COMMENT BOOKS & ARTS

humorous. The coun-

S. HARRIS
tering of the belief that
‘the journal Nature
is never printed on
pressed haddock’
should not merely
surprise you, but seem
funny. However, dan-
ger trumps humour:
it would not be amus-
Inside Jokes: ing, for example, if the
Using Humor to pressed haddock were
Reverse-Engineer
the Mind radioactive.
MATTHEW M. HURLEY, Humour, the authors
DANIEL C. DENNETT suggest, is an element
AND REGINALD B. in the cognitive ‘just-
ADAMS JR in-time spreading
MIT Press: 2011.
activation’ system, by
384 pp. $29.95, £22.95
which our brains fit the
best overall meaning to
the collection of mental scripts or frames it has
at its disposal. For example, you may currently
be following a ‘reading the journal Nature’
script; perhaps also a ‘sitting at my desk’ script,
and maybe a ‘trying not to forget to stop at the
grocery store on the way home’ script. The
brain is constantly mediating among these
frames, charting our course through a fast-
moving, life-threatening world.
Our ability to fashion ‘just in time’ mean-
ing from this jumble is far from perfect. We
are not computers but flesh-and-blood,
jerry-built synthesizers of meaning con-
structed from the impressions provided by
our sense organs, memories and emotions.
Humour happens when this operating sys-
tem detects an error that other parts had
overlooked. The brain’s dopaminergic pleas-
NE UROSCIENCE ure system rewards that survival-benefiting

What makes us laugh

discovery with a jolt of mirth.
The authors explain how their ideas build
on previous theories of how humour emerges.
Notably, that it comes from the joke-teller’s
position of superiority, as proposed by Aristo-
Humour is the brain’s reward for discovering tle and Thomas Hobbes; when an incongruity
unexpected errors, says Appletree Rodden. is resolved, as suggested by Immanuel Kant,
Arthur Schopenhauer and V. S. Ramachan-
dran; on release from internal censors, fol-

P
hotons have mass? I didn’t even know detection of humour” — is a valuable, if not a lowing Sigmund Freud; and from some kinds
they were Catholic. full, explanation. A mix of lightness and of surprise, as hypothesized by psychologist
Why do some of us find that funny? seriousness, the book also contains a great Jerry M. Suls. It can also be inspired by shifting
Inside Jokes surveys the scientific basis of collection of jokes: from awful groaners to our frame of reference, according to Marvin
humour and proposes a new theory. It pre- choice quips. Minsky, Victor Raskin and Salvatore Attardo.
sents a brief history of the concept’s develop- The authors propose that humour is a The authors sometimes labour to bend
ment from the ancient Greeks to the present, cognitive event, in which an unconscious the phenomena of humour and laughter to
discusses the possible origin of laughter from assumption is discov- fit their theory. And their attempt to explain
a Darwinian perspective and describes what ered to have been a every reason why humans laugh, smile or
is known about jocularity in the brain.
“Countering mistake. For exam- experience low-grade mirth is not entirely
Co-authored with philosopher Daniel the belief that ple, if on reading this satisfying. To their credit, the authors realize
Dennett and psychologist Reginald Adams, ‘the journal magazine you sud- this, and rightly consider their book a valu-
the book grew out of the dissertation of Nature is denly become aware able contribution. ■
neuro­scientist Matthew Hurley, then at Tufts never printed that the pages are not
University in Medford, Massachusetts. The on pressed made of paper but Appletree Rodden is a biochemist, physician
authors’ account of why humour and laugh- haddock’ of pressed haddock, and cognitive scientist at the Christian
ter exist independently, and how they relate should seem then, they argue, that Hospital of Quakenbrueck, Germany.
— such that laughter sometimes “expresses the funny.” should strike you as e-mail: annetree@aol.com

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