Laughing at Laughter

We have all heard the phrase "laughter is contagious" and I am sure all of us have experienced this phenomenon many times throughout our lives. I recently witnessed one such example, but this specific instance was a tad bit different than what I had become accustomed to.

To me, it always seemed like laughter's contagious tendency was put into effect when one individual found something humorous, but others did not. Said individual would begin laughing, which would signal to the others that this thing indeed is funny and their laughter would soon follow. Never did I actually believe that the individual's laughter itself was what caused the others to take up the act, but just a catalyst used to reveal the true humorous nature of the thing in question.

My perceptions on the subject have recently been altered due an incident in one of my lectures this past week. While writing on the whiteboard, a professor of mine quite suddenly and without warning began to laugh. It was quite obvious that the cause of this laughter was unknown to all of us students because no one else was joining in. This also made it impossible for his laughter to make the cause seem more funny to us because we had no idea what the cause was. But as the professor continued to laugh and laugh, we found ourselves beginning to join in. Not because suddenly the cause had become clear (that will forever remain a mystery), but simply because he was laughing. There is no other way to put this experience then that we were laughing at laughter.

I have now become convinced the contagious ability of laughter is not a signal for others to think something is funny, but instead stems from the fact that laughter is inherently humorous. Even without cause, the sound of laughter is amusing enough to us that it can cause us too to start laughing. So whenever you find yourself cracking up, but cannot seem to find the reason why, I would bet that someone had already initiated the laughing and you were simply a helpless victim to the most powerful contagion known to man.

Everything is Not How it Seems

This weekend I found myself in the Harris Medical Emergency Room. Before anyone starts to worry, I was there simply to observe the physicians, not because I was sick or injured in anyway. While I know people will be both comforted by my safety and disappointed by the lack of excitement, I will still try and continue with the story as best I can, even without the added danger and suspense. No my time in the ER did not include either, but was rather filled with realization that many of my preconceived notions about this place were wrong. Like any wide-eyed premed student, I came into this observation with that idea that an ER was a place filled with blood, gore, and all manner of fast paced excitement seen on hospital television shows. Of course, I was not so naive as to think that a real ER would be like the ones on TV, but I also did not expect what I did end up seeing. Instead of gunshot wounds and car accidents, I saw an elderly woman who's only symptom was the fear of death, a drug addict looking to get another fix, and a pregnant woman who believed her back pain was early contractions. But while I marveled at what seemed to be an unusually slow night, I also began to notice that the staff did not share my disbelief. No, to the dozens of doctors, nurses, scribes, ambulance drivers, and other employees, this is what an average day at the office looked like.

The point of this story is that my perceptions are constantly being broken down and reformed. At this point in my life in which I continue to try new things, my young naive mind is exposed to the real world at a rate much greater than anything I experienced before coming to school. My trip to the ER is just one example of dispelling an immature perception by actually going out and seeing it for myself instead of relying on what I see on TV, read in a book, or hear from a person. In my opinion, this is the best way to learn, something that cannot be replicated in a classroom, but, I believe, is still essential to our experience as college students.