1st of Brahm's op a 74 mo tatts Vall Missed Us least a given day music where for is given to him that is in misery Canadian for college was conducted by Philip head of Asia at the start of this year I went to see Dora who cuts my hair I said Now I want your best shot Dora because I got a big birthday coming up well you know at this age are 60 is the new 40 but as I explained 70 is the new 68 like Radio 3 the writer Julian Barnes is celebrating 70 years I remember you he wrote as a noisy and irritating presence in the 6th form chordal I couldn't deny this fellow people's reminiscence and so belatedly I've changed my mind about what I must to be like 50 and more years ago changing my mind on the essay tonight at 1045 here on b.b.c. Radio 3. And tonight we hear how Julian Barnes literary tastes have changed over the years that's in 45 minutes already or 3 at a minute after 10 o'clock the stars in our chairs show had a bari with free thinking if ours is the age of the Anthropocene with melting ice caps and disappearing rain forests in tonight's program we ask should we also spare a thought for these guys thanks thanks to. Get. Go Diamond Dogs by David Bowie which happens to be Chris pack and favorite song about animals he's one of Britain's favorite naturalists and our guest this evening he's been collaborating with musician it in sworn me to stage a symphony specifically designed for the is of non-human creatures great and small a menagerie tonight also includes Helen Pilcher a rare crossed breed stand up comic mixes science writer she bring to life the theory behind the extant ssion if you thought the to caper but they show the Tasmanian tiger and other law species had long been consigned to the far flung corners of Wikipedia think again here's a joke the Helen what does a cat say when somebody steps on its tail no. Complaints to b.b.c. Freethinking please but how does it really feel to be a cat what does the world look like from inside a horse's head Alan hook will be explaining how computer games designed for animals might help us better understand our 4 legged friends the question of how humans relate to animals is also captivated philosophers apologists and artists for centuries and it's the subject of a new exhibition at London's welcome collection we sent Darwin expert will Adelaide to find out whether it really is the really wild show now before we start just briefly I want to hear from all. Is there one animal with him you think we have a special relationship and what is that Chris I'm assuming you are animal of choice is a doggie Yes I mean we have co-evolved with these animals so we have innate understanding of dogs whichever culture you come from from whichever part of the world you come from you were born with a knowledge of these animals and what I like is that dogs have obviously co-evolved with Ask through that domestication process which has been going on for at least 35000 years perhaps longer we have learned to understand one another so that relatedness I find fascinating but also emotionally rewarding as well of course because I have 2 dogs and we are a threesome we're very much annoyed it in a triumvirate there and we share our lives to a great extent because we exercise that understanding we have for one another and your pupils Itchy and Scratchy the stars of the documentary of course if you watch it are going to hear from Helen Well I think I agree with Chris I think dogs have so much to teach us about love and loyalty and about how if you stare at the fridge for long enough maybe somebody will come along and opening give you a piece of cheese I like that very much but also dinosaurs I know they're no longer with us but for me they inspire They say curiosity this intense childlike fascination about the world that I think no other species really countries up. Well I'm going to go for something smaller and seemingly much more alien to us the Drosophila fly is a type of fruit fly which has been used extensively in research in genetics and biology and it was as a result of that we actually probably know more about their biology in some ways than we do any other animals on Earth including ourselves and their research with Drosophila flies has helped to develop a lot of our medical treatments so we actually owe them a lot we've got dogs dinosaurs in Drosophila flies I fully expect steering this show to be like herding cats but if you do have a dog dinosaur Drosophila fly at home with you tonight you might like to keep an ear out for them during this next clip it's taken from the animal symphony a Sky Arts documentary that asks if or how animals respond to man made music in it because back and meet snowball the cockatoo who is Polish a little bit of Boogie Wonderland and starlings Annie and Ani happily chair belong to she but musician Newton's Warney is tasked with composing a symphony capable of staring the soul of a seal called Alone in. The piece that Newton has compassion is complex is syncopated and initially the scientists were thinking when you push your luck here this animal is spread that you die but it may not be able to interpret the beat this type of music but it. Is fantastic seeing Ronan responding to that piece of music that specifically created for running but also snowball he's not even be in training actually to spontaneously moving to the music. You know like that. Chris back him and it in so many trying to make all the right noises in the animal symphony Chris in the show it becomes very quickly apparent and. Our musical we get a nodding seal since singing starlings howling wolves seem you love so then the question becomes will they respond to nip it in music I don't mean we giving anything away to say that they do but was their response what you expected each of their was sponsors was rather limited and focused so we looked at each of the and animals not just the species but that individual snowball that you mentioned the sulphuric acid cockatoo Ronin the Californian sea lion and we knew their capabilities now in the case of those they were able to predict beat so as we slowed the music down the $44.00 Boogie Wonderland track that they'd been exposed to they slowed down their beat and when we sped up they increased it and our question was what's the purpose of this I'm a firm believer that in the animal kingdom there is a reason for absolutely everything why would a sea lion why would a croc to be able to predict a beat like that there must be some purpose now one of the theories that we came up with for the sea lion is that it could be related to locomotion because in order to maximize an optimize their ability to swim through the water they do so in a very with mc why so perhaps that part of the brain which can recognise the Boogie Wonderland beat and indeed the pace that Newton. Wrote which was more complex but the sea lion managed to see through the music and find that beat it could be that that's to do with improving and maximizing its locomotion in the case of snowball going we know that these birds will go through ritualized displays and it could be that this is part of that but what's interesting is that within these species there are some animals which have the aptitude to respond in this way and some which don't just like humans I mean I cannot dance to save mine on I cannot keep in time even to Boogie Wonderland I don't have that aptitude so that there is that interspecies or r.t. As well we must mention that you talk with. As the musicologist who is actually called Emily Doolittle in their very grand but you also can sell an array of psychologist and scientists what does the cutting edge research on musicality of animals say about them and how what does that say and how is this changing the way that we interact with animals Well I don't see that we can call it cutting edge yet this is a very much an embryonic science musicology and also I have to say that understandably the scientists are at this point in time quite reticent to stick their necks out and really commit to the fact that these animals are understanding the music that the music has a purpose for them all the animals indeed produce music in the in the sense that we recognize it nevertheless progress is rapid they're investing a lot of time and effort into this and what we are clearly seeing is that there are parallels between our music and the way that animals use song and their calls and so on and so forth amongst the most exciting discoveries in recent time have been the fact that my own nightingales during winter time when they've migrated to Africa practice parts of their song which they build over a period of years into the full song that by the time they're 5 years old we'll get them a mite when they come back to to Europe or to the u.k. So in the wintertime there were harassing little verses and you know little courses which they don't do the 4 song and they're listening to all the miles doing that but they're definitely rehearsing what we see with animals like humpback whales which produced quite complex songs is that the structure of this song is very much money to so that it can be learned by the wilds so that it can be passed on and there's a cultural transference of song in these wild just like ours can we talk about the kind of song or the simply that it eventually writes I know you're a naturalist not a musician but I was surprised at how the animals responded to such melodic music for and for an animal symphony it was still recognizable in pleasing to. Human audience when I wondered if you could have just gone all out animal more guttural and ate before John Cage if you well that we surprised by that well not when I met those 2 starlings that you mentioned because they were very much into music which was consonant not dissonant music so any of those sort of minor keys that we typically associate in in human terms we sort of horror films the stabbing notes of our of the psycho music or the Jaws music when they're approaching those things that unsettle us on settle the animals too and what they liked was nice flowing easy to engage with music so what Newton did so cleverly was to look at how each of these species was responding to the music that it had been exposed to and he would do that into his symphony did you have a sense of his experience in it in experience because my favorite part of the documentary is you being delighted by the howling world but also in it in throughout the willed and astonished by what he's discovering it must have been remarkable for a composer to suddenly realize you have this entirely different audience available to you I listen to music a lot I'm very keen on music are not a musician as you say and when I met him he was initially very skeptical about the project actually but I managed to give him a gift and and it was an amazing thing probably the highlight of my year I took Newton to Wood's mail in Sussex when nightingales had a rival with a sound man friend of mine Gary and a massive power ball at reflector and an m o Nightingale started to sing about 3 or 4 metres away and I pointed the parabolic reflector right at the nightingale and I put the ear phones on to Newton and it changed his life and I saw a change in his life in front of me and I felt so happy to be noble to give this give someone with such an enormous musical skill something that he'd never heard before and he absolutely lit up and it was it was amazing and I should. Treasure that memory to my grave being able to just let him hear that incredible sound that loud Guns and Roses cocktail that heady mix of cascades of notes and whistles and all of the charm that Nightingale had brought all the way from Africa on a damp evening in Sussex and I gave it to Newton and it was brilliant that is such an amazing gift can you add me to your Christmas and instantly I did think that there might have been a risk with a project like this that it could have felt like a gimmick like it would have given the stuff of the You Tube video but actually when you watch the documentary you have I had a sense of this being a profoundly respectful project and I wondered whether it was because I like the reticent scientists you've mentioned underneath the fine you wanted to credit these creatures with a really deep and divest interior life it wasn't just about them blocking about was it you know we'd seen those things on You Tube And initially when I heard about the project I was skeptical about you so I was worried about that but we were true to our I'm still way out in this was. A duality this was where we were trying to find a commonality between this new science this emerging science of 0 musicology and of course the music the arts aspect itself and I feel that yes we were able to give a platform to those scientists and they are all very credible people and and also to explore at the very outset this interesting science and some of the stories in it as are so the humpback whales is one hump out while they're on the eastern side of Australia Western sort of Australia came up with a new song and then it spread all around Australia like a viral hit and then right across the Pacific Ocean so one while hanging in the sea for 45 minutes making that beautiful song all of a sudden invented something new it didn't work and well it came up with techno and all of a sudden all of the other whales took on board because they were fascinated by this new sound and to me that's a remarkable discovery brought about by access to technology that we have now to be able. To call these animals and analyze their calls of course but also because you know because because of some really good science that's being done well and you look fairly bright as can I bring un Well you've seen this document you're passive and yet will this make you start saying to your dog well one of my favorite bits of the documentary I thought it was fabulous throughout but one of my favorite bits is Chris when your dog starts singing along to the Lightning Seeds think their favorite song right yes it is year of pure by the lightning says I am going for 2 so my dog I have a doc will take these a cocker pay and he loves tub thumping by Chamberlain and when I put that on and he starts spinning around in the kitchen and jumping joyfully into my arms and I think there is a very rich connection you know between the music that's created in the animal kingdom and It with It was fascinating to see what you did with the symphony I'd love to have it played in a kind of orchestra setting without handpicked exclusive audience of animals planning anything like that that was one of our fantasies we imagine trying to get the symphony orchestra you know to perform to this great zoo how we'd stop the cockatoos who thought in the poodles and and I mean I think you know the sea lion and getting a whale in for the performance could be quite tricky So basically what we did we took the music to the animals it would have been Yeah I think you know in our fantasies we were there and organizing a litter tray and then you for that might be really astonishing Well did you think dad just really it's amazing how. Obviously this is a very new area of research but the same time there's all kinds of analogues that go back a long way I know from my work in the 19th century that there were asylums where there were some doctors who were actually very interested in the idea of playing music to animals and trying to see if they could elicit emotions from them because emotions were seen possibly as being this this area of continuity between humans and animals in the same way that music was sometimes used as a kind of therapy for patients in asylums So it's amazing really how how this is obviously. Been serving the people of pondered for a long time there's a moment at the end of the program Chris you get wolves to listen to a part of the simply that involves whale song and the wolves just how and your incorrigibly excited about it and it's completely remarkable moment because how often are whales and wolves put into your act but you're also very candid in that moment and you say I'm not entirely sure what happens there and I wondered maybe we can't ever really know what's happening there in animals so. Well never say never we're constantly making progress what we can do with science is that we can you know we take it to the point that it's statistically significant when we get to the point where there's always going to be some conjecture that despite the involvement of Ms Doolittle we will not be able to talk to the animals but we should be able to get to a point where we understand what they're talking about thanks to Chris pack and Chris down the line with us if you will you can catch the animal symphony it might make you how long to it's on Sky Arts tomorrow at 6 pm and from then it's available on demand the Argentinian writer Jorge Luis book airs pretending to be a fictional Chinese naturalist once compiled a list of 16 classifications of animal categories included suckling Paix maids and those who have recently broken a flower vase what kind of animal you book has is a mischievous story features in the work and collections new exhibition which traces the history of the way humans have related to animals Well I believe you went along for a prowl around it's been billed as a history of our ideas about animals does it work absolutely is really interesting because they really pull apart a part what a museum is and what we're trying to do in a museum trying to recreate nature to make this illusion that you're wandering through all of nature but at the same time it's very different to going out into a forest or the countryside or anywhere like that because it's trying to organize nature to give you this kind of this this whistles. At the top of everything really and the more you think about it the more you realize how how power is so important here it's about imposing order on nature on trying to say this is how it is and it starts with Karl when they us who really is the granddaddy of taxonomy trying to create this consistent system of nature and you have some of the specimens that he actually created these birds that were pressed into books very painfully looking and then you go through to look at the development of taxonomy in the way in which that was freezing in these animals still giving you in a way something that was real or then an animal that you would see live in the wild because you were able to scrutinize it and look at all the details rather than just seeing this this elusive phenomenon and when people would develop bird spotters books for example they would base the illustrations of each bird on stuffed animals and then he would use that illustration to then find the live ones that brings up all kinds of interesting questions of what's what's the authentic thing what's the real thing one of the boldest claims of the exhibition and I think you're right that it's really preoccupied with organization organizing a tear in ordering is that taxonomy is all forms of animal classification are say should be constructed that's their gambit that there's something arbitrary about these divisions but it is also a natural construct to isn't it as if Food Chain of Being we might say we could even argue that there's a hierarchy of self-consciousness I wonder if we can is contended more with this idea that these categories are constructed but I think it always comes back to sort of what vantage point you're looking from it's very interesting how they show you the designs of when the London Natural History Museum was 1st being made on its 1st director Richard Owen all of his sort of ideas and ideologies and values are coming through in the way that it's constructed He said he wanted to make a cathedral of nature with all of these high art cheese and stained glass windows and his religious faith was absolutely comi