This week, British Library scientists debated on what exactly makes us laugh.
Sun Columnist professor Richard Wiseman writes with the reference of one of the panelist of this debate. He says that there are the three main theories.
Close quote "First, there is the idea of superiority.
Richard Wiseman writes that lots of jokes involve a person appearing very stupid (Did you hear about the man who was proud he completed a jigsaw in 30 minutes - because it said on the box "Five to six years"?).
Or suffering from bad luck (Yesterday I peeled a banana - and it was empty).
The laughter at these jokes is a victory cry over a defeated foe.
According to him this is not a new idea. The Greek philosopher Plato noticed in 400BC that many jokes involved laughing at others and he argued they were cruel so should be banned.
Richard says, “A second theory of jokes was proposed by Austrian psychologist Sigmund Freud”.
He wrote a book hilariously entitled Jokes And Their Relation To The Unconscious and thought jokes are a way of dealing with what causes us anxiety. This explained why many are about affairs (I've been in love with the same woman for 40 years - if my wife finds out she'll kill me).
He gives many examples for such Jokes-
Or violence (How do you make a cat go woof? Pour petrol on it and throw it in the fire).
Or death (A doctor calls a patient and says: The bad news is you have 24 hours to live. The really bad news is I have been trying to contact you since yesterday). Then a third theory of jokes deals with puns. Like: Why don't cannibals eat clowns? They taste funny.
Or: There are two fish in a tank. One turns to the other and says: Do you know how to drive this?
Most puns consist of two lines - the first sets up an expectation, the next makes us see the situation differently.
According to Richard Wiseman, “Scientists say this makes us laugh as it surprises us. So is the science of humour all about superiority, anxiety and surprise? Actually, no”.
In his article he writes, “Researchers have recorded thousands of everyday conversations and looked at what makes men and women laugh. This has shown that about 70 per cent of women laugh when a man tells a joke but just 40 per cent of men laugh when a woman tells one”.
According to him, men argue this is because they are better at telling jokes, women that they have a more sophisticated sense of humour.
Other work has looked at what makes different nations laugh.
He says, “We are still a very long way from knowing exactly what makes one person guffaw and another groan”.
But one thing according to Richard Wiseman is far more certain - researching comedy is a funny way of making a living."
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