The Comic Imagination
by Greg on Mar.19, 2009, under Science Event
“Humor,” E. B. White tells us, “can be dissected as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind.” We’ll test White’s tongue-in-cheek observation, as we consider the development of comic theory in the works of Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Baudelaire, Freud, Bergson, and others. What draws us, again and again, to the comic? How might humor work as an adaptive survival skill that allows us to better cope with experience? And what happens when the comic and the tragic share closet space (and borrow each other’s clothes)? Some of the most potent humor in literature and entertainment is closely intertwined with sorrow and rage. (Even the existentially paralyzed Hamlet takes time for humorous asides.) A panel of writers and entertainers will address W.C. Fields’ observation: “I never saw anything funny that wasn’t terrible.”
:bruce mccall, lewis black, philoctetes
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Science, media, art, movies, politics, and what else I find interesting tweeting and reading on the internet. And ITP.
Nasa's Image of the Day
Large X-class Flare Erupts on the Sun
On Jan. 27, 2012, a large X-class flare erupted from an active region near the solar west limb. X-class flares are the most powerful of all solar events. Seen here is an image of the flare captured by the X-ray telescope on Hinode. This image shows an emission from plasma heated to greater than eight million degrees during the energy release process of the flare. Image Credit: JAXA/Hinode
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