When I listen to any song, I try to find and indentify at least one characteristic that I like about it.
( It's usually eAsy to find more than 1 .)
Let's say it was Trap music.
I might say I like the timbres, powerful rhythm .
And build up to a powerful hook.
If the music is old country , I might say that I like the earnest feeling, the storytelling . The way that the limited harmony puts more focus on the main melody.
If the music is progressive metal.
I might say that I enjoy the sense of power .
The intricacy of the drums . The explosive energy.
If the music is a pop song I might say that I like the imagery and visualization of the lyrics .
If the music is chamber music or jazz I might say that I like the more developed harmony .
The use of embellishment to expand the melodic idea . That the music is creating the motion of rhythm embedded in the melodies.

 

Music theory: a theory is not a fact, it's a principle or set of principles and beliefs which are in popular agreement but not proven as fact. At best a theory is good guide in testing the ideas that underpin the theory. All of science, mathematics, linguistics are based on theories often erroneously accepted as proven fact, which in reality are not.

 

You spend time describing that those are not facts.
Could you spend some time on what are facts?
Then spend time describing the the relavance
Of the things you listed out that are not facts ?
It just seems like you did not present much of a case . I'm left wondering what the point is and how relevant your description in the comment are.
It might help to list out things that are facts where them being a fact shows some type of significance in the discussion.
Otherwise looking at theories as not facts, then come to find out the only things that end up qualifying as facts have no significance being a fact or not, seems like a strange place to focus .
My point of view is that any significance is not centered around what is a fact or not .
If you believe
There is some significance whether or not something is a fact , I just wish you would have led with that . Shown that things which are not facts are missing something which are .
( By listing out things that are facts to show what your point even is.)
It just seems like a " deepity".
It's not a fact that E= mc2
( Yet not being a fact was not significant in the total transformation of the world through the fruit of all modern technology.)
It's not a fact that running into the street blindfolded will get you killed by automobile.
Yet , is has no significance to be missing facthood.
Most things are not facts , missing that attribute impacts most things by zero percent.
I'm just left wondering what is with the fact fetish?

 

Last edited: Dec 31, 2019

I can see your stance. Based on this you can say that for anything.
"The sun will rise and set tomorrow, that is fact".
No it's not. If the Earth's sun explodes tomorrow (it shouldn't) or if it moves away from the trajectory the earth will freeze or towards us, it will burn up. That is also not fact because while science may support it, it has not and may not happen and if it did, nobody may be alive to say it is fact.

Music Theory is based on Mathematics and Arithmetic. Four beats to a bar, or three beats or two and the divisions of that bar thereof, as but a few examples.
The math and arithmetic based on what we humans call "fact", is correct and it is fact. 16ths in 4/4 time mean there are 16 semi-quaver notes in the bar - 4x4=16 or 4 notes per beat.
You are welcome to try and change this because it's not fact in your opinion, but most of the schools, universities and mathematicians may not agree with you.

I agree that some fact can be disproven if this is what you mean? For example, the Radio with Marconi who was thought as 'fact' to have invented the radio and Tesla turned out to be the inventor who patented before Marconi.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Dec 31, 2019

The English language is not a fact.
The word " fact" , what it means is not a fact .
( The usage of fact as a word can be narrowed or widend by initial criteria .)
Does this mean that the word fact is useless?
Nah. It just means that we use a language which isnt a fact. Inside of that we use the word " fact"
And the semantics the thing we mean by the word " fact" is itself not a fact .
None of these things have no bearing in demeaning using the word " fact".
In the same way , music theory not being a fact is not demeaning in any sense .
( However you can say that if you begin in the framework on 12 tone e.t. certain patterns and relationships exist mathematically .
With Tonal music we have consonance and dissonance based on these patterns and relationships. They are objective not subjective.)
So in a common everyday usage of fact as
" A true statement ".( Widening our usage now )
The contents of music theory in the context which is being discussed ( say 12tone et)
In the category on Tonal language ( simply means consonance and dissonance relative to a Key center ) those patterns and relationships are built into the mathematics if slicing a pie in 12 equal parts , next from the view point of any given slice all other 11 slices have a relationship mathematically
Of consonance to dissonance ( a gradient )

Those fully consonant are grouped as "Tonic".
Those fully dissonant are "Dominant"
Those in middle are subdominant

This is the exact reason why you have non Diatonic substiutions .
( All 12 notes in key of C major as well as most chords being in C major before you even begin to think about modulating to another key.)
In the KEY of C major .

You have the Diatonic chords.
Next you have secondary dominants and secondary cadences .
You have 2 sets of Non diatonic subdominant substitutions
IVminor and #IVdiminished7
And you have non Diatonic tonic substitutions.
( This is objective not subjective.
Based in slicing a PIE into 12 equal peices , then from the point of view of 1 slice how the other 11 relate to the slice , on a gradient of consonance to dissonance.

So why focus so much on tonal language then if there are others?
Well modal language takes all the patterns and relationships of tonal music and makes a rotation shift on its side.
If we look at the KEY of C major .
1 Cmaj7
2.Dmin7
3.Emin7
4.Fmaj7
5.G7
6.Amin7
7.Bmin7b5

We rotate sideways so the 4 Fmaj7
Is the focus now ( and relative Dmin7)

So Modal language is based on "Unity"
Not consonance and dissonance.
But to get it , we shift our perspective using all the same knowledge contained in tonal language .
F Lydian.

Fmaj7
G7
Amin7
Bmin7b5
Cmaj7
Dmin7
Emin7

Now all these chords are in unity with Fmajor
Or Dmin

What about Polytonal language?
Same thing your using all the knowledge of tonal language with multiple keys at once .

What about Atonal language?
This is entirely different system,
Yet you purposely avoid sounding diatonic .
( So you need the knowledge of tonal language in order to get the result you want which is avoiding those patterns.)


Of course you can stay ignorant of these languages and just make generic music too.
Just kidding....? Am I?

 

Last edited: Dec 31, 2019

People need to learn the meanings of things first. Latin is a dead language yet was before most of them. Quod or Fact means that which is proven to be true. Look it up.
I am not even going to bother to debate it. Nobody here knows more than the dictionaries and languages that were around before any of us were born.

 

"
Is Music theory ( how music works) worth learning in your opinion?"

is there any other answer to this but yes?

i won't read thread, as i won't entertain another answer.

you don't "have" to to write or communicate, but hey, if you wanna communicate, it's kinda best to know the damn language.

 

I merely looked at the words Music Theory and in 28 pages not one person noticed that this is a theory, or they probably suspended disbelief as we all do when watching a movie or reading a book. I agree with MMJ2017 that Just because something isn't a fact doesn't mean it is not valuable, I said so in my original post when I wrote 'a theory is good guide in testing the ideas that underpin the theory'. Music Theory must be an excellent testing ground in music. Just because something is 'based' on mathematics does not necessarily make the theory valuable because you could use mathematics to prove nothing at all. I think that by calling Music Theory a theory it keeps it as an excellent cause for continuing study and experimentation. If any theory does this, then it is of course of value. Ultimately I was answering the OP with some philosophy which was at the heart of his question, 'What's your philosophy regarding music theory?' I have done this.

 

Look up the word Theory versus Hypothesis.
I won't spoil it for anyone.

HINT: They didn't call Einstein's 'The Hypothesis of Relativity"

 

Last edited by a moderator: Dec 31, 2019

Science has hijacked the word theory to mean a tested and proven fact. This is just one many things about our present day position in science that makes me distrustful of it.

OK, I'll be the first to admit a mistake. The scientific theories are accepted in the main as proven and provable, and so my examples above were wrong, at least according to the scientific belief system, which it surely is; science is just another controlled religion. But I take issue with for example, 'Darwin's Theory of Evolution'. The anthr-apologists would say that there is a preponderance of evidence to support Darwin. Actually, no there isn't! I was forced to use Darwin for my master's thesis, knowing in my heart that Darwin is a load of horse manure. Darwin has more holes than Edam cheese, but, look, the scientific community who use Darwin turn a blind eye. The entire world of science is underpinned by scientific 'Laws' which Rupert Sheldrake here does a nice job of tearing down:

.

Now, back to my mistake. I took issue with the word theory. But is music a science? Those who challenge me with mathematics and so forth are using the usage of theory from science to challenge me. Outside of science a theory is not a proven set of ideas. Yes or no?

 

I hadn't realised this thread was a competition to explore the depths of willful ignorance.

Well count me in...

I never need to read nuffin,
cos my closed brain spits out bigga bolda txt than all of U!

Do I get a prize for that?

 

(I am not (yet) commenting on @Thankful's opinions... just commenting on Sheldrake's garbage)

Straw man: when someone argues that a person holds a view that is actually not what the other person believes. Instead, it is a distorted version of what the person believes. So, instead of attacking the person's actual statement or belief, it is the distorted version that is attacked.

Sheldrake's statements about 'What Science is and what science believes' are worse than strawman caricatures;
they are pure garbage.

'Philosophy of Science' is both a well respected branch of philosophy and a well respected branch of science.
In his (now removed) TED talk, Rupert Sheldrake reveals an almost complete ignorance of real 'Philosophy of Science'.
All of his alleged science dogmas are presented in appallingly pathetic straw man fashion.

A quote from the TEDxTalks channel...
"All talks on the TEDxTalks channel represent the opinion of the speaker, not of TED or TEDx, but we feel a responsibility not to provide a platform for talks which appear to have crossed the line into pseudoscience."

Anyone who believes that "there are always two sides to every story and that every crackpot point of view deserves to be heard"
is living in cloud cuckoo land.

Just because Rupert Sheldrake 'sounds erudite', does not mean the content of what he says is anything other than woo woo garbage.

===

Now listen to me... "I know for a fact that Elvis is not dead, he was abducted by aliens and is playing live every night at a cosmic casino in the Andromeda galaxy. I DEMAND that my ideas are taught in schools. It's only fair!"
And I will strawman you into submission and taunt your ethical sensibilities... "If you don't teach my views about Elvis you are being unethical, and not even handed, and you are denying kids a full rounded education - how dare you!"

===

Can you see what's going on here?

It's obvious that my Elvis example was garbage because I wanted it to be obvious.

Rupert Sheldrake's arguments are also garbage (arguably much worse than my Elvis example),
the only difference is he's hiding his ignorance of philosophy-of-science behind a self-deluded, phoney-authority persona.

Don't be taken in!

Bollox is always bollox - and you do not need to waste precious time evaluating it.

===

Completely separate from above criticisms... a few comments about @Thankful sentences...

mmmmmm??? - self-inflicted blindness or what?

Wrong! - just a misguided strawman caricature of what science is and does.

Wrong again! - and another misguided strawman caricature of what science is and does.

Please read to at least the level of 'philosophy of science 101' before making absurd statements.
Science does not make the claim that scientific models are 'proven or provable'.
Proofs are logical constructs not empirical constructs. - this is comparing chalk and cheese!
Scientific models are merely our best-to-date explanatory and predictive tools.
Some of those models work superbly well and all of those models are subject to ongoing revision.

and most importantly,
gaps in scientific models are not a license to rush in with gap-filling crackpot fantasies
(that's a general comment - not directed at @Thankful in any way)

 

Last edited: Jan 1, 2020

Music is like a serious illness which needs treatment but unfortunately there's no exact diagnosis for it and every doctor treats it with the ways he/she knows and surely Doctor A's treatment is different than Doctor B's.

Theory tries to superposes A on B so they exactly coincides but what a reverie ...

 

Someone doesn't know how a thesaurus works. I won't spoil it for anyone...but check the very first word

CLUE: https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/theory

 

Hmm. Seems like he would have called it exactly that until the point he felt he had sufficient proof. (Or if not proof, that the theory was unassailable enough there was no significant dissension. I gather after all this time there are now a few holes.)

 

I see 'Straw men' are all the rage today.

Of course, very broadly, words do mean whatever we want them to mean.

Dictionaries do not 'define the meaning' of words; they just document the way we use words, and that evolves.
A Thesaurus is designed to 'diverge'. Instead of trying to narrow down the meaning, it deliberately stretches the use of words in order to identify and link similar concepts.

Context matters for words. If we discuss 'evidence' or 'proof' in a court of law, we won't be discussing the same ideas as 'evidence' or 'proof' in a scientific or mathematical context.

So, specifically within science, there is no way that 'theory' and 'hypothesis' mean the same thing. Just a because a thesaurus (deliberately being vague) lists those two words together will not change the fact that science is more precise about what each of those words means to science.

It does raise an interesting question though... in our context
Is there a difference between 'Music Theorising' and 'Music Hypothesising',
and maybe we should also include 'Music Bullcrapping'?

 

Synonyms? Really?
You have just explained why some people think those two words mean the same thing.

 

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Yes - A theory is based on fact or what is known to be correct, whereas a hypothesis can contain pure conjecture.

But everyone here is an expert.... NOT

 

Yes there's a difference. It's only evident to people that have done it as a living for decades. To most laypeople, they tend to believe many things that are incorrect. Context with the two words depends in whether they research or use Google or a Thesaurus to define the difference between fact and conjecture. Conjecture is the foundation of conspiracy theorists and theory is the foundation of academics.

 

So, you say that a theory is either a fact or what is known (accepted) to be correct. That seems to me, to make theory very weak, not a very solid absolute at all.

Look below at 1, very weak. Look also at 2a - a belief! Read all definitions. Theory is all about something that is plausible, most likely, generally accepted (by the very questionable scientific community), abstract principle, speculation.

Definition of theory
1 : a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena the wave theory of light
2a : a belief, policy, or procedure proposed or followed as the basis of action her method is based on the theory that all children want to learn
b : an ideal or hypothetical set of facts, principles, or circumstances —often used in the phrase in theoryin theory, we have always advocated freedom for all
3a : a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation
b : an unproved assumption : conjecture
c : a body of theorems presenting a concise systematic view of a subject theory of equations
4 : the general or abstract principles of a body of fact, a science, or an art music theory
5 : abstract thought : speculation
6 : the analysis of a set of facts in their relation to one another

Source: Merriam-Webster

Etymology:
theoria (Jerome), from Gk. theoria “contemplation, speculation, a looking at, things looked at,” from theorein “to consider, speculate, look at,” from theoros “spectator,” from thea “a view” + horan “to see.” ... The word 'theory' derives from the Greek 'theorein', which means 'to look at'.

I said this in my first post, which I will repeat in a different way:

A theory is an idea or field of study which is interesting enough to encourage further study and experimentation. This is exactly what music theory is in essence.

 

Last edited: Jan 1, 2020