Well, have you noticed that dozens of research these days are on things we take for granted or give little than a passing nod?
In Washington these days, everyone is battling the winter blues and a report which is likely to uplift the spirit was out last week about laughter.
We take it for granted, the report said, but you better believe that laughter can make you live longer, lose weight, be sexier and think smarter.
The study disclosed that laughter is so common a human experience that we forget how bizarre it is, sometimes.
Someone from another planet seeing us laugh would think we were having some sort of a fit.
Laugh loud! Live long. Use the healing power of laughter, the study said.
The idea that laughter is good for our health is at least as old as Proverbs 17 – A merry heart doeth good like a medicine.
In the past few years, a brave group of scientists has been uncovering the physiology of laughter and its provable medical benefits.
“There’s evidence to suggest that laughter has beneficial effects on our physical and mental health.”
So get those convulsions going and chuckle yourself to good health.
Tickle laughter is a good place to start since it’s the most primal form of laughter. Or perhaps we should say the most primate form of laughter.
Chimpanzees and other primates “play fight” especially when young and let out rhythmic sounds that’s the version of tickle laughter.
The study said laughter is deeply wired in our evolution, predating language and its origin in tickling and play fighting is more complicated than simple humour
We’re being touched in our most sensitive areas, under the ribs, the arms, and the neck. Perhaps we laugh because we are happy.
So just what is this ancient phenomenon of laughter is a pre set programme involving the entire body. If it’s a joke we hear, the phenomenon starts in the auditory nerves in our ears. If it’s a comic strip, the programme is triggered by our eyes.
When a father tickles his son, nerve endings in the boy’s skin send electric impulses to the spinal cord and up, triggering a reaction in the part of our brains responsible for sensing what’s going on in our muscles, joints and skin.
That’s put laughter in the category of activities you want to do over again such as eating.
Laughter is pleasurable, perhaps even addictive to the brain.
When we laugh as many as 15 small muscles squeeze our faces into a smile. Increased blood flow may give us a happy glow.
In this troubled world, add the institution of marriage and its now possible to deconstruct a marriage down to its most basic parts and predict with surprising accuracy, the likelihood that a marriage will survive or end in divorce.
How?
A gesture as seemingly minor or eye-rolling or the manner in which a man tells the story of how he met his wife can be strong predictors of happily married life or a looming divorce.
Strong marriages have at least a five-to-one daily ratio of positive to negative interactions.
Well it is said, pierced ears are better prepared for marriage as they’ve experienced pain and bought jewellery.
Last week, two academics met to dialogue on ways to bring America together in what they said, this time of deep polarisation, to rebuild a political discourse that is less paralyzed by dysfunction an contempt.
“It was a conversation on compassion and moving forward together as a nation,” participants said after the meeting.
Tuesday November 28, 2017.
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