4000 Years of Storytelling, What is Literature by Fiction Beast, 02-09-23

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1rfL-ms_3o

Learnings

"If humans were computers, the hardware is animal and the software? I say stories. Our animal body has seen very little change in the last few thousands years, but our software has changed a bit. With each generation the narrative changes. New stories replace the older ones. So the biggest difference between humans and animals is our ability to tell stories. But also our ability to believe in fictional stories. So our hardware is ape but our software is storytelling."

- Fiction Beast

Why storytelling?

1. (thinking in narrative form) Humans have an innate sense to search for meaning,
2. [Since the universe has no clear answer, storytelling is meant to compensate for the lack of it. An opportunity for us to create meaning for our lives.]
3. We remember [stories far better than facts and figures.]
4. The difference between us and animals is [rationality (ability to reason)]. It is a learned skill.
5. Rationality vs emotionality; we find meaning and purpose through the emotions we feel.
6. Storytelling stems from [emotions]; the narrative form is [designed to evoke emotions.]
7. As social creatures, humans have gotten the ability to form close ties with up to 150 people.
8. [Without bloodlines, we had to create stories/myths/legends to keep ties in large formations; to make masses of people collaborate towards a unified set of goals.]
9. Generation after generation, [stories are passed down]; so are major religions preserved through centuries.
10. Empires are kept alive through stories.
11. Carl Jung argued that [humans have evolved with a collective unconscious]; since the earliest stories, there have been the [same or similar archetypes recurring] which have formed memories in our early human ancestors; hence [we respond to the archetypes] we witness from stories around the world. For eg; the wise old man, the hero, the villain, etc.
12. Stories are innately human.
13. [If DNA tells us our biological tales; for eg; the shape of our nose, our eye color, hair, etc, then LITERATURE tells us our psychological/sociological tales.]
14. It's through literature that a community's culture and language survives.
15. Just as how evolution throws [random mutations into the gene pool] and counterbalances with most genes [replicating the same mutation], bringing order to chaos,
16. Storytelling is a human invention of bringing order into the chaos of the nature.
17. Difference between [philosophy and literature]; Literature tries to [explain the human condition] using [storytelling] whereas philosophy uses [reason.]
18. Literature and philosophy [complement one another]; former focuses on [emotional faculty] whereas the latter on [rational faculty].
19. Philosophy; abstract and generalization. Literature, [concrete in time and space].
20. Philosophy was primarily a [masculine domain] since as men prioritized rationality and dealt in the outside world, tackling survival problems.
21. [Women prioritized emotionality] by indulging in storytelling with their children to strengthen their bonds with them
22. As a result, literature is much closer to our [natural foundation] which is [emotional and often volatile.]
23. Stories and pieces of literature are capable of stirring us not only rationally but also emotionally, [inspiring us far better than reading a philosophical idea.]
24. [Philosophy] and rationality focus on the ['why' question] or the [outcome] whereas [literature] and storytelling makes us focus on the ['how' question] or the [process.]
25. Philosophy asks us [why we exist in the first place] and literature tells the story of [how the others survived and procreated.]
26. Philosophy asks us [what ought to be] and literature [tells us what was.]
27. Philosophy asks abstract [questions that do not resonate] with many people while [literature resonates with most people] through stories.
28. This is why [millions of people go to the movies] while [very few attend a philosophical lecture]; similar case with novels and philosophy books
29. How did storytelling come about? In early days when they came back from a hunt, men would tell [stories of why they came empty-handed] or [how they managed to get such a small/large prey]
30. (This indicates that the [need for storytelling] originates from [human tendency] to crave for the [highs and lows of an tale worth sharing] as their innate preferred experience [rather than a stable, linear pathway.])
31. Stories teach us the know-hows for our 3 basic instincts; how to survive, how to mate, and how to bond with a community (humans are social animals)
32. Stories teach us of other people's mistakes so that we can learn from them.
33. Good stories are like sex, we cannot have enough of them.
34. Sex determines our survival as a species, and stories determine our survival as individuals part of a community.