Abstract
This chapter explores the relationship between laughter and the body through the philosophies of Kant, Schopenhauer and Bergson. Kant draws attention to the physicality of laughter and suggests that it has a soothing effect on the body, which needs to recuperate periodically from reason’s blows. His theory inadvertently throws into question the sharp demarcation between the physical and intellectual that he himself draws. Schopenhauer rips apart the wedge that Kant’s philosophy had begun to crack open. The world of representation is an illusion that we cast over a world that is far from stable. Schopenhauer’s philosophy is funny when the body intrudes forcibly on the life of the intellect. Yet his theory of laughter is limited to the problems of conceptualization that occur when we lump different circumstances in a single category and the ridiculous nature of our concepts is exposed. Bergson devotes his attention to one facet of laughter and the comic: namely the awkwardness of exaggerated bodily mechanism, which precludes the possibility of flexible adaptation to circumstances. When life parodies lifelessness in the midst of life, it becomes comedic.
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Notes
- 1.
Dale Jacquette also notes that the standard view of the nature of reality is that there is a unitary “external world” which Schopenhauer resolutely denies. See Jacquette 2005, p. 12.
- 2.
Robert Wicks points out that Schopenhauer rejects Kant’s categories of the understanding with the exception of causality since all others confuse abstract reason with the kind of intuitive understanding that we share with animals. Causality is also the only category that relates to space and time. See Wicks 2008.
- 3.
Schopenhauer outlines his idea of the principle of sufficient reason which states that for any condition there is an explanation, even if it is unknown to human beings. He asserts that his theory identifies four kinds of reasons which in his view are exhaustive: physical things are explained by causal reasons, relationships between concepts are explained by logic, relationships between numbers are explained by geometrical and mathematical reasons and motivations can be illuminated by psychological explanations. Once we have chosen what is to be explained we must choose one of these methods. See FR 214.
- 4.
Hannan also points out that all changes in nature come about as a result of inexplicable natural forces. See Hannan 2009, p. 33.
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Froese, K. (2017). We Have a Body!: Kant, Schopenhauer and Bergson. In: Why Can’t Philosophers Laugh?. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-55044-2_2
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