Showing posts with label humor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label humor. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
Introduce yourself to The Great Cosmic Happy Ass Card Company
Tuesday, July 2, 2013
Essay: How to Build a Joke (No joking, I’m serious.)
Information and comments on the essay:
How to Build a Joke (No joking, I’m serious.)
From the book: Chum for Thought: Throwing Ideas into Dangerous Waters by David Satterlee
Find out more, including where to buy books and ebooks
Read or download this essay as a PDF file at: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4eNv8KtePyKSzZmZFNSTUtPUWc/edit?usp=sharing#Comedy #Humor
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| Chum For Thought: Throwing Ideas into Dangerous Waters |
How to Build a Joke (No joking, I’m serious.)
For most people, a good joke is like pornography or the
Tao—they cannot give you a good definition, but they know it when they see it.
Building good jokes requires attention to context, discrimination,
structure, and activation of a special set of neural responses. So, the first
thing I need to do is explain how a joke works. After all, how are you going to
create an original version of something if you do not have a grasp of the
fundamental internal mechanisms, the secret ingredients in the special sauce?
There is something wrong with a good joke. A good joke
produces immediate, obvious, and alarming symptoms of acute pathology. The
victim’s face contorts and begins involuntary convulsions that may spread to
the entire body. Respiration becomes disrupted and spastic. Blood pressure and
heart rate go up suddenly. Food may be aspirated and beverages may be expelled
from the nose. If you were not aware of the stimulus, the physiological reaction
might lead you to assume overt acute pathology.
As it happens, strokes and certain other brain lesions have
been known to trigger what is known in medical literature as “pathological
laughter and crying” (PLC). Oddly, the same small brain area is responsible for
both laughing and crying. This is consistent; we have all known, and possibly
been offended by, someone who laughed suddenly when
Essay: How to Build a Joke (No joking, I'm Serious.)
Information and comments on the essay:
How to Build a Joke (No joking, I'm Serious.)
 |
| Life Will Get You in the End: Short Stories by David Satterlee |
from the book: Life Will Get You in the End:
Short stories by David Satterlee
Find out more, including where to buy books and ebooks
Read or download this story as a PDF file at: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4eNv8KtePyKU0g3Zng3NXB6ckk/edit?usp=sharingAn essay, actually. Do you know why you laugh at shocking stuff that isn't funny? Comedians do - and it includes some brain physiology. Quotations include Phyllis Diller - what a hoot!
How to Build
a Joke
(No joking, I’m
serious.)
For most people, a good joke is like pornography or the
Tao—they cannot give you a good definition, but they know it when they see it.
Building good jokes requires attention to context,
discrimination, structure, and activation of a special set of neural responses.
So, the first thing I need to do is explain how a joke works. After all, how
are you going to create an original version of something if you do not have a grasp
of the fundamental internal mechanisms, the secret ingredients in the special
sauce?
There is something wrong with a good joke. A good joke
produces immediate, obvious, and alarming symptoms of acute pathology. The
victim’s face contorts and begins involuntary convulsions that may spread to
the entire body. Respiration becomes disrupted and spastic. Blood pressure and
heart rate go up suddenly. Food may be aspirated and beverages may be expelled
from
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