Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site rochester.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxn!ihnp4!qantel!dual!vecpyr!lll-crg!gymble!umcp-cs!seismo!rochester!nemo From: nemo@rochester.UUCP Newsgroups: net.math Subject: Humor (short) Message-ID: <12076@rochester.UUCP> Date: Fri, 4-Oct-85 16:49:53 EDT Article-I.D.: rocheste.12076 Posted: Fri Oct 4 16:49:53 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 7-Oct-85 05:32:51 EDT Sender: nemo@rochester.UUCP Organization: U. of Rochester, CS Dept. Lines: 23 From: Richard Newman-Wolfe Since I lost the original articles, and I thought the posters might be interested in a very readable, thought-provoking book that eloquently states many arguments in the previous articles, I am posting this reference. The book in question, which starts with a ~100 page essay on humor, is Arthur Koestler's _The_Act_of_Creation_, published by Dell Pub. Co., NY 1964. Both the assertion that humor (and creativity itself) rely on parallel interpretation structures ("two habitually incompatible associative contexts") and that laughter is a release of emotion occurring from the rejection by reason of the jump from one to the other. The emotions that have too much 'inertia' to follow this jump are "self-assertive, aggressive- defensive type, which are based on the sympathico-adrenal system and tend to beget bodily activity." Nemo -- Internet: nemo@rochester.arpa UUCP: {decvax, allegra, seismo, cmcl2}!rochester!nemo Phone: [USA] (716) 275-5766 school 232-4690 home USMail: 104 Tremont Circle; Rochester, NY 14608 School: Department of Computer Science; University of Rochester; Rochester, NY 14627