chortle

…why do people tend to laugh when someone slips over a banana skin or has a custard pie slapped into their face?… one theory explains that these types of situations make you feel superior to other people…the person who tripped, or who received the pie, has been made to look silly and that makes you feel good… in fact, it makes you feel so good that you laugh… many jokes make you feel superior to other people… in these types of jokes, people appear stupid because they have misunderstood an obvious situation, made a stupid mistake, or have been made to look stupid by someone else… according to the superiority theory, these jokes cause you to laugh because they make you feel superior to other people… the famous philosopher, plato (427-348 bc), was one of the first people to advance the 'superiority' theory… but he was not a fan of laughter… he thought that it was wrong to laugh at the misfortune of others and that hearty laughter involved a loss of control that resulted in people appearing to be less than fully human… as a result, he urged people to refrain from laughing… jay sommers, producer of the comedy show 'green acres' said that americans are so conditioned to the laugh track that if they don't hear it they don't know it's a comedy show…

a hapless crimson rosella, got itself trapped in the chook pen for the scratch grain mix…but got itself out of the situation eventually, bega valley shire ©070812

'I laugh until it didn't hurt'…

…did you not know that… laughter can help reduce pain?… in the book, anatomy of an illness (as perceived by the patient), norman cousins described how he used laughter to overcome the pain of arthritis… cousins reported how ten minutes of laughing at marx brothers films could lead to over two hours of pain-free sleep… his experiences have now been supported by years of medical research… research with rheumatoid arthritis sufferers has shown that laughter helps relieve both the intensity of pain, and the degree to which patients find such pain bothersome (described in funes, m (2000). laughing matters: live creatively with laughter. dublin: newleaf)… but why should laughter reduce pain?… one theory concerns the link between laughter and chemistry… endorphins are a special chemical produced by our bodies to help reduce the effects of pain and handle stress… some researchers believe that laughter produces endorphins which, in turn, help to deaden the effects of pain… (lifted from laughlab: the scientific quest for the world's funniest joke. the british association for the advancement of science 2002)… so now you know...

ps. ...and years of lab research have uncovered that films involving john cleese and peter sellers are especially good at making people laugh and feel better about themselves and their lives...