Laughter

This is not a topic aimed at LaughingMan, despite him surely having a thing or two to say... I'm really aiming this at Fixed Cross, Lyssa, Satyr or anyone else who has a good knowledge of ancient medical psycho-physiological system such as the Ayurveda etc. Or possibly even some of the psychoanalytic literature.

What role does laughter play in the overall maintenance of the psycho-physical well-being of the organism? We know that laughter is an expression of excess energy. By why does it come to and is expended more frequently by some organisms than others? Why is it expressed in times of inner moral conflict (such as soldiers gunning down 'terrorists' whom they can barely see in a modern battlefront)? Is there something to do with a blockage of certain meridian channels and pranic energy not being able to flow appropriately? Does it have any relationship with the psychoanalytical concept of armour, described in the Jan Fries book Helrunar that Fixed Cross linked to?

Laughter is the releasing of repressed nervous energy.
In comedy, or when we laugh at another, it is a recognition of a possible plight which afflicts another.
That it might me our own fate, but is not, is perceived as a relief.
Usually the plight is unexpected, expressing the infinite unknown, possibilities that might affect us.

Only an organism with a deeper perceptual-event-horizon, the imagination to project forward and to sample backwards, can experience the comedy/tragedy of the existential condition: an ordering within a chaotic world of uncertainties.

Why is this in the Palaistra?

The Palaistra is for all thing fitness/health related. Laughter expressed as a release of repressed nervous energy is surely good for the health/mental fitness of the overall organism.

If that's the case then I've been getting a lot of exercise lately.

I remember reading a piece you wrote on modern day comedians and how they appeal to the democratic issue of the time, appealing to the mass. Did you contrast them with comedians from Ancient times or those from a few decades ago? Anyway, I can't take modern comedians seriously anymore, although I never really did enjoy laughing purely because everyone else was laughing and laughter is infectious.

SuperfluousMass wrote:

I remember reading a piece you wrote on modern day comedians and how they appeal to the democratic issue of the time, appealing to the mass. Did you contrast them with comedians from Ancient times or those from a few decades ago? Anyway, I can't take modern comedians seriously anymore, although I never really did enjoy laughing purely because everyone else was laughing and laughter is infectious.

I think the only real difference is quantity of ambitious comedians, and the quality of the audience they must appeal to.

In the ancient world only the best works got to be presented to the public; today every stage with an open-mike is available to any wannabe ambitious "funny man", and the audience, being of a lower caliber, must be fed what it can comprehend - if you want to make it big, that is.

Then again, I have no clue what I am talking about...as is evident by my recent defeat...so never-mind.
Alls good....the best comedy is today, and the audience is more sophisticated than it was before.