in place. I don't know the answer. I just don't see a need to hypothesize that there are.
The more one reads about childhood development (and the stories of various "talented" people) the more one sees the influence of environment, and the less one needs to propose any genetic predisposition. (It doesn't disprove genetic factors; there's just no need to invoke them.)

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

I mean, yes, I know that people can train themselves to do things, but there are people that don't have to.

Really? Evidence?

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

You have not shown any reason why that should not be the case.

I've never known, seen or heard of anyone who can do anything that they didn't have to learn how to do. (Other than basic functions like walking, eating, sleeping, etc ).
IMO that's the beside the point anyway. The point is that some people find learning easier. Not that they don't have to learn at all. Some may learn so easily that it seems they're not learning. (Eg, savants, who can have remarkable skills. But they still began somewhere.)
Even Mozart had to learn his musical skills. He just learned them all quicker and younger than most people.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

You have only shown that people can make do without the talent to some degree.

That hardly needs showing, it's pretty obvious.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Intelligence has not to do with hearing the intervals. It has to do with how much the brain can process at once and understand. This means listening to the progression, predicting where it will go, hearing all of the instruments, bearing in mind what the musician has played, predict where the music will go, and what to play in order to complete a nice phrase by the time you get there. Stuff like that.

OK...

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

But ya, hearing a minor 6th and a major 6th, is part of it. I am certain that some people can't do that. Some people can't sing a unison.

True. That was me in the beginning.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

You found it difficult to understand "sing this note" because the timbre confused you.

Not only that. If he'd sung the note to me I'd probably still have failed to match it.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

That could never confuse me. The tone is so strong to me. That would be something I have often done already without anyone asking me. Tone compels me to do that.

That's because you've learned to ignore timbre, and focus on what matters.
That's not natural. In nature, timbral difference matters at least as much as pitch difference. That's why we find it easy to tell the difference between (say) a violin and flute playing middle C, but (unless we have perfect pitch) we can't tell it's middle C. A cheap tuner can easily identify middle C, but not the difference between violin and flute.
IOW, our ears have evolved to be able to discriminate finely between timbres, but pitched music is a cultural construct, not a natural phenomenon. Pitches may exist in nature, but intervals and chords don't.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Remember. Music came before theory. First we made music, then we analyzed it. It has to be that way. So, theory cannot be necessary to music.

No disagreement there .

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

That doesn't mean that at all. I hate it when people do experiments like this and then over state the conclusion. When your brain hears something, the brain processes it. It makes a memory in your brain. right? it doesn't matter how you perceive that, whether you perceive it as a mush of notes, or whatever. Like if you show a person with blurred vision a face, and one without blurred vision a face, and then showed them the face later on, that will still trigger a memory for both of them, and the brain will light up exactly as you described. But one sees blurry and the other does not.

Babies don't "recognize" anything anyway. They are not self aware until later on in life. That's why nobody ever has any memories of being a ababy.

Babies' brain scans can be interpreted to show responses that can be interpreted as recognition.
I agree that drawing conclusions from that sort of thing is risky. But you should read the full report before dismissing it. (I'll see if I can find a link later.)

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Talent is the name that of that thing that is innate aptitude for something. That's what the word means. It is not ability. You can't say that talent isn't innate. If you say talent isn't innate, then you are saying that talent doesn't exist.

Fair point. Talent is defined as "natural", as I mentioned above.
But that's only about the appearance.

"Talent" is a common word used by ordinary people to refer to a skill that seems to be "natural", and which they therefore assume to be inborn. (The dictionary is just recording that usage, not making any judgements about it.)

But that's a lazy assumption. Unscientific, and lazy thinking to boot. I want to know, is it really "natural", in the sense of innate? I just don't believe it.
So yes, if you insist "talent" is innate, then I will insist it doesn't exist. Or rather - to try to avoid confusion - I'll say you're naming a common phenomenon wrongly.
IOW, the phenomenon exists: people who can do things so well they seem to have been born like it. Let's not muddy the issue by insisting on the word "talent" and then insisting it's innate by definition. That gets us nowhere; it's circular.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Being able to do something easily is not to say you have talent at it. Talent is the innate ability to do something that some have and others don't. Everybody can learn a language so it is natural, and write so that it is natural, and walk so that it is natural. Mastering a tool, is not talent.

Just because english is easier to you than french doesn't mean you are talented at english. But the fact that english is easier to you than french is not evidence that talent doesn't exist. You are distinguish ability to do a task, with innate propensity at doing certain tasks.

Yes, because I don't believe in any "innate propensity at doing certain tasks". I don't see any need to believe such a thing exists.
You accept that we can learn to perform certain tasks in a way that looks "natural". But that's all that "talent" is: a skill that looks natural. Where's the evidence that leads you from "looks" to "is"?

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Any human might be able to speak english. But what some say, and others say has to do with "talent" right? I speak english and you speak english, but neither of us came up with relativity.

Ah! But what was it that enabled Einstein to arrive at that theory? Was he born any different from the rest of us? If so, in what way? He certainly didn't have the theory in his brain as an infant. Did he have some kind of "scientific gene"? A gene that made it easy for him to spend enough hours on those kind of questions?
IOW, what distinguished Einstein (seems to me) was a brain capable of a certain kind of abstract thought, as well as a love of mathematical/scientific puzzles. Maybe that can be inborn? Or maybe he learned to be that way, by finding personal reward in that kind of activity?
IMO, that's a salient point: the ability to really love a solitary pursuit - whether it's scientific investigation, learning an instrument, training to be an athlete. That's what makes "geniuses" stand out, and is a factor worth examining. I find it easier to believe in a general disposition towards that kind of monomania - which could be directed to anything - than in an innate talent in a particular direction.
Of course, Einstein was also an amateur musician - perhaps if his childhood and adolescence had been very different, maybe we'd remember him as a musical genius and not a scientific one?

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

no, it's not rules. It's feel.

No, there are rules to melody, to what makes great melody. They're just subtle ones that we experience as "feel".

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

You begin with the assumption that talent does not exist, and then try to justify things based on that principle.

Yes, and I manage quite well.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Perception is different. One can create great melodies without any theory whatsoever, just by singing.

That doesn't mean there are no rules. We can walk down the street without thinking about how our legs are moving; but rules of physics and biology are still being followed. And it's possible to identify all those rules.
Which is not to say (obviously) that knowing those rules helps us walk!
I'm not saying that learning all the rules of melody is helpful, it probably wouldn't be.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

It's not important to me to say that it is innate. I just know that it is from experience.

No you don't, you assume that, from common sense observation. You can't possibly know.

Originally Posted by Monk of Funk

Sorry, I don't have time to respond to the rest.

Me too. In fact I didn't really have time to respond to all this.

Shall we leave it? We're not going to find agreement here. (No hard feelings )

[BlueBird2]

How do you find a good teacher?

[Bern]

All 'talent' definitions aside, lets just enjoy what young talented people can give us.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBMfgLvRZJs

[DaveKell]

Originally Posted by Bern

Here are my 2 cents...
Personally, I believe talent is an innate characteristic we all have. In some cases people go through life not even being aware that they have it, because of their lifestyle nothing has triggered it to become part of them. Others, staying with music right now, discovered at an early age that they do have it by quickly adapting to an instrument, for example.
Talent, if discovered, developed and tweaked, gives one the ability to see right through things without effort and without distraction (for some people this can be burden or a curse, though).

I believe talent usually manifests as an unusual aptitude for doing something especially well. "Unusual" being the key word here. Throughout my childhood I was always drawing things and. coincidentally, in 3rd grade in 1963 I drew a jet that someone stole the idea for and it later was manufactured as the Concorde! Same long rectangular jet engines under the wings. My grade school teachers all noticed my aptitude for artwork and I was the kid who was always drawing the posters for school events. I remember a friend who my age had phenomenal talent for playing the piano. That is, he learned it at an accelerated rate. The teacher showed him something once and he got it. He required very little practice to consistently play very well. To me, these are examples of talent. I sometimes wonder as well if it is latent knowledge from a past life, but that would open a whole big can of worms to pursue.