This is no April Fool’s Day joke:
Importantly, various recent studies on the topic suggest that laughter in animals typically involves similar play chasing. Could be that verbal jokes tickle ancient, playful circuits in our brains.
More study is needed to figure out whether animals are really laughing. The results could explain why humans like to joke around. And Panksepp speculates it might even lead to the development of treatments for laughter’s dark side: depression.
Meanwhile, there’s the question of what’s so darn funny in the animal world.
“Although no one has investigated the possibility of rat humor, if it exists, it is likely to be heavily laced with slapstick,” Panksepp figures. “Even if adult rodents have no well-developed cognitive sense of humor, young rats have a marvelous sense of fun.”
Science has traditionally deemed animals incapable of joy and woe.
Heh.
H/t reader Ruth.
Mr. Bennett, I have a Solomon Island Eclectus parrot that laughs, only when she’s convinced she has played a good trick on me.
I’m not sure that cats laugh, but the ones I’ve lived with were surely capable of snickering.