The Basic Humor Process
A Cognitive-Shift Theory and the Case against Incongruity
1st Edition
Published on 8. September 2011
XII, 257 pages
978-3-11-080613-7 (ISBN)
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Content
- Intro
- Preface
- PART 1. Preliminaries
- Chapter 1. The mystery of humor and sundry further matters
- 1. The mystery of humor
- 2. The anti-essentialist approach
- 3. Humor processes and the basic humor process
- 4. The expressions "a particular experience of humor," "an episode of humor," "the experience of humor," and "humor"
- 5. Stimulus side and response side
- 6. Stimulus-side bias
- 7. The terms "laughter" and "amusement"
- 8. The subjective character of humor
- 9. The problem of consciousness
- Chapter 2. The fundamental question of humor theory
- 1. A question which must wait: that of the descriptive definition of humor
- 2. Peripheral cases
- 3. Further questions which must wait
- 4. Questions which will remain after the basic humor process has been identified
- PART 2. Theory L and reason to conclude it is true
- Chapter 3. Theory L
- 1. The initial stage of the basic humor process
- 2. The mid-process transition
- 3. The final stage
- 4. Theory L in sum
- 5. Classification of the theory
- 6. Major implications
- 7. The major positive thesis of this treatise
- Chapter 4. The laughter of humor, relaxation, and pleasure
- 1. Laughter and relaxation
- 2. Laughter and the expression of "relief"
- 3. Unrelaxation of the levels which must be posited: where it might be supposed to originate
- 4. Laughter and the expression of pleasure
- Chapter 5. The inapplicability of standard criticisms of "relief" theories
- 1. The straight-man level, the insider level, and the quasi straight-man level
- 2. Morreall on "relief" theories
- Chapter 6. The explanatory power of theory L
- 1. Analyses of examples
- 2. Theory L and the global phenomenon of humor
- 3. The unity and variety of the phenomenon of humor
- 4. Theory L and evolution
- PART 3. Incongruity theory and reason to conclude it is unsound
- Chapter 7. Incongruity theory and the concept of incongruity
- 1. The basic incongruity thesis, the ultimate incongruity thesis, and the major negative thesis of this treatise
- 2. Theory L and incongruity theory
- 3. The dictionary definition of incongruity
- 4. McGhee's definition in terms of ridiculousness
- 5. Extended definitions
- 6. Restricted definitions
- 7. Total redefinitions
- 8. McGhee's formal definition
- 9. The definition to be used here
- Chapter 8. First probe of incongruity theory: two complementary arguments
- 1. The incongruities that appear in examples of humor: irrelevant or inessential almost without exception
- 2. The view from the subject's point of view and the fallacy of mistaken point of view
- Chapter 9. Second probe of incongruity theory: its collapse into cognitive-shift theory
- 1. Elementary incongruity theory
- 2. Morreall's defense of elementary incongruity theory
- 3. The fantasy element in humor and "funny incongruity"
- 4. The phenomenon of the delicious image
- 5. Incongruity-and-resolution theory
- 6. The collapse of elementary incongruity theory
- 7. The collapse of incongruity-and-resolution theory
- 8. An argument against the strong version of incongruity-and- resolution theory
- Chapter 10. Third probe of incongruity theory: its lack of explanatory power
- 1. The term/relation fallacy
- 2. Analysis of the easy-and-breezy school
- 3. Attempts by incongruists to analyze examples
- 4. Ziv on "local logic"
- 5. Incongruity theory and the global phenomenon of humor
- Chapter 11. Fourth probe of incongruity theory: sundry arguments and points
- 1. The question of order of attention in processing a humor stimulus
- 2. Devices which draw attention from incongruities
- 3. Counterexamples to incongruity theory
- 4. Incongruity theory and evolution
- 5. The precise locus of the mystery of humor
- 6. The appeal of incongruity theory
- 7. Psychological experiments in incongruity theory
- PART 4. Further development
- Chapter 12. Kant and Koestler on humor
- 1. Kant
- 2. Koestler
- Chapter 13. The ultimate incongruity thesis and concluding reflections
- 1. The failure of the ultimate incongruity thesis
- 2. The current state of research into the basic humor process
- Summary of the case for theory L
- References
- Permissions
- Index
