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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><b>From:</b> extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org> <b>On Behalf Of </b>William Flynn <br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [ExI] and women<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Comic Sans MS";color:black'>Thanks for your support. I agree that many terrible jokes are truly funny. bill w<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>On Thu, Oct 31, 2019 at 12:15 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Comic Sans MS";color:black'>Very, very often jokes are about fear. </span><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Comic Sans MS"'>…<span style='color:black'><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Comic Sans MS";color:black'>bill w<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>This is a good day (in the US) for this topic to come up, for the single annual festival perhaps most associated with humor is today, Halloween. Look around at the costumes, and note how many of them have to do with death and dying, then note in popular culture how many Hollywood products have that as a theme. Then compare with actual life. How much death and dying do we see? Damn little. Ignore death by all natural causes and think about the death costumes, many of which relate to predators (we don’t have those anymore) crime (such as an axe in the head (very rare in most cases today)) war deaths (we don’t really have that (or if so, we don’t really see it here)) and once you consider that, think about it.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>I am not a primate expert, but BillW might know. A primatologist suggested that the origins of laughter might be a modification of the primate all-clear signal. A group of chimps have an alarm call for when a leopard is spotted (aaaaaaack aaaack aaaack) but a leopard knows better than to attack a group of chimps, so when he moves on, the chimps have a kind of oo oo oo oo eh eh eh eh sound they make.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>OK now look at these photos: Haunted house, something jumps out, camera takes a photo, tourist buy silly pictures of themselves, money is made, cool. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/haunted-house-reactions_n_5921790">https://www.huffpost.com/entry/haunted-house-reactions_n_5921790</a><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>OK think about what happens about 2 seconds after these are taken. The couple or group is all laughing their asses off. If the camera could take another picture two seconds later, everybody would be laughing at themselves and having fun. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Perhaps that theory is a modified primate all-clear has merit. BillW?<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>If so, we might be on the way to explaining some of our darker humor. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>spike<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div></body></html>