Laughter According to Hobbes...

Camden Goddard
While sitting here, remembering the funny moments that happen to have found their way into my life, sorting through those that have left an imprint into the deep depths of my most fond memories, sudden new thoughts occur as to why I thought these particular incidents amusing. Now looking back, I do not instantly feel the inevitable and almost seemingly involuntary form and expression of pure happiness to which most associate the term and action of “laughing”. Upon reading Thomas Hobbes, the roots behind what makes me smile and laugh now would seem almost cruel in many instances.

Hobbes writes, “sudden glory is the passion which maketh those grimaces called laughter; and is caused either by some sudden act of their own that pleases them; or by the apprehension of some deformed thing in another, by comparison of which they suddenly applaud themselves.”

Upon reading this, I directly apply my thoughts to memories of extensive laughter that have recently come over me. In one instance, I find that laughter comes many of times in situations where things or people have disadvantages, or when “emotion arises from a strained expectation suddenly reduced to nothing” (Kant). On many of these occasions, simply because laughter comes as an “instinctive-like” reaction, we fail to realize we demean, or belittle others, as we act by “observing the imperfections of other men” (Hobbes). Therefore, “laughter at the defects of others is a sign of pusillanimity,” and truly demeans oneself in the end (Hobbes). After all, “the wise man does not laugh without trembling” when he realizes that laughter may fall under the classification of a sin(Baudelaire).