This past Wednesday, I made it over to the CUNY Philosophy Colloquium at the Graduate Center. The speaker was Pierre Destrée from the Université catholique de Louvain in Belgium. I believe he is over at Princeton this semester. He is a specialist in ancient philosophy and on this past Wednesday he presented a paper dealing with Aristotle on humor.
It has been awhile since I have read Aristotle. I was never a devotee to ancient philosophy, though I do find myself more intrigued with Aristotle than I do Plato. Both played a large roll in getting this thing rolling. So I attended with the thought that this would be something light, and in a certain respect it was. There were a few jokes shared from Aristotle's time. I believe at least one of which was from Aristotle's works. That said it was an interesting discussion.
Aristotle's ideas on humor as per the talk focus on witticism. He is interested in humor derived from the spoken. He seems not interested in slapstick or physical humor. Ultimately it goes to his ethics, of pursuing that which is higher. Happiness is not gained via amusement, but through contemplation. And with that, humor is that which is witty. It is a play of words, of ideas, it is a challenge. It requires understanding and response. Is one up to the task of responding to another's witticism?
I myself am much more a fan of such humor as opposed to slapstick, so I sympathized with the Destrée's offerings regarding Aristotle. I found it kind of worked with my recollection of Aristotle. The significance of the mean and of balance cannot be stressed enough in Aristotle's ethics. That is my memory.
Destrée went on to introduce the concept of play or playfulness to this discussion. A joke or witticism works because of the play of words, both their relations, and their tensions. Likewise, between the parties engaged, witticism requires both parties to speak and to listen, and in such there is a component of give and take, of play.
It would seem that a joke is an imbalance and the laughter that follows such balances it. Often in using one's wit, there is typically a butt of the joke. Someone is being made fun of, belittled. There are various intents here and again, balance is the sound approach. You may want to make a point but you do not want humiliate. You do not want to cause harm. There are various situations, cases, no doubt but in general, with friends, family, coworkers. . . you do not want to cause pain. In short, you moderate and watch what you say. Playfulness and balance in humor complement each other.
Yet, I look at some of my favorite comedians and they are provocative. They do not watch what they say. They let it all hang out and they are proud of it. Even there, however, it is calculated. They in most cases know they provoke. Both your playful banter with a co-worker and Chris Rock's recent act both involve what is said, what is heard, a speaker and an audience. Each involves a balance or mean. Chris Rock simply goes a little further than you do, and the result is typically a little more laughter and more. He challenges and provokes a little more than one typically does at work or at the dinner table. Both illustrate Aristotle's point.
For myself, this reference to play did perk my ears up. It reminded me of Gadamer and his text, Truth and Method. Gadamer, a German philosopher, does acknowledge an interest in ancient philosophy. It is seen in his writings, but I did not appreciate the connection of play to Aristotle. In Truth and Method, another text that I read awhile back, Gadamer starts by looking at the relation of the artist to his tradition. The artist is trained and uses a certain set of tools that originate from a tradition or school, which he is part of.
Whether it be impressionism, dadaism, or manga, an artist will start somewhere and respond to that starting point, and that process is an act of play. There is an element of the social and cultural in this process. The same can be seen here. Perhaps more so as the humorous, the witty remark, involves and even requires us to speak and listen to each other. And to do it well requires that we consider both the other person(s) and the words we use. The playfulness and the mean are present.
This step, however, leads to two interesting points. The first is that a joke, a witticism, can in fact not involve language, and number two the contemplation of ideas or at least witticism is not the ideal, it is not required for happiness.
Let me start with number one. Chris Rock is an eloquent speaker. he speaks the language of the streets, of the family, of the political. And he does enjoy mixing them up. At the height of his riffing, however, he often does not speak, he rolls his eyes, or lifts an eyebrow. He often in his stand-up uses his body to convey the point. His witticism is often with more than language and sometimes even without language. It is the eye rolling or the lift of an eyebrow that makes us laugh. We can imagine Rock physically responding to his comments, literally tripping over his own words.
If this is true, then perhaps witticism is not the ideal form of humor. Perhaps it is but a tradition, which Aristotle favored. Perhaps slapstick is just the other end of the continuum and some comedians use words, some do not, and some use a mix. Perhaps play in a certain sense is more the key to happiness. It is play that allows one to go from the serious to the not, to the significant or ideal to the absurd. Play is to recreate, which is often what we do in work.
Sadly, I am limited regarding either of these concepts tonight, and likewise regarding Gadamer and Aristotle, but it is a delicious brew.
A few steps further. . .
With a lack of deep understanding or not, I continue to my next topic: Metaphor.
Jokes, witticism if you will, and metaphor both involve the play of words. Metaphor and humor, witticism, both involve the subtle and at times not so subtle substitution of a word or words. Aristotle does take note of this. Destrée points us to a passage in Aristotle's Poetics illustrating as much. I had pondered such things when reading Donald Davidson and Richard Rorty, who in their explorations of the concept of truth, did arrive at metaphor. In short they looked to metaphor as new or novel language. Metaphor for them was language that was used in a new or novel way.
As I said, some jokes, some witticisms, provoke. Chris Rock's material will probably provoke more than the witticism one engages in office banter. Now the question is does metaphor or witticism lead to truth? Throughout the talk I was thinking of one of the last songs on Eminem's, "The Eminem Show" album, a song titled "Say what you say". In that song is a verse that has just haunted me since hearing it. "But a lot of truth is said in jest".
And there is some truth in that assertion. If you are proposing something that you are not sure about, you introduce it often as a joke, a long shot, something that though not likely, you still had to share. Sometimes it is the option that you really do want. On that Wednesday while listening to this discussion of Aristotle, I had a particular case in mind. Specifically, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and his suggested embrace of the 25th Amendment. I could easily imagine him, with a dash of sarcasm, saying such. And I have heard that explanation. It would have allowed him to quickly rule out that option, or introduce it.
So we have a joke which is true, a joke that could could be explored or embraced as a proper solution to a problem. It has some element of truth. Sadly, Destrée was not having it. Or at least not in this discussion of Aristotle and humor. My limited knowledge and recollections of Aristotle had caught unprepared. It is a challenge to raise your hand in such a setting. When do you know something? More importantly, how do you talk of such when you do not know? Regardless, I did raise the issue, minus a knowledge of Aristotle, and likewise the attribution to Eminem.
Since Wednesday, the question has gotten me to do a few searches on Google, and pull out my The Basic Works of Aristotle. A nice bound volume but too nice to seriously start carrying around with me as I do today. I simply destroy books on my train ride to and from Manhattan.
More importantly, I have also arrived at some idea, some further thoughts on the subject. I believe I recall knowing that Aristotle did not attribute truth to metaphor. and in the last few days, I have arrived at theory. a fragile theory as to why Destrée was not having it, why Aristotle would not consider a joke or witticism to be true. The solution I believe is his metaphysics, where he focuses on substance. . . essence.
I think I heard the following joke in the course of Wednesday evening: It seems that the Academy had defined human as being a featherless biped. Shortly after arriving at such someone threw into the school's courtyard a plucked duck or chicken. Now, I know the Academy is Plato's school, perhaps it was the Lyceum. Perhaps I did not hear that joke on Wednesday night. Not sure where else I would have heard it though. Regardless, the joke is that if a man is defined as a featherless biped, than the object thrown in the courtyard is a man.
The point is that such concepts thrive in both Aristotle and Plato. What is it "to be" something? In the above case, what is it to be human? What is an object's essence? Yes, Plato is intrigued with the "forms", which Aristotle challenges. That said, Aristotle does embrace ideas about substance, and further, for him to know is to know and understand substance.
The above joke illustrates the challenge. For Aristotle, the joke points to or brings those those who are considering ideas such as "featherless bipeds" to reconsider their position. It only points to or brings them to reexamine or reconsider. It does not determine truth or falsity. It can only point one to the court where such truths are determined, but it cannot enter that court. The joke seems to get you to the courthouse, but not to the courtroom.
For myself the joke, (which is the retelling of an act, which is interesting in itself), illustrates the falsity of the claim or the inadequate nature of the claim. The joke is sufficient to challenge the claim that man is a featherless biped, as it illustrates that this chicken devoid of its feathers is now likewise a man. The joke illustrates that the definition is too broad, and with that it moves the conversation and search for a new solution. At the very least it allows us to remove items from consideration. It is a tool that can be used in knowledge acquisition and is truth-determinant.
Things are starting to get complicated. with the introduction of knowledge, truth, and substance. and there are several thousand years of discussions involving such. each of these have evolved. My appeal to a courtroom, to a formal setting that determines what is known, what is true and what is false, is appealing. Yet, the use of a joke as a thought-experiment to determine truth is also appealing. In short, there is a tension regarding whether metaphor, and humor, witticism, are truth-determinant. Probably, such questions as I raise will be contingent upon how you define knowledge and truth, and their relation to substance.
So much for a light evening, but again this is all a playful affair!
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