A Natural History of Innovation

September 4th, 2006 Fred McVittie Posted in Aesthetics, Art, Creativity, Evolution, History |

The ability to innovate, to produce novel behaviour, is primarily a human faculty. For the most part this ability has a clear use function; when combined with good critical and evaluative faculties the ability to produce new behaviour is how we solve problems, identify more efficient ways of satisfying needs, and gain an edge on competitors. For these reasons it is likely that this ability confers upon those who possess it a distinct adaptive advantage. In terms of evolutionary history, those members of a population who are able to think ‘creatively’ are more likely to survive and reproduce than those whose behaviours are bound to habit and instinct. Adaptive traits which confer a reproductive advantage on those who have such a trait tend to be manifest in the individual as an emotional and physical response experienced as pleasure. So, for example, the adaptive trait which allowed our ancestors to identify nutritious food is experienced as the pleasurable sensation we call ‘taste’. Similarly, sexual congress, which is self-evidently adaptive in that those who engage in it are those most likely to reproduce, and those who do not are unlikely to, is also accompanied by pleasure. These pleasures are both the bait and the signal for adaptive behaviour. In terms of creativity and innovation, if such a trait is adaptive we would expect it to also be accompanied by feelings of pleasure, and this is indeed the case. Surveys of artists, scientists, inventors and all other innovators demonstrate that the act of creation has its own intrinsic satisfactions and pleasures over and above whatever functional products may result from such acts.

Given that human beings are a pack animal, the innovations produced by one individual may benefit not only that individual but also other members of the community or group (other than direct competitors). Individuals in the group who were able to recognise and exploit the creativity of others could also profit from this creativity, gaining the same adaptive advantage and increasing the likelihood of their own survival and reproductive success. This suggests that in addition to the pleasures of creation itself, it is possible that evolutionary history may have conferred upon us an ability to recognise innovation and to experience pleasure from that recognition, again over and above whatever product may result from such creativity. Not only does being creative feel good, but watching the creativity of others feels good too.

The development of the arts since the end of the 19th century has been partly characterised by an almost obsessive demand for the new. And whilst this has undoubtedly been driven partly by a rampant consumerism and an increasingly profitably art industry, it is nevertheless likely that the appeal of innovative art lies not only in the ultimate market value of that art, or the status it confers, or in the traditional sensory channels of the aesthetic response. A significant appeal lies in what might be called the ‘aesthetics of innovation’.