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Humour (Commonwealth English) or humor (American English) is the tendency of experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement.The term derives from the humoral medicine of the ancient Greeks, which taught that the balance of fluids in the human body, known as humours (Latin: humor, "body fluid"), controlled human health and emotion.
Laughter is a pleasant physical reaction and emotion consisting usually of rhythmical, usually audible contractions of the diaphragm and other parts of the respiratory system. It is a response to certain external or internal stimuli. Laughter can rise from such activities as being tickled, [1] or from humorous stories, imagery, videos or ...
Relief theory suggests humor is a mechanism for pent-up emotions or tension through emotional relief. In this theory, laughter serves as a homeostatic mechanism by which psychological stress is reduced [1] [3] [8] Humor may thus facilitate ease of the tension caused by one's fears, for example.
The "world's funniest joke" is a term used by Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire in 2002 to summarize one of the results of his research.For his experiment, named LaughLab, he created a website where people could rate and submit jokes. [1]
Zeuxis, a 5th-century BC Greek painter, is said to have died laughing at the humorous way in which he painted an old woman. [10]Chrysippus, also known as "the man who died from laughing at his joke", an influential 3rd-century BC Greek Stoic philosopher, reportedly died of laughter after he saw a donkey eating his fermented figs; he told a slave to give the donkey undiluted wine to wash them ...
Laughter can evolve as a medium for self-preservation, detaching the individual from any adversity faced allowing for perceived control over uncomfortable situations. [ 9 ] Sad clown paradox is characterised by a cyclothymic temperament , which encourages the creation of light-hearted humour in a professional setting, despite inner turmoil. [ 10 ]
To understand laughter in humans and other primates, the science of gelotology (from the Greek gelos, meaning laughter) has been established; it is the study of laughter and its effects on the body from both a psychological and physiological perspective. While jokes can provoke laughter, laughter cannot be used as a one-to-one marker of jokes ...
The Funniest Joke in the World" (also "Joke Warfare" and "Killer Joke") is a Monty Python comedy sketch revolving around a joke that is so funny that anyone who reads or hears it promptly dies from laughter. Ernest Scribbler (Michael Palin), a British "manufacturer of jokes", writes the joke on a piece of paper only to die laughing.