Animal Aesthetics? Promises and Challenges of a Comparative Research Programme in Aesthetics

The main purpose of this paper is to offer some preliminary arguments in favour of an evolutionary and comparative (cross-specific) approach to the aesthetic and the arts. Through the analysis of some important passages from Darwin’s works and in light of a selection of recent papers on evolutionary and nonhuman aesthetics, I shall argue that we should be cautious about applying the label ‘aesthetic’ to nonhuman species with the same meaning it has in humans, i.e. we should be wary of speaking tout-court of an ‘animal (nonhuman) aesthetics. This not with the aim of undermining, but rather of encouraging further comparative and cross-specific research in aesthetics. Indeed, a comparative, cross-specific investigation of the aesthetic is not only legitimate but vital in evolutionary aesthetics; it also poses, however, some serious and intriguing challenges.