From our Practical News Desk: Scientists have learned chimpanzees will laugh at things they don’t find funny. Just like people who will laugh in order to share the moment, even when the moment isn’t funny, chimps will laugh in order to bond with each other and no doubt optimize their evolutionary progress in order to whip us up in the next generation–or two.
Laugh at that, you puny man.
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How do you know whether a chimp finds something funny or not?
That’s the big question, isn’t it.
I heard this news on NPR’s “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me.” Everyone laughed, and then we laughed harder when we realized someone could easily accuse us of thinking it wasn’t funny. It’s a catch-22 of sorts.
Chimps are thought to laugh, (like humans), because some human assigned a human characteristic to something expressed in a sound the chimps made. So, if something we humans saw was funny to us…and the chimps were making a “sound”….we labeled it laughing.
Gosh, Lars, haven’t you watched chimps on TV and in movies? You must have heard all the “hee…hee….hees and the har har hars and of course you couldn’t miss the GAFAWs!!!!!!” And at Christmas time, there is the seasonal, “HO HO HOs”.
Now Lars, don’t you feel a little silly not knowing when your little relations are in a good, happy, silly mood???? titter, titter, sneee-hee-hee…….
You know, I’ve never found chimps funny. At all. When I watch monkeys or apes of any kind, mostly I feel sorry for them, unless they’re filmed in the wild, in which case I’m not much interested in the first place.
I find that people laugh at my jokes three times, once when I tell it out of politeness. Again when I explain it, out of politeness. Yet again a week or so later in the wee hours of the night when it suddenly clicks.
Since Jane Goodall, (?spelling), gave us “Born Free” and all that good stuff…I’ve never had much use for that branch of the family tree……
Monkey-fites claim the little darlings are so much like us, which of couse proves we are just a hop, skip and a tiny genetic jump from them. They imply that if you open your mind a little, you can see that chimps are really just really hairy, little humans with a language we must learn.
They grasp things like us, they smile and laugh like us, they mate like us, (only more often, with many different mates and in “public” view.), they socialize like us, etc….etc….
Often, however, the children of Darwin forget to mention that monkeys are frequent cannibals, are even more vicious in their socializing than we ever imagined and even “tamed”, humanized monkeys will bite their “masters”, trainers, and any REAL human being! There are recorded stories that relate how chimpsa have actually killed humans that they had a hate on for.
I’ve never really liked the little monsters and never found them at all cute! I’ve had contact with chimps and some other kind of small monkey. None of them smell good to me or those I’ve been with. They are dangerous, (Never turn your back on a monkey!), unpredictable and loud. If I never get near one again, I’ll be happy.
So, there, I’ve exposed myself to the world as being a monkey-file. Reagan was only trying to get his name in lights when he and Bonzo were buddies.
And finally, remember, King Kong did not have pure intentions for Fay Ray!
Someone once explained to me that evolution teaches that all species are evolving to become more adapted to their environment. If that is true, noting that apes are much more adapted with no need for clothes or shoes, then in reality men are evolving into monkeys.