The Sunday Book Review has a review of “Stop Me If You’ve Heard This: A History and Philosopy of Jokes” by Jim Holt. The review isn’t favorable, but it reminded me of a book I read years ago that profoundly changed my approach to humor.

Back when I was an undergrad, I read John Allen Paulos’ book “Mathematics and Humor.” I’m sure some of you are snickering “more like mathematics or humor.” In fact, it was quite a funny book while offering some deep theoretical insights into the art of joke telling. The mathematics of humor is an offshoot of catastrophe theory. In the theory, a story is a path along a surface. Humor comes into the picture when the path encounters a tear in the surface. The path is severed, creating a discontinuity, or singularity, in the story.

What this theory is saying, is that during the course of a story, the listener builds up expectations about where the story will lead. When the story takes an abrupt turn, and deviates from this expectation, humor is created.

Thinking about these singularities in the listener’s expectations broadened my appreciation for all kinds of humor. I love puns and word play. The types of jokes most people would consider silly. I once told Angela that when she drinks she gets Randy. “Randy” means lusty, but it’s also a common nickname for people named Randall. I think its the funniest double entendre ever. 

The most important thing I learned from this book, however, is that to be an effective joke teller, you need to build up the listener’s expectations. It’s all in the setup. You need to lead them along the path, make them feel comfortable with where the story is going, and then WHAM! push them off the edge.

This launched another episode of a recurring argument between Ang and me–whether or not philosophy is “purer” than math.