Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!att!dptg!rutgers!apple!claris!sts!octopus!avsd!childers From: childers@avsd.UUCP (Richard Childers) Newsgroups: news.admin Subject: Smileys Vs. Humor Message-ID: <2019@avsd.UUCP> Date: 30 Aug 89 12:49:46 GMT References: <434@tp2.Waterloo.NCR.COM> <948@utoday.UUCP> <5862@ficc.uu.net> <949@utoday.UUCP> <2006@avsd.UUCP> <951@utoday.UUCP> Reply-To: childers@avsd.UUCP (Richard Childers) Organization: Metaprogrammers International Lines: 58 greenber@utoday.UUCP (Ross M. Greenberg) writes: >Richard: it was a joke! I understand this. But I didn't laugh last time it was brought up, either. If you don't want such a thing to happen, you don't bring up a topic. The presence of a smiley does not necessarily indicate the _presence_ of humor, so much as it does the _intent_ of humor, which is an entirely separate thing. Humor is used as a method of superficiality as much as it is used to share an insight or relieve the pain of the moment. As a matter of fact, I agree with many anthropologists and psychologists whom classify most humor as 'laughing at the expense of another'. Example : "Give me those scissors, I want to see if I can cut this fiber-optic building-to-building trunk, just for the hell of it. (-:" What ? Nobody's laughing ? Why not ? Certainly, there is an element of shock value in such a thing, which could be misinterpreted as humor - but try reading it a few times and I think you'll find the humor draining out of the phrase rapidly. ( Perhaps this is a truism, that 'true' humor is funny every time you encounter it, while 'false' humor is only funny once. For purposes of possible future discussions, I will classify these two types of humor, tenatively, as 'wry' and 'malicious'. ) If you bring up the topic, and stand to benefit from it, then you will probably encounter a degree of flack, as people will naturally be curious as to why _you_ brought it up, instead of another. Example : >Ross M. Greenberg >UNIX TODAY! 594 Third Avenue New York New York 10016 >Review Editor Voice:(212)-889-6431 BBS:(212)-889-6438 >uunet!utoday!greenber BIX: greenber MCI: greenber CIS: 72461,3212 I will see what I can do about laughing at the pain of others. Obviously, I am a severely emotionally crippled individual. (-: Perhaps the furor over the use of the maps for targeting sites with sales materials specific to the UNIX community was funny, in retrospective. But the idea of it becoming 'appropriate' is not. And any humor I might perceive is directly derived from the fact that some people were so hurt by such an apparently trivial thing, so angered over their abstractions ... and that's not really that funny, if you think about it. -- richard -- * Truth : the most deadly weapon ever discovered by humanity. Capable of * * destroying entire perceptual sets, cultures, and realities. Outlawed by * * all governments everywhere. Possession is normally punishable by death. * * ..{amdahl|decwrl|octopus|pyramid|ucbvax}!avsd.UUCP!childers@tycho *