Comment by nelox
Humans everywhere seem wired to favour simple integer-ratio rhythms, but culture tweaks which rhythms become “natural.” This suggests a shared rhythm cognition backbone, yet enough flexibility to account for global musical diversity. The study is a solid counter to the claim that music structure is purely learned or arbitrary, while also showing culture doesn’t just ride on biology: it shapes what we actually use.
If you’re into music cognition, evolution of culture, or cognitive universals vs cultural diversity, this is the kind of data you want to see.
I don't think it's only humans. All kinds of animals would benefit from knowing that awhoo comes from a wolf and that, in this example, awhoo awhoo is the same sound coming from the same wolf or that an animal recognizes that the first awhoo comes from one wolf and the second awhoo from another wolf.
It also helps for an animal to know the volume of these awhoos as it is a good proxy for closeness, and therefore danger. It's even a good thing to know the rhythm of these awhoos as it helps again to assess if these wolves, or wolf, is on the move while awhooing or on the move between awhoos.
And this is just one example I'm currently making up bit at least makes sense that for many animals: tempo, volume, rhythm, patterns in sound, it's needed for survival. So evolution will select for it.
Music is a lot more than just those things I think, but it at least shows some evolutionary backbone as to why I believe that more animals have been evolved to like music. At least, some elephants sure seem to enjoy a good piano [1].
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFIT87yPNYk