Years later, however, when the test was repeated in a much larger and more diverse population, researchers realized that children from privileged families had an easier time resisting the treat because they knew another marshmallow would always come their way. Better life outcomes had to do with affluence, not self-control.

Sylvan immersed himself in communities of ravers, Grateful Dead fans, hip-hoppers, and metalheads in scholarly research that led to his book Traces of the Spirit: The Religious Dimensions of Popular Music.

Nevertheless, the entire harmonic system of Western European music developed through the Church, step by step. After Gregorian chant, only gradually did the Church allow harmony (different notes sung together) to trickle back in. First came the octave along with fourths and fifths, followed later by thirds and sixths. Church composers avoided

of collisions with other runners. But after a race or workout, slow-paced music can help prompt our body’s hemodynamic response, which adjusts blood flow to depleted tissues. Ideally, said Karageorghis, the music should start at around ninety beats per minute “and gradually bring you down towards a state of homeostasis, a resting state, with a

Music at sixty to eighty beats per minute, the pace of a resting heartbeat—a rhythm we hear in the womb—appears to lower stress best.

Brain scanning has confirmed that contrary to Pinker’s “cheesecake” theory, we don’t need our language system to process music.

Concealed in our eyes, ears, mouth, and nose is a crucial antibody, Immunoglobulin A, our first line of defense against viruses and bacteria. A meticulous review of sixty-three studies describes this antibody as “particularly responsive to music,” especially when people enjoy the sounds. Music also reduces levels of interleukin-6, a protein linked

Changes in the outer and middle ear helped our ancestors tune in to each other’s voices like never before. Over time, their brains began to pick out distinct pitches from all the sounds around them. This floors me: the separate tones we hear in music and speech are mental perceptions—all in our heads. In nature, there’s no such thing as “middle C.”

each era had different restrictions on how one note could move to the next. In a sixteenth-century crackdown, for example, the Church’s Council of Trent warned that harmonies “must not give empty pleasure to the ear” and ordered priests to “banish from church” all sounds “that are luscious or impure.”