Many animals have a concept of “play.” At times and places where they feel safe, friendly associates practice important motions, like chasing or fighting, but try to avoid any big effects – they retract their claws, pull their punches, etc. Play is an important way for young animals to learn how to act like old ones. Humans
I imagine Einstein thought "God doesn't play dice." was pretty funny. It's just that jokes about the rules of Quantum physics doesn't speak to the norms the rest of us are talking about.
the ability to speak inderectly is surpassed only by the innocence of not having to be inderect. to be inderect sacrifices morality,youth and original humanity.being direct is more efficient .the shortest distance between two points is a strait line.it is and will always be.
I've now endured for months first joking about sex, casual mentions about someone's sexual preferences and activities, and lately explicit references to erogenous zones, from a woman who is engaged and these things happen not always in the presence of the husband. Now the husband has joined the talk, mentioning sexual acts explicitly. These now occur so routinely that I've come to expect them. It's now one of the topics. I've just laughed it off. Are you suggesting I might be receiving a message here? I'm feeling as if I'm being ...prepared.
As it becomes more and more clear that humor is simply benign norms violations with some compressible information, it should be unsurprising that a species of beings who may (by Robin's thinking) have evolved specifically to violate norms in controlled ways should practice it so often and place so much importance on it. In some ways it is one of the most important forms of play, since, as you suggest, some of it might even be playing at playing.
Steve Pinker has written about the issue of "common knowledge" and plausible deniability as the source of indirect language. Katja Grace wrote about his ideas here, an animated video is here.
Robin, you've brought three of my favorite subjects together. Jokes, play, taboos... and recursion. My four favorite weapons are jokes, play, taboos, recursion, and the cognitive unconscious. Five!
Freud said that humor is about taboos, and Minsky added, cognitive mistakes. Viewing this as dog-like play-fighting, it could be a way of fooling you into doing something terribly wrong, but it turns out you didn't really, so wow, what a relief, and I'm a good sport, hah hah. Then laughter is a little less mysterious, it's a specialized and concentrated form of fun--which is the special kind of enjoyment of play, which in turn is a special as-if / not-quite danger mode.
I'm wondering about what I think of as "merely clever" jokes vs. "true humor."
Taboo fits with how puns are supposed to be awful.
Thanks for some new ways to look at those times when it's puzzling just what's funny.
Doesn't it seem awfully telling that approximately half of humor is based on wittily playing with covert beliefs and discussing subjects that aren't supposed to be discussed?
If covertly violating social norms gives evolutionary advantage (which it sure seems like it would), and humor enables covertly violating social norms, there is the connection.
I dunno that I buy that this is the primary driver of brain size, but it sure seems like a potential driver.
I see the value of this but I'm don't think I'm a good enough people reader to get away with it. I'd like to learn some algorithms to compensate, does anyone have any relevant links or advice about this?
Ann Althouse linked to a video of two toddlers apparently engaging in non-verbal communication, which seems to indicate they were using, and responding to, humor. I'm not sure you can make the case the humor arose later than syntax or vocabulary.
Evan said: "... we developed ginormous brains to support our sense of humor implies that it also gave us an evolutionary advantage... I don't see that connection..."
Robin said: "We cherish our ... lovers for making us laugh"
Yeah - that might be sufficient for an explanation of the ignorance. A posssible counter argument is that awareness of such subtexts is actually extremely advantageous - because one can then begin to game them.
Philosophers often like to appeal to 'implicit knowledge' in order to explain our understanding of semantic rules and the like. They use the analogy of our implicit knowledge of syntactic, grammatical rules. We use such rules correctly, but most of us can't articulate the rules themselves.
Although I've never really been a fan of this form of explanation (in a sense it's not really explanation at all) - one might think the same sort of implicit knowledge is at work in the case of subtextual communication. Since it's easy at least to admit that implicit knowledge of some sorts is possible (i.e. grammar) - then claiming that such and such is a form of implicit knowledge has the effect of easing up the explanatory burden of that phenomena, because it becomes less 'amazing'. Ultimately the problem gets subsumed under the broader problem of how/why the lower brain automates various behaviours in a rule like way beneath the conscious level. It then is no longer a special problem of your particular theory.
Yes, the universal ignorance of such subtexts is indeed a crucial datum. I find it completely implausible that we are just accidentally ignorant of such things - they are far too important, even if that only takes 5% of our play talk. Far more plausible is that we have an interest in avoiding conscious awareness, as this makes our pleas of innocence and denials of rule evasion so much more sincere.
I imagine Einstein thought "God doesn't play dice." was pretty funny. It's just that jokes about the rules of Quantum physics doesn't speak to the norms the rest of us are talking about.
the ability to speak inderectly is surpassed only by the innocence of not having to be inderect. to be inderect sacrifices morality,youth and original humanity.being direct is more efficient .the shortest distance between two points is a strait line.it is and will always be.
I've now endured for months first joking about sex, casual mentions about someone's sexual preferences and activities, and lately explicit references to erogenous zones, from a woman who is engaged and these things happen not always in the presence of the husband. Now the husband has joined the talk, mentioning sexual acts explicitly. These now occur so routinely that I've come to expect them. It's now one of the topics. I've just laughed it off. Are you suggesting I might be receiving a message here? I'm feeling as if I'm being ...prepared.
My take on Play Talk:
http://theliteraryorder.blo...
As it becomes more and more clear that humor is simply benign norms violations with some compressible information, it should be unsurprising that a species of beings who may (by Robin's thinking) have evolved specifically to violate norms in controlled ways should practice it so often and place so much importance on it. In some ways it is one of the most important forms of play, since, as you suggest, some of it might even be playing at playing.
Steve Pinker has written about the issue of "common knowledge" and plausible deniability as the source of indirect language. Katja Grace wrote about his ideas here, an animated video is here.
Robin, you've brought three of my favorite subjects together. Jokes, play, taboos... and recursion. My four favorite weapons are jokes, play, taboos, recursion, and the cognitive unconscious. Five!
Freud said that humor is about taboos, and Minsky added, cognitive mistakes. Viewing this as dog-like play-fighting, it could be a way of fooling you into doing something terribly wrong, but it turns out you didn't really, so wow, what a relief, and I'm a good sport, hah hah. Then laughter is a little less mysterious, it's a specialized and concentrated form of fun--which is the special kind of enjoyment of play, which in turn is a special as-if / not-quite danger mode.
I'm wondering about what I think of as "merely clever" jokes vs. "true humor."
Taboo fits with how puns are supposed to be awful.
Thanks for some new ways to look at those times when it's puzzling just what's funny.
Doesn't it seem awfully telling that approximately half of humor is based on wittily playing with covert beliefs and discussing subjects that aren't supposed to be discussed?
If covertly violating social norms gives evolutionary advantage (which it sure seems like it would), and humor enables covertly violating social norms, there is the connection.
I dunno that I buy that this is the primary driver of brain size, but it sure seems like a potential driver.
I see the value of this but I'm don't think I'm a good enough people reader to get away with it. I'd like to learn some algorithms to compensate, does anyone have any relevant links or advice about this?
Ann Althouse linked to a video of two toddlers apparently engaging in non-verbal communication, which seems to indicate they were using, and responding to, humor. I'm not sure you can make the case the humor arose later than syntax or vocabulary.
Evan said: "... we developed ginormous brains to support our sense of humor implies that it also gave us an evolutionary advantage... I don't see that connection..."
Robin said: "We cherish our ... lovers for making us laugh"
I think I might see the connection...
Yeah - that might be sufficient for an explanation of the ignorance. A posssible counter argument is that awareness of such subtexts is actually extremely advantageous - because one can then begin to game them.
For a good example see - The Game by Neil Straus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
Another possible way to think about it:
Philosophers often like to appeal to 'implicit knowledge' in order to explain our understanding of semantic rules and the like. They use the analogy of our implicit knowledge of syntactic, grammatical rules. We use such rules correctly, but most of us can't articulate the rules themselves.
Although I've never really been a fan of this form of explanation (in a sense it's not really explanation at all) - one might think the same sort of implicit knowledge is at work in the case of subtextual communication. Since it's easy at least to admit that implicit knowledge of some sorts is possible (i.e. grammar) - then claiming that such and such is a form of implicit knowledge has the effect of easing up the explanatory burden of that phenomena, because it becomes less 'amazing'. Ultimately the problem gets subsumed under the broader problem of how/why the lower brain automates various behaviours in a rule like way beneath the conscious level. It then is no longer a special problem of your particular theory.
We are ambivalent.
Yes, the universal ignorance of such subtexts is indeed a crucial datum. I find it completely implausible that we are just accidentally ignorant of such things - they are far too important, even if that only takes 5% of our play talk. Far more plausible is that we have an interest in avoiding conscious awareness, as this makes our pleas of innocence and denials of rule evasion so much more sincere.
They did, but their publicists weren't as good. :)