Artificial Intelligence: The Very Idea by John Haugeland, and: Mind Over Machine by Hubert L. Dreyfus, Stuart B. Dreyfus (review)

The usual picture of Ives as the Transcendentalist composer par excellence simplycannotaccountforwhatis most basic to his music, nor for the origins of his complex aesthetic. That Ives sought to depict Transcendental figuresandsomethingofTranscendental thinkinginmusicisobvious. Buthedid not develop his musical method or conceive his musical aims through or becauseofTranscendentalistphilosophy (p. 32). Just as Emerson’s was not the sole religious or philosophical influence within the Ives family, so Transcendentalism did not form the core of Ives’s personality or world view as a youth or as a mature philosopher,and it cannot explain every facet of Ives’s aesthetic (p. 41). It would help a reader considerably to have been furnished a chronology of Ives’s life,a discography of his musicand a list of Ives’s published and unpublished works. Perhaps these will be given in the promised sequel. THE MUSIC WITHIN YOU: HOW ATIVITY, COMMUNICATION AND CONFIDENCE THROUGH MUSIC by Shelley Katsh and Carol MerleFishman . Simon and Schuster, New York, 1985. 224 pp. Paper, $8.95. ISBN: YOU CAN ENHANCE YOUR CRE0 -67 1-55554-5. Reviewed by Allan Shields, 4890 Old Highway, Mariposa, CA 95338, U.S.A. The authors, both ‘certified music therapists’, have produced an ample musical recipe on how to make music a pervasive constant in one’s life. Written for the uninitiated, it traces the origins of one’s musicalityfrom womb to tomb, and discusses at length ways to use music, how to listen to music, how to make musicand how to bring the harmony and integrity of musicintoeveryaspect oflife: musicto relaxby, musicto shopby, music tojog by, music to make love by. It is an ambitious program with therapeutic encores. In it, there is something for everyone. Exercisesareprovided-more than twenty of them-to help you to implement the lessons, learning by doing. Before you begin to listen, take a momenttorelax.Breathedeeply,finda comfortableposition for listening,and tell yourself that you will let your mind openly respond to the music. Close your eyes and let yourself experience whatever your mind is creating in response to the music, whether it be recounting an experience from work, reliving a childhood memory, or visiting a happy yet forgottenplace ....@p. 183-84) There are discussions of ‘how to learn music’ that are actually very insightful and full of sound advice, much of it drawn from solid research, much drawn from anecdotal evidenceand the authors’ personal experiences. Occasionally,thetopics touch aesthetic concepts and philosophical names are dropped, but not often. Mostly, the authors’ research entered the literature of the psychology of music,psychoanalysis, educational psychology, music journals and, of course, music therapy. Because the authors are so evidently devotedtothevalueof musicalexperiences in human life, they present a mixed approach to their topic. On the onehand, they are intent on citing research others have done, giving the impression, the aura of scientificauthority and detached objectivity. On the other hand, they wax enthusiastic over the silliest highly speculative ideas: You know music from your very first stirrings of life. As a pulsation of splitting cells within your mother’s body,you arealreadyintroducedto the most fundamentaland universal aspect of music:rhythm.Within fourweeks of conception, your own heart has begun beating,announcingyourveryexistence to the world @. 16). Music is never defined in the book, an understandable lacuna, and the authors’ speculum on music is wide open, egalitarian, inclusive and generous. The authors quote with apparent approval a nonsense statement by John Cageastheir theme: “Everything you do is music and everywhere is the best seat.” While this work is refreshingly aesthetically naive, to say the least, it may nevertheless serve well for introducing music to the uninitiated. It has little to teach musicians or a sophisticated audience. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: THE VERY IDEA by John Haugeland. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1985. 287 pp.. illus. Cloth, $14.95. ISBN: 0-262-08153-9. MIND OVER MACHINE by Hubert L. Dreyfus and Stuart B. Dreyfus. Free Press,New York, 1986.231 pp. Cloth, $16.95. ISBN: 0-02-908060-6. Reviewedby StephenWilson,Art Department , San Francisco State University, San Francisco, CA 94132, U.S.A. Many artists engage new scientific and technological ideas more in the spirit of dilettantes than as serious practitioners. While this approach allows them to...