According to Inside jokes (Hurley et al., MIT Press, 2011), humor is likely an evolved reward for shifting the target of our idea-driven just-in-time spreading-activation (JITSA). If so, media-assisted solutions to the adaptive-evolution of institutional-cultures ala Learning to eat soup with a knife (Nagle, U. Chicago Press, 2005) will likely have to take this into account.
In other words: our collective skill at comedy may prove to be a key element of our path to a sustainable future, since comedians are among the few who can give us a visceral reward now (to accompany the benefits that we and our offspring might get long-term) for cleverly changing our tune. Moreover the capacity for mirth is a tool with which humans are especially well-equipped.
N'est pas?
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