From: T0Morrow@aol.com
Date: Thu Jan 23 1997 - 13:06:41 MST
Sunah.Caroline.Cherwin@pobox.com writes:
>>You might enjoy the experience of making more challenging jokes.
>to a more curious crowd.
I don't get it. What do you mean?
I've given some more thought to humor, and posted a revised version of my
essay, "On the Importance of Silliness" off of the T0Mpage cited below.
Here's the punchline:
I suggest that <EM>humor, like inoculation, generates anti-memes</EM>.
Though the exact causal mechanism remains unclear (as do the causes of humor
itself) I theorize that making a meme the butt of jokes transmits it in
enfeebled form. Just as inoculations prepare our immune systems for
potentially worse things, silliness can introduce a meme while simultaneously
stripping it of authority.
(Heh. Get it, Sunah.Caroline.Cherwin?)
T.0. Morrow
V.P. and Director, ExI
t0morrow@aol.com
http://members.aol.com/t0morrow/T0Mpage.HTML
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