I have a major theory about the funny, actually, involving… and I hope I spell this right… Schadenfreude. Any misfortune you find humorous will instantly be ten to fifty times funnier, sometimes more, if it happens to a nun. Because we are naturally wired to be all the things that religious people hate, since they hate all things natural (the devil made you wanna do that) for it helps them get under your skin more.
So picture a person being hit by a pie. Funny! Now picture it being a nun. Try again, picture a person being hit by a car… not so funny. Now run over a nun in your mind. Even that which isn’t funny becomes hilarious if a nun is involved.
I’ll take that to the extreme. A few posts back there was a video of a burning of a person accused of witchcraft. Not the least bit funny. Imagine that being a nun now.
And you get my point. We’re wired for evil, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. (Although there are the occasional anomalies of sexy, like furries who lust for Chewbacca… or me, who wasn’t into those ladies, but thought the speaker in this video rather handsome, but I digress…)
Sven DiMilosays
c’mon. How could that dude fit down a chimney? Talk about counterintuitive…
Dago Redsays
This phenomenon Dennett notes is not restricted to evolution. I would say this counterintuitive nature is found in nearly all things in life, the universe, and everything. If most things were intuitive in the first place we, as a species, would have never needed to invent simple-minded explanations — like those found in religion — that “explain” things in a way even the dumbest among us can understand and most of science would simply be part of our common-sense.
Clearly, having an “understanding” of how/why the universe works was never something our survival ever was contingent upon.
H.H.says
The Stumbling Block wrote:
I have a major theory about the funny, actually, involving… and I hope I spell this right… Schadenfreude. Any misfortune you find humorous will instantly be ten to fifty times funnier, sometimes more, if it happens to a nun.
I know you were making a joke, but there does seem to be some truth to that. Not about the nun, necessarily, but bad things do seem to be much funnier when they happen to someone else. Golf ball hits you in the balls? Not funny. Golf ball hits your friends in the balls? Hilarious. So it would seem that any theory of humor must account for its social component to be considered complete. I didn’t look like Dennett’s “debugging” theory will do so, but we’ll see when it comes out. Myself, I feel are probably multiple “levels” of humor which may actually have resulted from separate mechanisms. In short, there may be more than one right answer for why we find some things funny.
Supernormal stimuli: I’ve seen sparrows feeding carp with great, gawping, yellow-rimmed mouths. And it’s funny-sad, because you know somewhere nearby, baby sparrows are starving.
As of this morning, robins (red-breasted thrushes, not European robins) are back in town. A couple of weeks ago it was the cardinals and blue jays, who seem to arrive at the same time.
I know you were making a joke, but there does seem to be some truth to that. Not about the nun, necessarily, but bad things do seem to be much funnier when they happen to someone else.
That’s what Schadenfreude is… “happiness and enjoyment at the misfortune of others”. You know it’s scientific. It has a really long funny German name!
Sven DiMilosays
I feel are probably multiple “levels” of humor which may actually have resulted from separate mechanisms.
Yes.
1) farts
2) somebody else slips and falls or gets hit in the balls
3) stupid puns
4) Amis Kingsley
5) Monty Python’s Flying Circus
It’s hard (for me) to see much that these have in common other than being “funny.”
It’s hard (for me) to see much that these have in common other than being “funny.”
Except… funnier if happening to a nun. Imagine… the nun farts… hard enough that the habit flies up like she’s Sister Marilyn Monroe or something. FABULOUS!
Mangoricksays
He makes the same point about sweetness and such in his book “Breaking the Spell,” which I highly recommend.
cmsays
How great would it have been had, for his “sexy” image, he took the Burt Reynolds 1972 Cosomopolitan nude centerfold.
(see if it you dare)
The whole rest of his talk would not have been processed by anyone in the audience.
DLCsays
Dennett for the win.
A guy makes me glad my first name starts with the same letter.
In an unrelated comment: anybody seen W00t around lately ?
You know, the commenter who used to leave links to boobies.
SomeGuysays
Dennett rocks.
One of my favourite Dennett insights: thinkers have frequently mistaken a failure of imagination for an insight into deep necessity. … Yup. And sure enough, the talk in the vid starts with a case in point.
If you have not picked up “Consciousness Explained” and “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea” you might consider doing so. Dennett is a real credit to his profession.
Elitistbsays
*Is now picturing nuns being hit in the balls with a golf ball and is finding it intensely amusing*
Jdhueysays
In an unrelated comment: anybody seen W00t around lately ?
You know, the commenter who used to leave links to boobies.
That’s so we could stay abreast of developments on the web.
ID and tentacled things may have a lot more in common than we think…
H.H.says
Sven DiMilo:
It’s hard (for me) to see much that these have in common other than being “funny.”
Exactly! But I think these seemingly disparate “jokes” can be roughly ordered by the brainpower required to “get” them. I actually left to think up my own hierarchy of humor, based roughly on lowest to highest level reasoning skills, and quickly sketched out something like this: Finding actual misfortune funny; to Slap Stick (pretend misfortune), to insults (verbal slap stick), to situational irony (the unexpected occurs), to social irony (people act in unexpected way), to puns (word play), to violating group taboos.
I concluded that poopy jokes might actually be the highest form of humor.
Anyone know if anyone’s attempted any serious research on this topic that I could read?
Chris Richardssays
As wrong as Dennett is much of the time, this was pretty good. It’s a nice explanation of some odd phenomena, albeit highly simplified (sugars are sweet because of the way they are AND the way we react to them). And, of course, he’s always amusing and interesting, though he often oversimplifies and strawmans his opponents. Oh well; nobody’s perfect.
Riman Butterbursays
It has always seemed to me that humor involves a sudden, unexpected shift in viewpoint. I think of it as resetting the brain — like what you do to your computer when you restart it.
Nice. Seven minutes of Dennett is perfect. Gives him no time to ramble as usual. Or am I just happy to see pretty pictures on his slides for the first time?
Chris Davissays
Very interesting comments here on humour.
Another ‘funny’ category is mimicking baby behaviour, Bill Cosby’s standard method. We are amused by gaucherie, because babies are gauche.
But these don’t address the function of humour – and nor, I suspect, does Dennett’s debug reward theory. I understand that PET studies have confirmed that women appear to be humour’s natural audience, while men are its natural creators – which by no means denigrates the many superb female comedians or suggests that men can’t have a laff.
But if their is a gender discrepancy, it points to a para-sexual function for humour, and goes some way to explaining the high value that women place on men who ‘make them laugh’.
What purpose would this serve? It seems to me that a facility with humour is a kind of intellectual dipstick. Above all, good comics are smart. Ridley Scott has said that he often uses professional comedians for serious parts, having found that their minds are agile enough to handle almost any role.
Sexual preference for funny men could be one of the main drivers for our hypertrophied cerebra.
This is humor according to Steven Pinker (paraphrasing):
Some expectations are set up – then the expectations are subverted in a quick shift of frame – and in the new frame, someone has lost their dignity.
Laughing is a universal primate signal for “I am not taking this seriously”. So the laughter that goes along with situations like this (the leader of the tribe just tripped on a rock and fell on his face) defuses potential violent conflicts. That is the selective benefit, I think. Since we have great imaginations we can come up with fictional stories that trigger this response more than any actual situations would have (supernormal response).
That sounds good to me, anyway.
Glenn Daveysays
This is humor according to Steven Pinker (paraphrasing):
Some expectations are set up – then the expectations are subverted in a quick shift of frame – and in the new frame, someone has lost their dignity.
That phrase alone just drew a chuckle from me. Even reading the format of a joke is funny. I love to laugh.
Evidence that even though creationists are intellectually challenged and dishonest and worthy of great disdain, there are much lower forms of life in the pond who nevertheless consider themselves human.
This one clearly has forgotten his medication. Don’t be surprised if he starts boasting about how he organised his forces to win the Battle of Austerlitz.
Caligulasays
It’s too bad the quality of spam is so low; there’s not even anything to respond to :/
It’s when turds like this scumbag loon posting as pzdummy come squealing that I feel sorry for you all who don’t have Firefox and the Greasemonkey killfile.
AdrianTsays
I am seeing Daniel Dennett give a talk on Thursday here in London. I guess if I watch this now it would spoil it…. Damn you PZ, don’t do this to me – it’s so tempting to just press play!!
See, all it takes to sell evolutionary psychology is the right salesman.
echidnasays
Ben Stein should have said: “Christianity leads to killing people.”
It would have made a lot more sense.
kung foo joesays
I’ve been waiting to read “Je suis Napoleon” since SamC suggested the crazy would morph into the French emperor. Suppose I’ll have to write it myself.
Or hope JESUS tells pzdummy to write it by manipulating his/her foil hat.
Joshsays
Oh, pzdummy, I’m so sorry. You missed New Troll Day (it was Friday). We’re not currently taking applications for new trolls. Have no fear, though. We’ll schedule another application deadline at some point. Give me your email and I’ll make sure to let you know when the next announcement gets put up–so as to make sure that you have plenty of time to get your application submitted on time.
kung foo joesays
Oh the pzdummy troll seems to be the crazy mabus person from the dungeon that explains everything. I guess he’s not going to be Napoleon I’m a little disappointed.
WTFinterrobangsays
pzdummy is obviously a MORmON wearing his mad-gical mystery underwear which protect him while *lying* behind his computer.
delusional fool. I hear electroshock therapy can be helpful.
bassmanpetesays
@ Chris Davis # 29 “But these don’t address the function of humour – and nor, I suspect, does Dennett’s debug reward theory. I understand that PET studies have confirmed that women appear to be humour’s natural audience, while men are its natural creators – which by no means denigrates the many superb female comedians or suggests that men can’t have a laff.”
I make this comment from a male heterosexual point of view, and it’s a quote I heard many years ago – if you can make them laugh, you can get them into bed. From an evolutionary standpoint, is any other reason necessary?
Stephensays
I’m seeing Dennett on the 25th March here in South Africa.
I was thinking of getting a pimp hat and asking him to wear it for a photo.
So picture a person being hit by a pie. Funny! Now picture it being a nun.
That would certainly make her more “pie”-ous, wouldn’t it ;)
NewEnglandBobsays
Chris Richards @26:
As wrong as Dennett is much of the time, this was pretty good.
Just because you do not understand Dennett and your attention span is too short, is no reason to fling unsupported accusations.
“Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life” by Dennett is brilliant and quoted by many, many scientists.
Dennett’s “Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon” and “Consciousness Explained” are deep philosophical studies that requite critical thinking by the reader.
So, Chris Richards, show us your studies that refute Dan Dennett’s ideas instead of ad hominem attacks.
Another case of counterintuitiveness. If heaven were to exist and contain gems of humanity like pzdumbass, I would relish hell.
Louissays
Dennett is in London on Thursday? Fucksticks! I have tickets to see Mark Thomas* that night.
Louis
*Excellent comedian IMO, UKians in particular should check him out.
qcsays
I’ll never forget accidentally bumping into Dr. Dennett at a neurophilosophy conference in Ottawa a few years ago. After apologizing, I turned to my friend, excitedly (almost giddy) and said, “Can you believe I just touched Charles Darwin?
He pretended not to hear me, but I’m pretty sure he did (along with our stifled giggling). Yes, we found the resemblance hilarious. So sue me.
Juliansays
There’s an interesting quote that I think says allot about the service performed by humor. When asked to define the two traditions of the theater, Mel Brooks said, “Tragedy is when I cut my finger, comedy is when you fall into a sewer mane and die.”
If we consider that laughter in chimps is a fear and submission response, not an expression of joy, I think it opens up some space in which to interpret Mr. Brooks’ comment. The first humor, developing as it likely did out of fear, must have been dark humor; laughing at misfortune and terror so as to maintain cognitive function. The physically taxing act of sustained laughter may have both distracted one from the primitive paralysis-response to fear, and increased one’s oxygen intake. Just like with crying, humor could have acted as a way to achieve a calm mind through exhaustion, and by doing so, give the laugh-er the proper distance from calamity to consider and learn from it. Considering this, one can begin to understand the mate-appeal of humor; a humorous person, one of ‘good humor’ is better equipped to deal with stress, better able to react to dangerous and frightening situations, and less likely to relieve stress physically, through violence.
These thoughts just occurred to me after having listened to Dennett and considered the Brooks quote, so they aren’t as fleshed out as they could be, but I think it’s an interesting line of inquiry.
senecasamsays
One question – Could that hirsute beauty be Ann Coulter after she(?) skipped a monthly depilation?
Crash this stupid thing!
(scroll down, right hand side)
Ploonsays
I’m confused. Am I going to PAY WITH MY SOUL or have I already LOST MY SOUL? That would be embarrassing, if the bill came and it turns out I lost my soul-wallet.
Geesh, they can’t even keep their hysterical invective straight.
Dear PZDummy… you forgot to condemn ME to hell and I feel left out. Besides, I was gonna bring mini quiche and make pina coladas, and now our little party in hell will be doing without them, since I clearly didn’t get my invitation.
Mabus is really going to town this morning. He must have missed his medication.
Drewsays
Wow just noticed that Dan Dennett is actually Charles Darwin, either reincarnated or Darwin never actually died and Dennett is just his new public persona :)
When we finally have universal health care, people like pzdummy will be able to afford their medication and attacks like this will go away.
Pierce R. Butlersays
“Our next contestant in this year’s ‘Papa’ Darwin Look-Alike Competition hails from Boston, Massachusetts…”
Eriksays
Further to Julian’s post, I get the notion sometimes that laughing at another’s misfortune is an indicator that you are relieved that bad things don’t happen only to you. In other words, you are expressing relief in the reminder that you are part of a group in which the burdens of survival are shared.
Treppenwitzsays
NewEnglandBob (#55)
Just because you do not understand Dennett and your attention span is too short, is no reason to fling unsupported accusations.
This is followed by chiding the other poster for making the supposedly ad-hominem argument that Dennett is wrong. Hm.
“Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life” by Dennett is brilliant and quoted by many, many scientists.
Without some more information, this is just an appeal to authority. Now, if those scientists are doing research that confirms Dennett’s claims, that’s another matter, and I’d be interested in hearing the details.
Don’t get me wrong, I like what I’ve seen of Dennett, but let’s be rational if we’re going to defend him.
Ovid compiled a collection of (largely Greek) myths in Metamorphoses which tell of, surprise, animals changing into other animals, and humans turning into animals and into inanimate objects. The fact is that it is not so hard to see the similarities between quadrupeds, birds, and terrestrial bipeds, and a number of myths reflect this fact.
The whole bit about machines not reproducing themselves, and animals reproducing themselves imperfectly, was also noted in the myths. It was not astonishing to many that animals might evolve into other animals. Remember, it wasn’t that much earlier than Darwin that people still believed that “lower animals” were spontaneously generated by rotting meat and other icky stuff.
And few, if any, ancient myths actually tell of some great “artificer” creating life. In Genesis, god is a sculptor, but then breathes the “magic of life” into Adam. It is not a story of design, save as a sculptor, life was simply conferred. Many myths have similar tales, or involve reproduction and often very rapid metamorphoses.
It is with Newton, the “Age of Reason,” and later, the industrial revolution, that “god the designer” appears in any definite sense. Frankenstein and his monster are tales of the “modern age,” not of earlier times when life was seen as special and vitalistic. The IDiots are a product not of an earlier age of spirituality and of religion, rather are far closer to Mary Shelley and her tale of the monster.
Dennett went back in time, but not very far. Natural selection may be counterintuitive to humanity (though Empedocles had a crude version of it), but transformations redolent of evolutionary change are not. Now I cannot deny that there are many today who find evolution to be counterintuitive, the thought that the magic of life could magically shift and change is not at all foreign to most of human intellectual history.
Dennett should not take the West, and particularly the US, as if these represent humanity. They do not, and many cultures and religions have found it to be relatively easy to integrate into their worldviews.
I have reason to state that he does not understand Dennet when he writes:
though he often oversimplifies and strawmans his opponents
because that is not what he does at all. How can someone call his ideas “oversimplified” when he spends 500 pages on a topic? Clearly this person has not really read Dennett’s books (ad hominem) or he does not understand them.
Now your assertion:
Without some more information, this is just an appeal to authority.
is nonsense. I have read several of Dennett’s books and so have many scientists. The supporting date is in the books. Go read them for more information and also go read the hundreds of references Dennett has made and the many articles and books that have discussed Dennett’s ideas.
David Marjanović, OMsays
That was a really great explanation.
I hope I spell this right… Schadenfreude.
You did! :-)
Schaden = damage, Freude = joy.
How great would it have been had, for his “sexy” image, he took the Burt Reynolds 1972 Cosomopolitan nude centerfold.
(see if it you dare)
The whole rest of his talk would not have been processed by anyone in the audience.
Huh? It would still have been processed by the part of the audience that isn’t into men. Like, a bit under half. :-|
albeit highly simplified (sugars are sweet because of the way they are AND the way we react to them).
Nope. “Sweet” is the way we react to the way sugars are.
That phrase alone just drew a chuckle from me. Even reading the format of a joke is funny.
Same for me.
When we finally have universal health care, people like pzdummy will be able to afford their medication and attacks like this will go away.
The good man sits in Canada. You can lead him to medication, but you can’t make him take it…
H.H.says
If humor evolved to impress the ladies, then how come Barney Fife isn’t a sex symbol?
Treppenwitzsays
NewEnglandBob @ 75
Looking at the rest of his post (I originally only had in mind the part you quoted in your other post), I agree that your statement has some justification. PZ encourages some ad-hom in any case, so I guess it’s a moot point.
Maybe I’m just being pedantic, but I maintain that “lots of scientists quote Dennett” (paraphrasing) doesn’t really say anything about whether his arguments are sound. I’m not disputing the claim that his arguments have empirical support.
For what it’s worth, I’m not out to get Dennett or anything. I’m currently reading Freedom Evolves and, while I’m not far enough into the book to say whether I agree with him on the issue of free will, I’m finding it an interesting and challenging read.
NewEnglandBobsays
Treppenwitz @78:
Yes, Freedom Evolves is a very difficult read. I read it during October ’08 and my take was “Some rehash of his & others’ books. World is deterministic with free will. Terrific last 2 chapters”
Watchmansays
you are already DEAD, fuc*er
Am I the only one who finds it amusing that this malignant growth chose to bleep the “k” – presumably for the sake of propriety and politeness – in a sentence like that?
David Marjanović, OMsays
presumably for the sake of propriety and politeness
No, evidently for the sake of evading the imaginary language filter.
teammartysays
Chris Davis @ #29
If women are the natural audience for humor, then why is so much of it specifically aimed at 12 year old boys??
qcsays
Drew (#65) and Pierce R. Butler (#70):
I guess at least y’all probably won’t sue me…
(see comment #58)
;)
Nicolesays
I often think Dan Dennett is the most underrated of the horsemen. He seems to come at things with such curiosity! Anyway, I love him and hope to see and read more of him on Pharyngula.
Patricksays
I’m not sure I agree with this talk. Although, I agree with the idea, in general. I have some gripes about the specifics.
Dennet seems to imply that preference is prior to qualia. Preference is the qualia. The sensation and the impulse are identical expressions of the same thing observed from a different perspective.
A second issue, Loosely, Dennet says we find sugar to be sweet because our brain is telling us to prefer sugar, and men find women attractive, because our brains are telling men to prefer women, but the experience of finding something sweet and being attracted to a woman, are very very different sensations. The mere biological necessity of these different stimuli, is insufficient to explain the marked difference in the qualia, and thus insufficient to account for sensation. It cannot just be a difference in the degree to which each is needed, because this would mean a little bit of sugar would feel like seeing an attractive woman or vice-versa. They still have a … qualitative … difference regardless of quantity.
The only two explanations I can think of for differences in sensations that are both equally preferred and important, is
#1 Historical/Evolutionary Contingency, #2 Detailed information is being communicated through variation in sensation.
#1 just says that we have different sensations of different needs because these needs evolved at different times and thus end up lumped into different neural pathways. #2 Says that sugar tastes different than sex because we don’t want men to get confused and start eating women.
In truth, it is probably a combination of the two, but neither really tell me why sugar has this *particular* taste.
For example, it seems utterly intuitive that when I see something positioned to the right side of my body, it appears on the opposite side of my visual field from something positioned on the left side of my body. In other words, the information from the sensation follows directly from the content of sensation.
But there is no such obvious explanation for why sweet things taste like sweet things and salty things taste like salty things. Why couldn’t sweet things and salty things taste identical? We prefer them both.
In the case of vision, the variations in kind are so obvious they hardly bear explanation and in the case of taste the differences are utterly inexplicable. This is what I mean by Dennet’s explanation being insufficient.
Wow, That was so much better than that spewpid Georgia Puredumb!
Yeah, but Puredumb had the ontological morality figured out in relation to the flu virus. This is what her legacy will be to modern science.
I wonder how often Dennett gets asked to do magic tricks, or is complemented on his awesome debunking of Uri Gellar.
Already watched this earlier today. Dennet is cool.
I was waiting for a Dilbert comic at the end, but it never came…BASTARD!!!
Hilarious!
I look forward to that book.
@Jim B (#3)
Having met both of them, I would never mix them up. Randi is a “seemingly frail” little man who makes me look tall. Dennet is a f***ing sequoia. ;-)
I have a major theory about the funny, actually, involving… and I hope I spell this right… Schadenfreude. Any misfortune you find humorous will instantly be ten to fifty times funnier, sometimes more, if it happens to a nun. Because we are naturally wired to be all the things that religious people hate, since they hate all things natural (the devil made you wanna do that) for it helps them get under your skin more.
So picture a person being hit by a pie. Funny! Now picture it being a nun. Try again, picture a person being hit by a car… not so funny. Now run over a nun in your mind. Even that which isn’t funny becomes hilarious if a nun is involved.
I’ll take that to the extreme. A few posts back there was a video of a burning of a person accused of witchcraft. Not the least bit funny. Imagine that being a nun now.
And you get my point. We’re wired for evil, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. (Although there are the occasional anomalies of sexy, like furries who lust for Chewbacca… or me, who wasn’t into those ladies, but thought the speaker in this video rather handsome, but I digress…)
c’mon. How could that dude fit down a chimney? Talk about counterintuitive…
This phenomenon Dennett notes is not restricted to evolution. I would say this counterintuitive nature is found in nearly all things in life, the universe, and everything. If most things were intuitive in the first place we, as a species, would have never needed to invent simple-minded explanations — like those found in religion — that “explain” things in a way even the dumbest among us can understand and most of science would simply be part of our common-sense.
Clearly, having an “understanding” of how/why the universe works was never something our survival ever was contingent upon.
The Stumbling Block wrote:
I know you were making a joke, but there does seem to be some truth to that. Not about the nun, necessarily, but bad things do seem to be much funnier when they happen to someone else. Golf ball hits you in the balls? Not funny. Golf ball hits your friends in the balls? Hilarious. So it would seem that any theory of humor must account for its social component to be considered complete. I didn’t look like Dennett’s “debugging” theory will do so, but we’ll see when it comes out. Myself, I feel are probably multiple “levels” of humor which may actually have resulted from separate mechanisms. In short, there may be more than one right answer for why we find some things funny.
Supernormal stimuli: I’ve seen sparrows feeding carp with great, gawping, yellow-rimmed mouths. And it’s funny-sad, because you know somewhere nearby, baby sparrows are starving.
As of this morning, robins (red-breasted thrushes, not European robins) are back in town. A couple of weeks ago it was the cardinals and blue jays, who seem to arrive at the same time.
That’s what Schadenfreude is… “happiness and enjoyment at the misfortune of others”. You know it’s scientific. It has a really long funny German name!
Yes.
1) farts
2) somebody else slips and falls or gets hit in the balls
3) stupid puns
4) Amis Kingsley
5) Monty Python’s Flying Circus
It’s hard (for me) to see much that these have in common other than being “funny.”
Except… funnier if happening to a nun. Imagine… the nun farts… hard enough that the habit flies up like she’s Sister Marilyn Monroe or something. FABULOUS!
He makes the same point about sweetness and such in his book “Breaking the Spell,” which I highly recommend.
How great would it have been had, for his “sexy” image, he took the Burt Reynolds 1972 Cosomopolitan nude centerfold.
(see if it you dare)
The whole rest of his talk would not have been processed by anyone in the audience.
Dennett for the win.
A guy makes me glad my first name starts with the same letter.
In an unrelated comment: anybody seen W00t around lately ?
You know, the commenter who used to leave links to boobies.
Dennett rocks.
One of my favourite Dennett insights: thinkers have frequently mistaken a failure of imagination for an insight into deep necessity. … Yup. And sure enough, the talk in the vid starts with a case in point.
If you have not picked up “Consciousness Explained” and “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea” you might consider doing so. Dennett is a real credit to his profession.
*Is now picturing nuns being hit in the balls with a golf ball and is finding it intensely amusing*
In an unrelated comment: anybody seen W00t around lately ?
You know, the commenter who used to leave links to boobies.
That’s so we could stay abreast of developments on the web.
Then there is: http://people.rit.edu/rhrsbi/GalapagosPages/Boobies.html
That’s Dennett?
I didn’t recognize him without his usual pimp outfit.
Dennet is great.
Oooh, PZ, have you seen this webcomic?
http://www.macguff.fr/goomi/unspeakable/vault292.html
ID and tentacled things may have a lot more in common than we think…
Sven DiMilo:
Exactly! But I think these seemingly disparate “jokes” can be roughly ordered by the brainpower required to “get” them. I actually left to think up my own hierarchy of humor, based roughly on lowest to highest level reasoning skills, and quickly sketched out something like this: Finding actual misfortune funny; to Slap Stick (pretend misfortune), to insults (verbal slap stick), to situational irony (the unexpected occurs), to social irony (people act in unexpected way), to puns (word play), to violating group taboos.
I concluded that poopy jokes might actually be the highest form of humor.
Anyone know if anyone’s attempted any serious research on this topic that I could read?
As wrong as Dennett is much of the time, this was pretty good. It’s a nice explanation of some odd phenomena, albeit highly simplified (sugars are sweet because of the way they are AND the way we react to them). And, of course, he’s always amusing and interesting, though he often oversimplifies and strawmans his opponents. Oh well; nobody’s perfect.
It has always seemed to me that humor involves a sudden, unexpected shift in viewpoint. I think of it as resetting the brain — like what you do to your computer when you restart it.
Nice. Seven minutes of Dennett is perfect. Gives him no time to ramble as usual. Or am I just happy to see pretty pictures on his slides for the first time?
Very interesting comments here on humour.
Another ‘funny’ category is mimicking baby behaviour, Bill Cosby’s standard method. We are amused by gaucherie, because babies are gauche.
But these don’t address the function of humour – and nor, I suspect, does Dennett’s debug reward theory. I understand that PET studies have confirmed that women appear to be humour’s natural audience, while men are its natural creators – which by no means denigrates the many superb female comedians or suggests that men can’t have a laff.
But if their is a gender discrepancy, it points to a para-sexual function for humour, and goes some way to explaining the high value that women place on men who ‘make them laugh’.
What purpose would this serve? It seems to me that a facility with humour is a kind of intellectual dipstick. Above all, good comics are smart. Ridley Scott has said that he often uses professional comedians for serious parts, having found that their minds are agile enough to handle almost any role.
Sexual preference for funny men could be one of the main drivers for our hypertrophied cerebra.
That was really good, an interesting way to think about things.
This is humor according to Steven Pinker (paraphrasing):
Some expectations are set up – then the expectations are subverted in a quick shift of frame – and in the new frame, someone has lost their dignity.
Laughing is a universal primate signal for “I am not taking this seriously”. So the laughter that goes along with situations like this (the leader of the tribe just tripped on a rock and fell on his face) defuses potential violent conflicts. That is the selective benefit, I think. Since we have great imaginations we can come up with fictional stories that trigger this response more than any actual situations would have (supernormal response).
That sounds good to me, anyway.
That phrase alone just drew a chuckle from me. Even reading the format of a joke is funny. I love to laugh.
Maybe old news, but this is pretty freaking cool
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/17/2518756.htm
pzdummy:
… and more gibbering.
Evidence that even though creationists are intellectually challenged and dishonest and worthy of great disdain, there are much lower forms of life in the pond who nevertheless consider themselves human.
This one clearly has forgotten his medication. Don’t be surprised if he starts boasting about how he organised his forces to win the Battle of Austerlitz.
It’s too bad the quality of spam is so low; there’s not even anything to respond to :/
Dennis, get back on your meds you two-bit hack. Vicariously claiming the million dollar challenge is a really lame mental illness to have.
Are you… Satan?
Are you threatening my life there Dennis?
you are already DEAD, fuc*er
you have LOST YOUR SOUL, you idiot….
It’s when turds like this scumbag loon posting as pzdummy come squealing that I feel sorry for you all who don’t have Firefox and the Greasemonkey killfile.
I am seeing Daniel Dennett give a talk on Thursday here in London. I guess if I watch this now it would spoil it…. Damn you PZ, don’t do this to me – it’s so tempting to just press play!!
I contend that unless the soul is a physical manifestation in the body, I never had one to begin with.
Hey, can someone smite me and condemn me to hell. I’ll even pretend I have a soul if it helps.
*Sigh*
Can we just ignore the mentally ill ones until PZ mops up the vomit in the morning?
actually, he will be mopping up the blood of all you blaspheming atheists….
you all think you are safe *lying* behind your computers…
you are *deadly wrong*
…and you will pay the price with your SOULS
http://forums.about.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?tsn=1&nav=messages&webtag=ab-paranormal&tid=15900
See, all it takes to sell evolutionary psychology is the right salesman.
Ben Stein should have said: “Christianity leads to killing people.”
It would have made a lot more sense.
I’ve been waiting to read “Je suis Napoleon” since SamC suggested the crazy would morph into the French emperor. Suppose I’ll have to write it myself.
Or hope JESUS tells pzdummy to write it by manipulating his/her foil hat.
Oh, pzdummy, I’m so sorry. You missed New Troll Day (it was Friday). We’re not currently taking applications for new trolls. Have no fear, though. We’ll schedule another application deadline at some point. Give me your email and I’ll make sure to let you know when the next announcement gets put up–so as to make sure that you have plenty of time to get your application submitted on time.
Oh the pzdummy troll seems to be the crazy mabus person from the dungeon that explains everything. I guess he’s not going to be Napoleon I’m a little disappointed.
pzdummy is obviously a MORmON wearing his mad-gical mystery underwear which protect him while *lying* behind his computer.
delusional fool. I hear electroshock therapy can be helpful.
@ Chris Davis # 29 “But these don’t address the function of humour – and nor, I suspect, does Dennett’s debug reward theory. I understand that PET studies have confirmed that women appear to be humour’s natural audience, while men are its natural creators – which by no means denigrates the many superb female comedians or suggests that men can’t have a laff.”
I make this comment from a male heterosexual point of view, and it’s a quote I heard many years ago – if you can make them laugh, you can get them into bed. From an evolutionary standpoint, is any other reason necessary?
I’m seeing Dennett on the 25th March here in South Africa.
I was thinking of getting a pimp hat and asking him to wear it for a photo.
@Stumblingblock:
That would certainly make her more “pie”-ous, wouldn’t it ;)
Chris Richards @26:
Just because you do not understand Dennett and your attention span is too short, is no reason to fling unsupported accusations.
“Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life” by Dennett is brilliant and quoted by many, many scientists.
Dennett’s “Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon” and “Consciousness Explained” are deep philosophical studies that requite critical thinking by the reader.
So, Chris Richards, show us your studies that refute Dan Dennett’s ideas instead of ad hominem attacks.
Another case of counterintuitiveness. If heaven were to exist and contain gems of humanity like pzdumbass, I would relish hell.
Dennett is in London on Thursday? Fucksticks! I have tickets to see Mark Thomas* that night.
Louis
*Excellent comedian IMO, UKians in particular should check him out.
I’ll never forget accidentally bumping into Dr. Dennett at a neurophilosophy conference in Ottawa a few years ago. After apologizing, I turned to my friend, excitedly (almost giddy) and said, “Can you believe I just touched Charles Darwin?
He pretended not to hear me, but I’m pretty sure he did (along with our stifled giggling). Yes, we found the resemblance hilarious. So sue me.
There’s an interesting quote that I think says allot about the service performed by humor. When asked to define the two traditions of the theater, Mel Brooks said, “Tragedy is when I cut my finger, comedy is when you fall into a sewer mane and die.”
If we consider that laughter in chimps is a fear and submission response, not an expression of joy, I think it opens up some space in which to interpret Mr. Brooks’ comment. The first humor, developing as it likely did out of fear, must have been dark humor; laughing at misfortune and terror so as to maintain cognitive function. The physically taxing act of sustained laughter may have both distracted one from the primitive paralysis-response to fear, and increased one’s oxygen intake. Just like with crying, humor could have acted as a way to achieve a calm mind through exhaustion, and by doing so, give the laugh-er the proper distance from calamity to consider and learn from it. Considering this, one can begin to understand the mate-appeal of humor; a humorous person, one of ‘good humor’ is better equipped to deal with stress, better able to react to dangerous and frightening situations, and less likely to relieve stress physically, through violence.
These thoughts just occurred to me after having listened to Dennett and considered the Brooks quote, so they aren’t as fleshed out as they could be, but I think it’s an interesting line of inquiry.
One question – Could that hirsute beauty be Ann Coulter after she(?) skipped a monthly depilation?
Oh for crying out loud!!!
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Crash this stupid thing!
(scroll down, right hand side)
I’m confused. Am I going to PAY WITH MY SOUL or have I already LOST MY SOUL? That would be embarrassing, if the bill came and it turns out I lost my soul-wallet.
Geesh, they can’t even keep their hysterical invective straight.
Dear PZDummy… you forgot to condemn ME to hell and I feel left out. Besides, I was gonna bring mini quiche and make pina coladas, and now our little party in hell will be doing without them, since I clearly didn’t get my invitation.
Mabus is really going to town this morning. He must have missed his medication.
Wow just noticed that Dan Dennett is actually Charles Darwin, either reincarnated or Darwin never actually died and Dennett is just his new public persona :)
Crash this stupid thing!
(scroll down, right hand side)
“Do You Believe In Evolution?”
“Yes” = 47%
“No” = 51%
Decline to say = 2%
O, Canada? I thought you people were smarter than that…
“There’s No Such Thing As An Inside Joke.”
“There’s No Such Thing As An Inside Joke.”
When we finally have universal health care, people like pzdummy will be able to afford their medication and attacks like this will go away.
“Our next contestant in this year’s ‘Papa’ Darwin Look-Alike Competition hails from Boston, Massachusetts…”
Further to Julian’s post, I get the notion sometimes that laughing at another’s misfortune is an indicator that you are relieved that bad things don’t happen only to you. In other words, you are expressing relief in the reminder that you are part of a group in which the burdens of survival are shared.
NewEnglandBob (#55)
This is followed by chiding the other poster for making the supposedly ad-hominem argument that Dennett is wrong. Hm.
Without some more information, this is just an appeal to authority. Now, if those scientists are doing research that confirms Dennett’s claims, that’s another matter, and I’d be interested in hearing the details.
Don’t get me wrong, I like what I’ve seen of Dennett, but let’s be rational if we’re going to defend him.
Yeah, I don’t know about that.
Ovid compiled a collection of (largely Greek) myths in Metamorphoses which tell of, surprise, animals changing into other animals, and humans turning into animals and into inanimate objects. The fact is that it is not so hard to see the similarities between quadrupeds, birds, and terrestrial bipeds, and a number of myths reflect this fact.
The whole bit about machines not reproducing themselves, and animals reproducing themselves imperfectly, was also noted in the myths. It was not astonishing to many that animals might evolve into other animals. Remember, it wasn’t that much earlier than Darwin that people still believed that “lower animals” were spontaneously generated by rotting meat and other icky stuff.
And few, if any, ancient myths actually tell of some great “artificer” creating life. In Genesis, god is a sculptor, but then breathes the “magic of life” into Adam. It is not a story of design, save as a sculptor, life was simply conferred. Many myths have similar tales, or involve reproduction and often very rapid metamorphoses.
It is with Newton, the “Age of Reason,” and later, the industrial revolution, that “god the designer” appears in any definite sense. Frankenstein and his monster are tales of the “modern age,” not of earlier times when life was seen as special and vitalistic. The IDiots are a product not of an earlier age of spirituality and of religion, rather are far closer to Mary Shelley and her tale of the monster.
Dennett went back in time, but not very far. Natural selection may be counterintuitive to humanity (though Empedocles had a crude version of it), but transformations redolent of evolutionary change are not. Now I cannot deny that there are many today who find evolution to be counterintuitive, the thought that the magic of life could magically shift and change is not at all foreign to most of human intellectual history.
Dennett should not take the West, and particularly the US, as if these represent humanity. They do not, and many cultures and religions have found it to be relatively easy to integrate into their worldviews.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
Just to be more clear, I change the last sentence of #73:
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
Treppenwitz @72
I have reason to state that he does not understand Dennet when he writes:
because that is not what he does at all. How can someone call his ideas “oversimplified” when he spends 500 pages on a topic? Clearly this person has not really read Dennett’s books (ad hominem) or he does not understand them.
Now your assertion:
is nonsense. I have read several of Dennett’s books and so have many scientists. The supporting date is in the books. Go read them for more information and also go read the hundreds of references Dennett has made and the many articles and books that have discussed Dennett’s ideas.
That was a really great explanation.
You did! :-)
Schaden = damage, Freude = joy.
Huh? It would still have been processed by the part of the audience that isn’t into men. Like, a bit under half. :-|
Nope. “Sweet” is the way we react to the way sugars are.
Same for me.
The good man sits in Canada. You can lead him to medication, but you can’t make him take it…
If humor evolved to impress the ladies, then how come Barney Fife isn’t a sex symbol?
NewEnglandBob @ 75
Looking at the rest of his post (I originally only had in mind the part you quoted in your other post), I agree that your statement has some justification. PZ encourages some ad-hom in any case, so I guess it’s a moot point.
Maybe I’m just being pedantic, but I maintain that “lots of scientists quote Dennett” (paraphrasing) doesn’t really say anything about whether his arguments are sound. I’m not disputing the claim that his arguments have empirical support.
For what it’s worth, I’m not out to get Dennett or anything. I’m currently reading Freedom Evolves and, while I’m not far enough into the book to say whether I agree with him on the issue of free will, I’m finding it an interesting and challenging read.
Treppenwitz @78:
Yes, Freedom Evolves is a very difficult read. I read it during October ’08 and my take was “Some rehash of his & others’ books. World is deterministic with free will. Terrific last 2 chapters”
Am I the only one who finds it amusing that this malignant growth chose to bleep the “k” – presumably for the sake of propriety and politeness – in a sentence like that?
No, evidently for the sake of evading the imaginary language filter.
Chris Davis @ #29
If women are the natural audience for humor, then why is so much of it specifically aimed at 12 year old boys??
Drew (#65) and Pierce R. Butler (#70):
I guess at least y’all probably won’t sue me…
(see comment #58)
;)
I often think Dan Dennett is the most underrated of the horsemen. He seems to come at things with such curiosity! Anyway, I love him and hope to see and read more of him on Pharyngula.
I’m not sure I agree with this talk. Although, I agree with the idea, in general. I have some gripes about the specifics.
Dennet seems to imply that preference is prior to qualia. Preference is the qualia. The sensation and the impulse are identical expressions of the same thing observed from a different perspective.
A second issue, Loosely, Dennet says we find sugar to be sweet because our brain is telling us to prefer sugar, and men find women attractive, because our brains are telling men to prefer women, but the experience of finding something sweet and being attracted to a woman, are very very different sensations. The mere biological necessity of these different stimuli, is insufficient to explain the marked difference in the qualia, and thus insufficient to account for sensation. It cannot just be a difference in the degree to which each is needed, because this would mean a little bit of sugar would feel like seeing an attractive woman or vice-versa. They still have a … qualitative … difference regardless of quantity.
The only two explanations I can think of for differences in sensations that are both equally preferred and important, is
#1 Historical/Evolutionary Contingency, #2 Detailed information is being communicated through variation in sensation.
#1 just says that we have different sensations of different needs because these needs evolved at different times and thus end up lumped into different neural pathways. #2 Says that sugar tastes different than sex because we don’t want men to get confused and start eating women.
In truth, it is probably a combination of the two, but neither really tell me why sugar has this *particular* taste.
For example, it seems utterly intuitive that when I see something positioned to the right side of my body, it appears on the opposite side of my visual field from something positioned on the left side of my body. In other words, the information from the sensation follows directly from the content of sensation.
But there is no such obvious explanation for why sweet things taste like sweet things and salty things taste like salty things. Why couldn’t sweet things and salty things taste identical? We prefer them both.
In the case of vision, the variations in kind are so obvious they hardly bear explanation and in the case of taste the differences are utterly inexplicable. This is what I mean by Dennet’s explanation being insufficient.