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.