"In another sphere of the visual arts there is biophilia, the innate affiliation people seek with other organisms, and especially with the living natural world. Studies have shown that given freedom to choose the setting of their homes or offices, people across cultures gravitate toward an environment that combines three features, intuitively understood by landscape architects and real estate entrepreneurs. They want to be on a height looking down, they prefer open savanna-like terrain with scattered trees and copses, and they want to be close to a body of water, such as a river, lake, or ocean. Even if all these elements are purely aesthetic and not functional, home buyers will pay any affordable price to have such a view. People, in other words, prefer to live in those environments in which our species evolved over millions of years in Africa."
Tags: evolution sociobiology landscape design
— Harvard sociobiologist E.O. Wilson on the origins of the arts | Harvard Magazine May-Jun 2012
Posted 1 year ago with 1 noteTags: evolution sociobiology landscape design
