Daniel Levitin Quotes
-
Music and dance have also always been a communal activity, something that everyone participated in. The thought of a musical concert in which a class of professionals performed for a quiet audience was virtually unknown throughout our species' history.
-
Two sides to a story exist when evidence exists on both sides of a position. Then, reasonable people may disagree about how to weigh that evidence and what conclusion to form from it. Everyone, of course, is entitled to their own opinion.
-
Having learned something, we tend to cling to that belief, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. New information comes in all time, and the thing we ought to be thinking about doing is changing our beliefs as that new information comes in.
-
There's an ancient connection between movement and music. Most languages don't make a distinction between the words 'music' and 'dance.' And we can see that in the brain. When people are lying perfectly still but listening to music, the neurons in the motor cortex are firing.
-
In a country that was still racially segregated and prejudiced, music was among the first domains in which African-Americans thrived alongside whites.
-
Music changed more between 1963 and 1969 than it has in the 37 years since, with the Beatles among the architects of that change.
-
When a musical piece is too simple we tend not to like it, finding it trivial. When it is too complex, we tend not to like it, finding it unpredictable-we don't perceive it to be grounded in anything familiar. Music, or any art form... has to strike the right balance between simplicity and complexity...
-
When you're at work, be fully at work. And let your leisure time be what it's meant to be - restorative and fun.
-
Multitasking creates a dopamine-addiction feedback loop, effectively rewarding the brain for losing focus and for constantly searching for external stimulation.
-
Collective music making... may have historically served to promote feelings of group togetherness and synchrony, and may have been an exercise for other social acts...
-
We may have had music before we had a word for it.
-
The obvious rule of efficiency is you don't want to spend more time organizing than it's worth.
-
One of the most important tools in critical thinking about numbers is to grant yourself permission to generate wrong answers to mathematical problems you encounter. Deliberately wrong answers!
-
Evolution doesn't design things... The brain is... like a big, old house with piecemeal renovations done on every floor, and less like new construction.
-
I became a cognitive psychologist because I met a bunch of teachers I really liked.
-
Of the thousands of ways that humans differ from one another, turns out there's this one cluster of traits called conscientiousness that predict a whole host of positive life outcomes, such as longevity over our health, life satisfaction.
-
Music can be thought of as a type of perceptual illusion in which our brain imposes structure and order on a sequence of sounds. Just how this structure leads us to experience emotional reactions is part of the mystery of music.
-
Fondness for stories is just one of many artifacts, side effects of the way our brains work.
-
Many of us feel as though we are overloaded and overwhelmed by all the things that are happening, and we can't stop work for even five minutes or we'll fall behind: the idea that if we don't take breaks, we're being more productive.
-
The point of art is to emphasize some elements at the expense of others.
-
Our to-do lists are so full that we can't hope to complete every item on them. So what do we do? We multitask, juggling several things at once, trying to keep up by keeping busy.
-
I'm not a great guitarist, and I'm not a great singer.
-
Activities that promote mind-wandering, such as reading literature, going for a walk, exercising, or listening to music, are hugely restorative.
-
We're assaulted with facts, pseudo facts, jibber-jabber, and rumour, all posing as information. Trying to figure out what you need to know and what you can ignore is exhausting.