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Comedy Theory (2022)

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Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#121

Post by seanhunter »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #37
seanhunter wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The jokes in the article are just there to demonstrate the pattern. There are lots of more sophisticated jokes which clearly follow the same pattern. For example Milton Jones' classic (which won "best joke" at the edinburgh comedy festival I believe) I come from a long line of police marksmen. Apart from my grandfather, who was a bank robber. But he died recently..... surrounded by his family. More Milton Jones "gran…

But this is not truly funny comedy. These seem quite clearly made up and depend on this very specific scenario. I think truly funny jokes are ones that are plausible real life scenarios, that spot some sort of unexpected social circumstance or a phenomena with a clever take or perspective that people do not frequently consider and that many in the audience can relate with. Usually you would expect it to be something…

Well as E.B. White put it, explaining a joke is a like disecting a frog. You learn a lot but the thing dies in the process. People do find Milton Jones funny - he won the Perrier "Best Newcomer" Award which is a pretty big deal in UK comedy.

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#122

Post by latexr »

Retr0id wrote: post #104
latexr wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that every single joke in that table is awful and that deconstruction on why the joke is bad doesn’t generically apply to all of them.

The column heading just says "mix ideas", I don't think they're supposed to be taken as finished, stand-alone jokes. I think some of them have potential if framed correctly or rephrased a bit (foraging for wild cake, in particular). Take the not entirely dissimilar Windows Vista joke from the IT Crowd: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IfnjBHtjHc It's not especially funny if taken in isolation, but in the context of t…

> The column heading just says "mix ideas", I don't think they're supposed to be taken as finished, stand-alone jokes.

Right above the table there’s a title that says “Joke Ideas”, and the text introducing the table is “And here are a few jokes that were created using this method”.

Everything indicates they are intended as jokes.

> Take the not entirely dissimilar Windows Vista joke from the IT Crowd

That joke doesn’t use the “mix ideas” concept at all. It’s straightforward in not deviating from the theme.

> It's not especially funny if taken in isolation, but in the context of the scene and the show as a whole

The idea of that joke could’ve worked in any context. It’s just:

A: “I’m having a computer problem.”

B: “What OS is that computer on?”

A: “Windows Vista.”

B: “That explains the problem.”

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#123

Post by pohl »

OisinMoran wrote: post #51

“There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” The equating of jokes and comedy here is an affront for anyone who has explored different avenues of comedy in any way. The analysis is fine and even interesting for (as others have pointed out) one specific type of joke but just flippantly calling that all of comedy is very jarring as it is obviously wrong. I just completed…

I feel like I've read this comment before, except the topic was music theory and the focus was on harmony and someone who valued rhythm, texture, and timbre felt left out.

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#124

Post by smokedetector1 »

patcon wrote: post #120
smokedetector1 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does this explain away the mystery of consciousness?

One take: Chasing the Rainbow: The Non-conscious Nature of Being (2017) https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.0192... You might get a kick out of this paper (though some may find it's proposal a bit bleak, I think there's a way to integrate it without losing any of the sense of wonder of the experience of being alive :) ) It analogizes conscious experience to the a rainbow "which accompanies physica…

I find these types of arguments very odd, though at one point in my life I would certainly have endorsed them.

What is it about the modern scientific mindset that makes people say "actually, the ubiquitous experience of being alive, having thoughts, feelings, and making choices, is actually 100% an illusion."

Don't get me wrong, obviously there is interaction between evolutionary functions, the brain, etc - I mean, there's anesthesia, there's being drunk, horny, fight or flight.. there's all sorts of ways that it's obvious there's a link.

But why do so many theorists want to go from "there's a link" to "this is 100% an illusion?" I just don't get it. Is it that uncomfortable to have something that is outside the reach of physical systems theorizing, or something that is unexplainable (i.e., the link) that we'd rather fit reality into the theory than the other way around?

We have to have the courage to live with something that is inexplicable, at least for now (and, honestly, maybe forever), rather than lose faith in our own existence.

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#125

Post by JoblessWonder »

Freud has a book on jokes called "The Joke and Its Relation to the Unconscious" which I thought was pretty interesting (although I mostly read the first section which analyzed the technique of the joke and the tendencies of the joke.)

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#126

Post by smokedetector1 »

gota wrote: post #115
smokedetector1 wrote: post #84

It's really annoying and deadening, not to mention foolish, when people try to reduce every activity of the soul to a mechanical, comprehensible process.

If you want to vindicate your distaste, check out the "Joke Examples" section of the argument: > And here are a few jokes that were created using this method: (...) > "I'm awful at jogging, I'm running slower than windows 95" (...) > "You're such a great guy! - I'm not a great guy. Abraham Lincoln was a great guy. I'm a barely adequate guy." (...) These are two out of 6 examples there - all are extremely plain and bo…

I like how they highlighted a commonality between two disparate things. When I recognized the pattern, my neurons lit up, eliciting a pleasurable response.

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#127

Post by soniman »

If you are going to make a video about how comedy works you have to begin it with a joke and then use your theory to explain that joke. I don't want to hear your theory unless you give me something to think about first.

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#128

Post by tetris11 »

amenhotep wrote: post #102
tetris11 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same with Phil Hartman and Matt Berry, they can make the most boring lines instantly funny through sheer power of charisma and vocal inflections.

You and he were buddies, weren't you?

I'm a one track lover...

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#129

Post by ndarray »

bazoom42 wrote: post #11

Now explain why some jokes following this formula are hilarious but most are painfully unfunny. This would seem to be the hard part. > I’m awful at jogging. I run slower than Windows 95. Yeah you have definitely cracked the secret to comedy.

Try:

"Us humans are so limited in our capabilities. I'm willing to admit, in many ways, I run slower than Windows 95. God, I'm awful at jogging."

Running is the connection here, that's clear. But it seems to me that jogging should be the punchline, not Windows 95. Win95 works as the setup. Maybe I prefer that because Win95 is a much more specific thing than jogging. The punchline "I was talking about Windows 95 all along!" just feels so arbitrary compared to "I was talking about jogging all along!"

There's also a bit much lifting done in your punchline (double meaning of run + bringing in Win95), but even when you disjoint the two a little more, it doesn't work that well:

"I'm awful at jogging. I run slow... I'm not even the Windows 95 of joggers."

Re: Comedy Theory (2022)

#130

Post by airstrike »

wanda wrote: post #109
scandox wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heard Adrian Edmondson on Desert Island Discs and one of the interesting things he said about comedy was that there were a limited number of jokes all of which he believed are contained in the recorded works of Laurel and Hardy and that he would be able to enumerate and show all of them from those works. He also said he was tired of comedy as he knew all of the jokes. Later he sort of contradicted himself by saying t…

I think the word "joke" in the context of his interview was more or less intended to mean "bit" or "skit" or "humour-incitement type" -- rather than literally joke as in "knock knock." I believe he actually said that all humour is passed on, i.e. that all the comic acts that have come along after Laurel and Hardy were in essence re-enacting scenes that they had performed, in another form, prior. Of course, Laurel and…

> if the contrary was true and humour was infinite. Then everything could be funny.

I don't think that necessarily follows. Some infinities are greater than others.

(Even though I happen to think anything could be funny with sufficient effort. Even tragedy)

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