quote:I think all laughter is either pain avoidance or affirmation of superiority (which is probably just another method of pain avoidance).
I'm not quite sure I buy this. I've heard variations on this idea asserted before, and while it's always struck a wrong note in my mind, I've never really sat down and thought about it much.
I don't have any kind of opposing theory worked out, but I have started thinking about situations that elicit laughter in which it is clear that neither of these explanations fits. The first is wordplay--puns and the like. While you could argue that the pun threads that occur around here are an assertion of superiority, since we're all trying to come up with the best/worst pun we can come up with, but that's beside the point. Whether I try to come up with a pun in response or not, I appreciate the pun for its own sake, and the response that it elicits is laughter.
Another category of laughter that doesn't fall into either category, I think, is one that sublime silliness. I'm thinking of things like Monty Python's Ministry of Silly Walks sketch.
Was it Heinlien that defined laughter as a response to a "wrongness"? I think I'm thinking of Stranger in a Strange land, because when I typed "wrongness", the phrase "I grok a wrongness" popped into my mind unbidden. In any case, I think that that might be a more accurate descrption of what elicits laughter, but I'll have to think about it.
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I laugh at myself all the time. I run into and trip over things too much not to.
There is laughter, though that is derived from pure happiness and sheer joy. That is probably the best laughter. But it occurs rarely in the overall scheme of thing.
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We aren't conciously avoiding emotional pain. The fact is, that like pleasure, there is a very fine line between humor and embarrassment, anger, frustration etc. About the only exception I can think of is the funny things kids say. But again, this is often because it is a painful truth they tell us about ourselves or a way to make us feel grown up and and superior in a benign way.
I didn't claim to be witty. That isn't my talent. I don't collect jokes like my husband does, nor do I tell them very well, as he does.
But I am rather clumsy and often forgetful. Rather than be pained at my ineptness, I laugh and I enjoy the laughter of others. I don't cover up. I'll tell the story about myself, if the subject comes up. This is far more fun than crawling into a hole and and crying about what a jerk I am.
Edit: this is just to say that this was taken from the GrandmaBlog thread to avoid being off topic.
posted
Sooo... would you say that we only feel happiness to avoid feeling pain? Is pain/sadness the only "honest" emotion?
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Yeah, I was forgetting about "sheer joy" laughter. That is the best kind, isn't it? It could be argued, though, that that is in and of itself laughter in response to wrongness, in that the laughter is elicited by something that one perceives as not part of one's ordinary experience of the world. "Wrongness" probably isn't the best word to use there, as it has negative connotations. What would be a better term? "Unusualness"? "Alien"? Hm.
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Trying not to wax poetic here, but trying to describe the laughter from sheer joy.
It seems in my mind to be closely related with the beauty of nature. Like riding my boogie board down a wave, and getting tumbled over by it and coming up with a mouthful of saltwater, and being unable to do anything but laugh, because it was so much fun being part of the ocean and the wave that I was just a speck.
On the other hand I know that laughter is a built in defense mechanism I have. I am generally a happy person by nature so very, very few people can read past my laughter to see what I actually feel, if I feel something other than happiness. It creates a barrier between me and my feelings.
This is derived from my childhood, where it "wasn't ok" to be unhappy. If you are happy you make other people happy, therefore you should act happy regardless of how you feel because no one wants to be around an unhappy person. And you being unhappy makes other people unhappy and it is bad to make other people feel unhappy.
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In Larry Niven's Ringworld, Nessus said that all humor is the result of an interrupted survival (or was it fear) instinct. Which is why only insante puppeteers have senses of humor -- no sane puppeteer would interrupt such an instinct.
I personally believe that this partially explains ticklishness.
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IIRC, Jake, the discussion about laughter in Stranger In A Strange Land happened while Mike and Gillian were at the zoo and Mike saw a big chimp bully a medium chimp, who subsequently bullied a small chimp. Mike's explanation of laughter was a lot closer to Amka's than yours.
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Bob - I don't think joy is the same thing as laughter. For instance, I don't experience joy when I try to drink the ketchup on the table. But I do laugh.
Joy is a response to good things happening, to feeling loved, secure, etc.
You folks are right, I did forget the 'laughter out of sheer joy' aspect. But is that humor? It isn't really funny, though it is absolutely fantastic. Another time laughter can happen is at orgasm. But I wonder if that isn't sensory overload and/or avoiding other noise because there are children in the house who might think someone is being murdered.
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It's funny, AJ, how much we have in common. I had that whole "happy is the only acceptable emotional state" stuff foisted on me when I was little too. With me, though, it was "Jake is the happy one", which was true--I've been a very happy person pretty much since I emerged from the womb. The thing is that when people started expecting it from me, I started providing it regardless of whether I actually felt that way or not. Something genuine became a mask. That sucked.
But anyway, that's not the subject at hand, and I'm a little too interested in the thread's subject to play a very active role in derailing it this early in its life.
So--laughter. I know exactly what you mean about laughing with joy. I've had the same response when standing in a huge tree, looking out at waist-high grass waving gently in the breeze while sunlight glimmers off of a lake in the distance, and the crisp chill of fall air, tinged with the faint scent of woodsmoke and that magnificently fresh outdoor smell intoxicates me. Hm, was that a sentence? Anyway, you get the idea. In response to that, I've broken out in laughter. I've also burst out laughing in response to really magnificent sex. I've also burst out laughing when in completely normal circumstances that suddenly feel exceptional due to an interior shift on my part. All of these circumstances could be thought of as a "wrongness", not in that they are wrong or bad--they most decidedly aren't--but in that they are so far removed from our usual perception or experience. Does that make sense?
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Thanks for the correction Mike. In that case, I can just think of Heinlein as the springboard for this idea.
Can anybody shoot a hole in it? I'd love to prove it wrong, but so far I haven't been able to come up with a laughter-eliciting situation that doesn't fit into that fairly neatly.
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You know, Juliette would probably be able to do a pretty good job at this. She did her undergrad senior thesis on comedy. I don't remember much about it, just that she read a lot by a guy named Bergson. Or Bergsen. I don't know how it was spelled. Did this post have a point? I didn't think so.
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If you could quantify humor and laughter, then you would make boat-loads of cash every time you tried to do something comical, by using precepts that you would then know.
But the funniest people do it instinctively. I really don't believe that laughter is always this, that, or the other. I think you've limited your definition too much.
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Marge: Now Lisa, listen to me, this is important. I want you to smile today.
Lisa: But I don't feel like smiling.
Marge: Well it doesn't matter how you feel inside, you know? It's what shows up on the surface that counts. That's what my mother taught me. Take all your bad feelings and push them down, all the way down, past your knees until you're almost walking on them. And then you'll fit in, and you'll be invited to parties, and boys will like you, and happiness will follow.
Lisa: [feeble attempt at a smile]
Marge: No, come on. You can do better than that.
Lisa: [a much brighter smile]
Marge: Aww, that's my girl. [rubs Lisa's hair]
Lisa: [through her teeth] I feel more popular already.
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I think what we call humor is an acknowledgement of juxtaposition, be it unexpected behavior or happenstance. And I think the reason we laugh from joy is that joy is sufficiently rare that it's an unexpected happenstance. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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I read that as being basically the same as what I was saying, although stated much more succinctly. Do you agree Tom, or is there something I wasn't picking up on in what you just said?
Elsaine, obviously, this idea that Tom and I are talking about doesn't wholly define what is funny--you can have unexpected circumstances that aren't funny in the least. I haven't been able to come up with any examples, though, that *aren't* described by this theory. Can you?
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As you well know, I am rotten at debate. I walk away from more arguments than the pope walks away from condom dispensers.
Also, from my last comment there, I've been watching far too much Black Adder, which is comedy supported by irony and superiority over the stupider characters.
And so, I should abstain.
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That said, I wonder what kind of studies have been done on this. Why, for example, do some people find slapstick hilarious, while other people enjoy puns?
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I agree with Tom and Noemon about laughter, and the best situations I can think of involve new babies. Usually the first things that make babies break out in cackles are things that don't fit into their realm of experience. For example, when Daddy's hat is on his knee. It's not really funny at all, but it just "doesn't fit". If you want to make a kid laugh, do something they've never seen before, or change something that was normal into something abnormal, like trying to put his pants on his head.
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One of Robert J Sawyer's in "The Terminal Experiment" suggested the juxtaposition idea, your brian reacting to something that doesn't fit together. As an example he suggested it was why puns and jokes weren't as funny aftrer the first time, since you no longer react to the juxtaposition the second time. I'd quote from it but I'm far from my library.
I'd also suggest that laughter can be a reaction with many causes, and trying to pin it down to one will just result in endless amounts of "Oh yeah? What about this?" examples.
[ August 19, 2004, 03:28 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
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My dad always said that laughter was the result of a short-circuit in the brain. Something happens that doesn't "fit" your brain and so you laugh. Posts: 5879 | Registered: Apr 2001
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There's actually a pretty good write-up on the juxtaposition idea (uncredited) in Prehistory of the Far Side. It's in one of the sections with banned cartoons or the complaint department near a cartoon about a woman blocking her doggie door and then calling her little dog.
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I agree with these last few posts - especially PSI's.
I think things are funniest when you're not expecting them. (and nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!) This also explains why some people laugh at stupid predictable slapstick while others of us groan and know exactly when the bad guy is going to get kneed in the crotch. If laughter were really about superiority, we'd laugh when we picked up on that and someone else didn't. Some people aren't of the dissectionary mindset that steps outside of the plot and thus don't expect the knee to hit the crotch, because according to the plotline it shouldn't.
It has nothing to do with stupidity (Mr. Bean is pretty stupid, yet all my cultured friends enjoy it), just with predictability.
A good example:
quote:Dad always said laughter was the best medicine. I suppose this is why several of us died of Tuberculosis.
Is it funny? Yeah, it's funny. Why is it funny? Because we didn't expect such an extreme, insensitive comment. And then further, we didn't expect ourselves to laugh at such an extreme, insensitive comment.
So my hypothesis is this; we don't laugh because we're compensating or feeling superior. We laugh because we're making fun of ourselves. We're a bit bashful that we didn't expect the joke to end that way, and it makes us uncomfortable. We fill this uncomfortability with laughter and extreme respect for the one who made us just that little bit more humble. Rather than feeling smarter than the joke teller, we admit that they got us by giving them a laugh.
Just out of curiosity, what to you is the funniest movie/show/book/comedian ever? What do you consider the pinnacle of funny?
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I have to echo Chris in his assertion that laughter has multiple causes. Before I had made it to Tom's comment on juxtaposition I was going to use the term dichotomy. So many things that cause laughter are triggered by incongruity.
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Personally, I like the theory that humor is an experiment by aliens, and when we figure out where jokes come from they will be taken away and our sense of humor will vanish. (It's in a science-fiction story somewhere... )
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I was reading recently on brain chemistry, and it appears that we do a lot of laughing almost entirely for social cement. Nothing funny has happened, and yet people in a group will laugh together. (Try taking a video camera out and asking people to laugh for the camera. Naturally, they can't. Then, as you tape, they'll turn to their companions and start to laugh as they talk, without even noticing what they're doing.)
And how often do you laugh out loud at a joke when you're alone? It has to be something really funny to make most people laugh out loud when alone, but when you're with another person, you laugh a lot more at comments that are much less funny. Because part of laughter's function is to help us make social connections.
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quote: I think all laughter is either pain avoidance or affirmation of superiority (which is probably just another method of pain avoidance).
What an unusual sentiment! I have never heard this idea before. There are so many different kinds of laughter! The above may be true for some kinds, but certainly not all! I like laughing out of pure delight. That is my favorite kind of laughter.
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I read an article on the same thing - laughter as social cement. People laugh at themselves far, far more than they do at other people's jokes. The more comfortable people are together, the more in sync their laughter is. A giggle happens just as often as an "um" in spoken conversations.
Remember in The Village when Noah's laughter was inappropriate? That one social faux pas established him as being simple. It's very complex - its existence is not negative.
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quote:Try taking a video camera out and asking people to laugh for the camera. Naturally, they can't
I once laughed for literally minutes on end when someone decided it was time to have a contest to see who could laugh the longest without cause. I've discovered that simply laughing causes more laughing, both in others and in myself. Which is one instance in which laughter is not a result of the more depressing defentions of laughter put forward.
And as an example of humor that's also not about pain or avoidence:
How many sur-realists does it take to change a light-bulb?
Three, one to change it and two to fill the bath-tub full of strawberry-jello.
How many Zen masters does it take to change a light-bulb?
Two, one to change it and one not to change it.
I dis-like defentions of humor that seem to insinuate that we're only having a good time at someone's expense, especially the one from Stranger in a Strange Land.
quote: If you could quantify humor and laughter, then you would make boat-loads of cash every time you tried to do something comical, by using precepts that you would then know.
*has nightmare flashbacks of the STNG episode with Jerry Lewis when Data is trying to comprehend humor*
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quote: I once laughed for literally minutes on end when someone decided it was time to have a contest to see who could laugh the longest without cause. I've discovered that simply laughing causes more laughing, both in others and in myself. Which is one instance in which laughter is not a result of the more depressing defentions of laughter put forward.
True, delighted laughter heals! It brings such pleasure, such comfort, such ease of mind and body. It does bond people together. We love people who laugh freely. It is a joy. I really hesitate to apply survivalist motivations to it.
quote: ...laughter if the corrective punishment inflicted by society upon the unsocial individual: 'In laughter we always find an unavowed intention to humiliate and consequently to correct our neighbour. We also find 'two elements in the public's humour: delight in suffering, contempt for the unfamiliar'. Me Dougall believed that laughter has been evolved in the human race as an antidote to sympathy, a protective reaction shielding us from the depressive influence of the shortcomings of our fellow men.
Talk about taking all the fun out of laughter, but it's an interesting point. It's always struck a chord with me, but maybe because I'm such a cynic (not that it keeps me from laughing mind you).
Feyd Baron, DoC
EDIT: The above came from a book called "The Act of Creation" by Arthur Koestler. It's not an easy read, but it has some interesting point (the basis of the book is the need, how, and why of human creativity.)
posted
I can see where this came from, and it can be true, but isn't always.
I think laughter came about as a way of dealing with events that there is no other appropriate response, and it works well at that. Often when something happens that I didn't expect at all, either to myself or to others, I find it funny.
I'll be by myself walking fast through the house and trip and fall flat on my face...and once I figure out that I haven't been hurt, I start to laugh at how silly it must have looked. Or someone I know says something completely wrong, out of context, and I die laughing.
In either situation I am laughing at something that came out of nowhere, something I didn't expect. In both cases there isn't a need to be angry, for the "fight or flight" reaction that is ingrained into us....but I am startled into laughter.
We have all been on the wrong side of someones humor, I am sure. Humor is highly subjective, and a lot of times it IS at someones Else's expense; but that doesn't mean it's cruel or unkind. Not always.
Sometimes we see something that happens that we have done ourselves, like someone tripping or getting hit out of the blue by guano ( ), and it reminds us of when it happened to us. So we laugh, once we are sure they are OK, and that takes some of the sting/humiliation out of it. For both of us.
And sometimes we are glad it didn't happen to us, so we laugh in relief. We don't wish it on someone else, we just are glad we survived it unscathed.
There are many types of laughter, and a lot of them are a release valve from inappropriate emotions.
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), and it reminds us of when it happened to us. So we laugh, once we are sure they are OK, and that takes some of the sting/humiliation out of it. For both of us.
