
Why Exaggeration Jokes Work - samclemens
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/12/biological-phenomenon-why-wit-works/578842/
======
torstenvl
There is a reason that it became common practice for an introduction to give a
broad overview of the topic. It seriously detracts from the writing when the
first paragraph plunges you into deep background, and you don't get a hint as
to the supposed topic until halfway through.

~~~
CPLX
This has been how storytelling has been done for centuries, it’s a a mark of
thoughtful feature writing. The Atlantic is over 100 years old and extremely
prestigious, it’s resonable to assume that at least from a technical writing
standpoint they know what they are doing and do it on purpose.

It’s not writing intended for a textbook or academic paper. It’s a story.
You’re supposed to read it and get introduced to things and discover the
themes of the story gradually.

I see a variation of this criticism of a long form feature about every week or
so on HN. It’s sort of equivalent to a person walking into a modern art museum
and asking why the artists didn’t just paint the pictures so they look exactly
like the thing the artist was looking at when he painted the picture.

~~~
dandellion
As someone who's first language is not English it comes off more as a mark of
pedant writing. Some folks might enjoy the "storytelling", but it's really
annoying when the author goes in circles and gets nowhere until you've read
more than half of the text. Like that joke that goes on forever and ends
without a punchline, that some people tell when they just want to pull your
leg. And whether it's done by the centuries-old extremely-prestigious my-dad-
is-very-important The Atlantic or some random person's blog it's just as
annoying.

~~~
CPLX
There’s certainly no judgment made, in the sense that I think people should
consume whatever media they prefer. If you don’t enjoy long form feature
writing in English you shouldn’t read it.

My comment is intended to point out the genre. The comments on this article
are like people complaining that rap music doesn’t have enough melody, or jazz
music isn’t catchy enough, or whatever.

It’s an unwillingness to understand the concept. Some of us are pretty damn
glad The Atlantic, Harpers, and The New Yorker, among others, are still
around. The world isn’t running short of thinly narrated to-the-point content.

------
gnicholas
I felt like this article over-promised and under-delivered. There was a lot of
ink spilled on the animal kingdom, and a weak/unconvincing analogy to human
humor.

~~~
TaupeRanger
All articles that purport to explain how some aspect of the human mind works
(in this case, why exaggeration jokes trigger the emotional response they do)
inevitably fail miserably. This is simply due to the fact that science has
basically nothing meaningful to say about human experience, other than to draw
vague correlations between it and fMRI scans or lesion studies. For god's
sake, we don't even know why/how Ibuprofen works...what kind of moronic hubris
makes an Atlantic writer think they can illuminate anything worthwhile about
something as complex as humor?

~~~
dpark
> _For god 's sake, we don't even know why/how Ibuprofen works..._

I bet physicists also assert that bumblebees cannot possibly fly, right? For
God’s sake...

“ _NSAIDs such as ibuprofen work by inhibiting the cyclooxygenase (COX)
enzymes, which convert arachidonic acid to prostaglandin H2 (PGH2). PGH2, in
turn, is converted by other enzymes to several other prostaglandins (which are
mediators of pain, inflammation, and fever) and to thromboxane A2 (which
stimulates platelet aggregation, leading to the formation of blood clots)._ ”

~~~
TaupeRanger
You just explained my point for me by giving a perfect example. We have no
idea why any of these correlations hold or why they would lead to any
particular change in pain experiences. For god's sake indeed.

This explanation of "why" ibuprofen works is as good as the article's
explanation of "why" exaggeration jokes work. It's so unfortunate that
otherwise rational people have been made incurious by modern education, enough
to believe that "there is a change in the level of one neurotransmitter" is a
good explanation for "why a pain medicine works".

~~~
dpark
You defend your claim that “we don't even know why/how Ibuprofen works” by
pretending that Wikipedia’s incomplete description of COX mechanics are proof
that we “have no idea” how any of this works. You’re not pointing out
meaningful gaps in our knowledge. You’re passionately arguing that incomplete
knowledge is equivalent to complete ignorance.

Boo. This is lazy and anti-intellectual, akin to “debunking” climate change by
claiming that since we don’t know everything that influences climate, we don’t
know anything at all. Someone who complains of “incuriousity” should do better
than this.

~~~
southerndrift
I guess they mean that there is still the gap between molecules and
perception. There is no concept for pain and thus no explanation of how
Ibuprofen changes the perception of pain. That said, how do you exactly point
out that an explanation is not sufficient? It's like describing a hole, you
can only point at the borders.

~~~
dpark
“There is no concept for pain” is only true if you believe that human
experiences do not map to the physical world. Otherwise pain is entirely a
manifestation of physical chemical interactions. Pain is actually a pretty
well understood phenomenon. Perfectly understood? No, but that’s typical of
most things.

As for pointing out that an explanation is not sufficient, it is perfectly
reasonable to point out the gaps in our knowledge. If those gaps are extremely
large, it’s reasonable to call that out as well. It’s not reasonable to claim
that the knowledge we do have is meaningless simply because there are still
gaps in our knowledge. We don’t understand the origin of the universe, and yet
we still manage to fly rockets pretty well. We managed to predict eclipses
with perfect accuracy long before modern astronomy existed. The gaps in our
knowledge don’t prevent the existing knowledge from being useful or accurate.

------
bambax
Very weak article, as pointed out by other comments. There isn't even the
beginning of a proof of a connection between wit and exaggeration, and the
examples don't help.

------
baron816
1000% if my jokes are exaggeration jokes.

~~~
tabtab
97.471% of my jokes are about pedanticy.

~~~
jfk13
I think you mean "pedantry".

~~~
gammateam
Meant

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Do they no longer mean "pedantry"? Seems that they meant it and mean it.

~~~
groestl
All of you have a mean pedantry going on.

~~~
TrustAndSafety
a mean pedantry is not necessarily a median pedanticity

~~~
reificator
But both are preferable to a mean pediatrician.

------
hirundo
So jokes share much with sex even when they're not sex jokes. An instinct to
focus on supernormal stimuli would also help explain the fascination with over
sized and contrasting genitalia, makeup to exaggerate signals of arousal,
various modes of sexual harassment, etc. They're variations on Tinbergen’s
stickleback mandible spots.

------
thedailymail
The article is not great but the Buster Keaton scenes the author links to are
great, especially the second one.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZSTM3knaao](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZSTM3knaao)

------
RichardHeart
If you enjoyed the article, you'll probably also really enjoy this comic
titled "Supernormal Stimuli" [http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comic/supernormal-
stimuli/](http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comic/supernormal-stimuli/)

------
PavlovsCat
> The same principle is at work in verbal wit. The English film director
> Anthony Asquith, for example, once introduced Jean Harlow, the platinum-
> blond 1930s Hollywood star, to his mother, Lady Margot Asquith, the author
> and wife of the longtime British prime minister Herbert Henry Asquith.
> Harlow mispronounced Lady Margot’s first name, sounding the final t, as in
> forgot. “The t is silent, my dear,” Asquith snipped, “as in Harlow.” Lady
> Margot isolated and exaggerated the significance of the simple t, just as
> Tinbergen isolated and exaggerated the herring gull’s orange spot, thereby
> dramatically enhancing its impact.

Is that a way of saying "she called her a harlot" that went over my head? Or
did the author not catch that she called her a harlot?

At any rate, I don't see the wit there (a smart person wouldn't betray their
pettyness, cruelty and insecurity like that at "hello"), and I noticed how
it's all in the setup, in "platinum-blonde" vs "the author and wife of
longtime prime minister".

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margot_Asquith](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margot_Asquith)

> she accused her shell-shocked stepson Herbert of being drunk.

Jesus Christ.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Harlow](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Harlow)

... hey _wait_ a second ... I don't know these people. But neither did the
author, so here goes nothing:

> A totally different principle is at work in psychological abuse. The English
> film director Anthony Asquith, for example, once introduced Jean Harlow, the
> young, beautiful and warmhearted 1930s Hollywood star, to his mother, Lady
> Margot Asquith, a woman of a remarkable lack of any endearing features, who
> had developed an especially cruel looking mouth. Harlow mispronounced Lady
> Margot’s first name, sounding the final t, as in forgot, though she meant
> nothing by it. “The t is silent, my dear,” Asquith snipped, “as in Harlow.”,
> marking the beginning of an evening that to the young people felt like
> trying to have a picnic while being harrassed by a flock of old sea gulls
> that seemed more intent on shitting on the food than stealing any.

> They didn't talk back, laughed politely, because it seemed clear Margot was
> not just unhappy, she didn't even remember happiness, and this was her way
> to get back at all what that had broken her heart when she was younger.
> Harlow knew Margot _think_ she meant her, but that she didn't, didn't even
> see her, couldn't see her, saw only the light playing on her hatred for
> herself... so she came to feel deep compassion for this person. In the
> picnic analogy, she simply decided that they weren't going to get to eat a
> bite anyway, and that they may as well watch the acrobatics of the shitting
> birds... for even the ugliest human is beautiful, if you look at them
> careful enough, listen well enough. What seems ugly, what seems like chaos,
> is just as causally ordered, that order is just hidden from casual glance.
> Beauty is symmetric, and that's sublime, but uglyness is complex, and that
> is sublime too, and sneaking these kind of bald claims into stories is
> probably what makes writing them so fun.

> Later that night, when they were alone, Harlow said "you said it was bad,
> but I had no idea" and made sweet pity love to Anthony Asquith, which
> totally blew his mind.

[actually looking at his bio he was homosexual, which both makes that ending
unlikely, and gives the scene a whole other level of oppressive atmosphere, at
least in my mind: his mother calling a person she literally just met a harlot
for being pretty and an actress, makes it seem unlikely she would have
approved of his homosexuality, so maybe they were _relieved_ she called her
harlot, since that meant she had no clue of his homosexuality and they gladly
played along]

~~~
windowsworkstoo
Yes, she was implying harlot. It was just a joke, I don’t know how you turned
a throw away one liner into a blog post...

~~~
jacobolus
You don’t think it’s rude for an elderly lady to respond to a young woman
mispronouncing her name by “jokingly” calling her a prostitute?

There is some dispute about whether this famous insult actually happened
though, [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/11193714/Meet-
Marg...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/11193714/Meet-Margot-
Asquith-aprime-ministers-wife-who-was-more-vilified-than-Cherie....html)

~~~
windowsworkstoo
It’s savage as fuck...still funny though

~~~
PavlovsCat
Such savagery is born out of weakness. To respond like that to a honest
mistake is like slapping someone in the face for no reason at all. It's like a
child saying something wrong to an adult and the adult just throwing it across
the room, for no reason. There's no such thing as "no reason" though, and in
this case it seems pretty easy to guess at the rough shapes of those reasons,
and I find it _hilarious_ that it seems to escape thousands, millions of
people. I guess that is just one more pebble pointing to the wider alliance of
the obedient with sociopaths that Arno Gruen described.

------
rayalez
Jokes are "absurd associations". Our brain thinks in patterns. When you put
together two patterns(ideas) that don't belong together, it creates the
feeling of absurdity, the less patterns belong together, the less they fit
together, the more absurd they will feel. ("A man on a bicycle" is not absurd,
"a man on a unicycle" is a little bit absurd, "Hitler riding a unicycle" is
very absurd, "Hitler riding a unicycle while wearing a white dress and
juggling fish" is absurd as fuck). Comedy is the art of finding connections
between patterns. You "connect the dots" between two ideas, find an overlap(an
association) between two patterns that are far apart, and you put them
together. The more absurd(less compatible) the two ideas are, and the stronger
the connection(the more it makes sense), the funnier the joke will be.

A longer post on this:

[https://medium.com/@rayalez/comedy-theory-
fd142076657e](https://medium.com/@rayalez/comedy-theory-fd142076657e)

\----

I can analyze about 80% of the jokes this way and find two different patterns
with clear connection between them, remaining 20% are what I call "purely
absurd" jokes, they don't have two connected patterns, they're just ideas that
make as little sense as possible. I don't know how to explain both types with
some common underlying mechanism.

Just as an example, here's a "dot-connect" comedy sketch:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AT6jS_X4NaY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AT6jS_X4NaY)

(Pattern 1 is clouds, common recognizer is "cloud that looks like a mushroom",
pattern 2 is nuclear explosion).

And here's a "pure absurd" comedy sketch:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQfvSLxTsEs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQfvSLxTsEs)

(no two distinct but connected patterns that I can discern, just an absurd
idea that makes as little sense as possible)

\- Puns are the simplest example of dot-connect jokes ("this word sounds like
this other word"). Pranks too (the same situation means one thing to the
person who's doing the prank, and another to the person who's being pranked).

\- Metaphors are associations that aren't absurd enough to be funny, if a
metaphor is absurd/weird enough it becomes a joke.

\- Exaggeration/reversal jokes are closer to "pure absurd" jokes, you're
taking a normal idea and making it make less sense by exaggerating a part of
the pattern, or replacing it with it's opposite.

\----

Animals seem to laugh when playing, another way to put it - "fake fighting".
Play makes sense evolutionarily because kids are practicing fighting, and
laughter seems like a signal that "I'm not actually trying to hurt you". I
couldn't figure out how to reconcile it with the idea of absurdity, they seem
vaguely similar, but I can't expain how comedy works from evolutionary
standpoint.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laughter_in_animals](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laughter_in_animals)

To understand humor from evolutionary perspective, it would be interesting to
analyze the jokes babies and kids find funny. Why do babies laugh at peekaboo?

Here's a fascinating video about the first jokes Hank Green's kid has came up
with:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3q9AEu27NAg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3q9AEu27NAg)

Interestingly, two of them are "pure absurd" jokes (blue baby, police bus),
and three of them are "dot-connect" jokes(mam-da, papa pants, coconut baby).

\----

Laughter and humor are not the same thing. Tickling isn't funny, "social
signaling" laughter isn't funny (like when girl giggles when she's attracted
to a guy).

\----

It would make sense if brains evolved to reward novelty. When you learn
something insightful about the world, you get a pleasant dopamine hit. If
comedy is "supernormal stimuli", it could come from people learning to hack
this mechanism, making the sensation more intense.

The way people add more sugar/fat to the food to make taste more intense, or
learned to masturbate to fake sex, maybe people found a way to trick their
minds into feeling they've learned something super insightful? But what does
that have to do with laughter?

Some sort of error-correction process? When you learn a new idea, your brain
corrects your old wrong world model, "erasing" mistaken beliefs. Another way
to describe absurd is an "obvious error". Maybe there's something to it...

\----

It's easier to make jokes on taboo subjects because there's an absurd gap
between the seriousness of a taboo subject and a lighthearted goofiness of a
joke.

~~~
Nasrudith
I have wondered at times if it would be possible to have a whole academic
field of study in 'humor theory'. I personally termed it as the unexpected is
part of what makes things funny.

A professor giving a lecture on medieval economics in a hall or an exotic
dancer dancing at a bachelor party isn't funny. The exotic dancer giving a
lecture on medieval economics at a bachelor party or the professor dancing at
a lecture hall? Funny.

~~~
rayalez
Awesome examples!

I think all jokes are surprising, but not all surprising things are jokes
("you have lung cancer" is surprising but not very hilarious). Surprise seems
more like a side effect of comedy, instead of an explanation. The trick is to
figure out what, aside from surprise, creates comedy. What kind of properties
apply to _all_ the funny things, and _only_ to funny things.

There's a "benign violation" theory - they say that things are funny when
they're surprising but harmless, but that's also not true. Plot twists,
scientific inventions, new insightful ideas - there are plenty of surprising
harmless things that aren't funny.

------
a11595
light on content, not sure what the point of the article is besides filler (I
stopped reading half way through), so I'll go by the title. This must be a
story about a guy with a liberal arts degree, who exaggerated on his resume,
got hired as a joke, didn't get the joke (due to lack of iq), and just started
writing crap.

James Geary mesdames et messieurs. Calling his work and career a joke would be
an exaggeration.

------
ryanmarsh
For just once could we not downvote jokes here? The topic is humor. One HN
thread of jokes won’t turn this place into reddit.

~~~
TeMPOraL
That's what they all say.

You let one joke in, and the next day you have to scroll through thousands of
pictures of Pepe the Frog on a bloated app that tracks your every scroll.

If you want to avoid that, you have to nuke all humor from orbit. That's the
only way to be sure.

~~~
labster
Don't worry, if Pepe shows up, I'll call in Gritty to take him down a peg or
two.

