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After 5 years of research into auditory spatial awareness, which is
discussed in my book Spaces Speak, Are You Listening? Experiencing Aural
Architecture, I tried to integrate a wide variety of insights from more than
a dozen disciplines using the evolutionary fitness argument.

The evidence was consistent with the speculation that the wide variety of
ability to sense space within the population might be explained by the
environment of our ancestors. Some spent many generations in the open
tundra, others in dense forests and jungles, or in rough mountain ranges.
Each of these environment has very different acoustics. It seems plausible
that there was differential adaptation that took place.

It is known that the ability of human to navigate a space by listening,
especially among some blind, varies widely. Reports of humans using
echolocation goes back to 1749 when Diderot, the French Philosopher and
writer, describe how a blind friend walked around his room describing such
objects as a cabinet with open doors. It was only during the mid-20th
century, that researchers proved that what had been called "face vision" was
actually the ability to hear passive objects and spatial geometry, now
called echolocation. Somewhat later, strong evidence appeared in the
literature showing that a wide variety of other species, besides bats and
dolphins, had the option of using echolocation, for example, rats, shrews,
hamsters, and some species of birds supplement vision with hearing.

Information about the book is available at the MIT Press web site:
http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=10947 or you
can email me to request a copy of the Introduction and Table of Contents.

I would welcome any discussion or literature that considers the evolutionary
pressure to acquire the latent ability to hear space. The literature on bats
and dolphins is extensive, including the evolutionary trajectory of bats.
Does anyone know of any literature that considers the corresponding ability
in humans? I regret not having previously opened these questions to a
larger, and more knowledgeable group.

With Appreciation,
Barry Blesser
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