As Noël Carroll, a philosopher who has also been at the forefront of these ideas, has emphasized, “Art has been about stirring up and shaping the emotions in a way that binds and inculcates those under its sway as participants in a culture.”16 And indeed, the very notion of culture—a broadly shared set of traditions, customs, and perspectives—relies on a common heritage of artistic practice and experience. Members of such emotionally attuned groups had a better chance of surviving and passing on a genetic tendency for such behaviors to subsequent generations.
