Descartes' Digressions on Mockery & his Connection to Hobbes

 

In Response to René Descartes

In reading the excerpts on laughter and its relation to emotion as Descartes exhorts, I was continually reminded of Thomas Hobbes's philosophy. The similarities persist throughout the digressions on laughter and humor while diverging in aspects that distinguish the two men fundamentally. What is immediately apparent is the two men's proclamations of pseudoscience to understand the origin of laughter in the body. Both Hobbes and Descartes are early enlightenment thinkers and thus are at the precipice of beginning to converge philosophy and science practices. For the sake of giving credit where credit is due, both men are at the cutting edge of their time and attempting to discern the correlations of emotion and physiology in a way that has been absent to a point in the colloquial lexicon of theory. 

Furthermore, what caused me to pause and wonder was Descartes' digressions on jest. While reading through the excerpts from "Article 178, 179,...181", I noticed a shift in the tone of Descartes writing from a more technical description of the causes and sources of laughter to a more nuanced philosophical pronouncement of how to manage laughter in certain situations: how to properly engage in jest in amiable as well as adverse company. In a similar fashion to Hobbes, Descartes formats his perceptions of jest within a power hierarchy. Descartes and Hobbes both touch on the concept of ridicule and mockery. In response to humanity's affinity to mock the least perfect, Descartes proffers that people laugh at those in less fortunate positions than themselves because "for, desiring to see others held in as low estimation as themselves, they are truly rejoiced at the evils which befall them, and they hold them deserving of these" (179). Descartes touches on an essential notion of human nature in his response to the existence of mockery; that it is human nature to compare oneself to another and that, albeit not honorable to defame others, a particular emotion is stirred in the comparison one to others. In interpreting this except, I discern it to have two potential paths by which this emotion's nature can manifest itself.

Firstly, I think the path in which Descartes puts forth, that by which one's own cup is filled at the sight of others imperfections, is reminiscent of the old adage that bullies only lash out because they're insecure about themselves. This, I believe, is the mockery that Descartes is referencing in this article. Just as Descartes established in "Article 125", laughter does not always accompany joy in a manner that would suggest inexorably linked to the emotion. In the sense of mockery, similar feelings apparent in the laughter of scorn, as found in "Article 178," may be evident in the laughter found in mockery. Given the malicious distinction between mockery and jest (of which is particularly nuanced and necessitates a keen awareness to discern the two), the admixture of joy and hatred also seem to manifest themselves in mockery and belittlement. Secondly, when in the circumstances where the opportunity for mockery is present, there is a different course of emotion that may also manifest itself. This would be the feeling of gratitude and joy in one's own position without having to mock or belittle another to feel as such. In this course of action, the one in the place to mock considers the situation and circumstances that have befallen the less fortunate person who is the potential subject of mockery and recognizes their own subsequent fortune and privilege of circumstance. For instance, Descartes argues "that people with very obvious defects such as those who are lame, blind of an eye, hunched-back, or who have received some public insult are specially given to mockery;…". The emotion is sprung from a feeling of unspecified indignation at one's own station and potentially not a consciously malicious endeavor. However, the notion of mockery fades from the indignant minds when a birds-eye view of circumstance and situation is understood, when they recognize the inescapable nature of evil that permeates every human existence and causes pain. In understanding the universality of pain, the mindset of mockery may take alternative forms in gratitude and/or potentially jest between contemporaries.