Why is it so funny when things go wrong? Are humans just so cruel by nature that when we see somebody else fail, we can’t help but laugh? Are we that insecure about our own success that it makes us smile to see somebody else make a mistake? Or is it a sympathetic response? Are we so afraid of failure ourselves that we treat the failure of others with the levity that we’d like ours to be treated with? We may never know the answer to these questions. 

All we know is that when we see somebody fall down the stairs, and we know that they’re going to be okay, we are going to laugh. Think about the program America’s Funniest Home Videos. Rarely were those videos ever of somebody doing something successfully. It’s not as fun to watch somebody successfully led down a hill as it is to watch them careen down backwards, somersaulting off the sled. It’s just one of those truisms of life on earth. It’s why we gather for the design fails list every week.