The book stands somewhat apart from the rest of Freud's writings as a study of normal, rather than pathological psychology, and, although it contains the most closely reasoned accounts of complicated psychological processes that Freud ever gave, it remains one of his most readable works. It includes a rich collection of jokes, particularly those of Jewish folk tradition, in which Freud clearly revelled.

"The book's qualities are, first, its scope and persuasiveness. The whole book demonstrates the seriousness of humor and its central place in human life. I know of no comparable work.

Kant's attempt to establish the principles behind the faculty of judgment remains one of the most important works on human reason.

The question “What is humour?” has exercised in varying degrees such philosophers as Aristotle, Hobbes, Hume, Kant, Schopenhauer and Bergson and has traditionally been regarded as a philosophical question. And surely it must still be regarded as a philosophical question at least in so far as it is treated as a conceptual one. Traditionally the question has been regarded as a search for the essence of humour, whereas nowadays it has become almost a reflex response among some philosophers to dismiss (...) the search for essences as misconceived. Humour, it will be said, is a family-resemblance concept: no one could hope to compile any short list of essential properties abstracted from all the many varieties of humour— human misfortune and clumsiness, obscenity, grotesqueness, veiled insult, nonsense, wordplay and puns, human misdemeanours and so on, as manifested in forms as varied as parody, satire, drama, clowning, music, farce and cartoons. Yet even if the search for the essence of humour seems at first sight unlikely to succeed, I do not see how we can be sure in advance of any conceptual investigation; and in any case we might do well to start with the old established theories purporting to give the essence of humour, for even if they are wrong they may be illuminatingly wrong and may help us to compile a list of typical characteristics. (shrink)

Comic Relief: A Comprehensive Philosophy of Humor develops an inclusive theory that integrates psychological, aesthetic, and ethical issues relating to humor Offers an enlightening and accessible foray into the serious business of humor Reveals how standard theories of humor fail to explain its true nature and actually support traditional prejudices against humor as being antisocial, irrational, and foolish Argues that humor’s benefits overlap significantly with those of philosophy Includes a foreword by Robert Mankoff, Cartoon Editor of The New Yorker.

Five dimensions of amusement are ethically searched: incongruity, perspectivity, dissociation, enjoyment, and freshness. Amusement perceives incongruities and virtues are formally congruities between one's character and one's nature. An ethical sense of humor is a sense for incongruities between people's behavior and character, and their telos. To appreciate any humor one must adopt a perspective, and in the case of ethical amusement this is the standpoint of one who possesses the virtues. In being amused at the incongruity of some human foible, (...) one is dissociated from it, and adopts a ?higher? perspective. Thus a sense of humor about one's own foibles is a capacity of character?transcendence; but character?transcendence is basic to the very concept of a moral virtue. The prima facie moral dubiousness of enjoying failures of human fulfilment leads to placing certain restrictions on such enjoyment: a sense of humor cannot be a virtue unless allied with compassion and hope. Finally, amusement implies a certain vivacity of perception of the incongruity in question. It is thus a way, not merely of knowing or judging that certain things are fitting and others not, but of ?seeing? that. (shrink)

According to the standard analysis, humor theories can be classified into three neatly identifiable groups:incongruity, superiority, and relief theories. Incongruity theory is the leading approach and includes historical figures such as Immanuel Kant, Søren Kierkegaard, and perhaps has its origins in comments made by Aristotle in the Rhetoric. Primarily focusing on the object of humor, this school sees humor as a response to an incongruity, a term broadly used to include ambiguity, logical impossibility, irrelevance, and inappropriateness. The paradigmatic Superiority theorist (...) is Thomas Hobbes, who said that humor arises from a “sudden glory” felt when we recognize our supremacy over others. Plato and Aristotle are generally considered superiority theorists, who emphasize the aggressive feelings that fuel humor. The third group, Relief theory, is typically associated with Sigmund Freud and Herbert Spencer, who saw humor as fundamentally a way to release or save energy generated by repression. In addition, this article will explore a fourth group of theories of humor: play theory. Play theorists are not so much listing necessary conditions for something’s counting as humor, as they are asking us to look at humor as an extension of animal play. (shrink)

In this urbane and witty book, Ronald de Sousa disputes the widespread notion that reason and emotion are natural antagonists.

How should we understand the emotional rationality? This first part will explore two models of cognition and analogy strategies, test their intuition about the emotional desire. I distinguish between subjective and objective desire, then presents with a feeling from the "paradigm of drama" export semantics, here our emotional repertoire is acquired all the learned, and our emotions in the form of an object is fixed. It is pretty well in line with the general principles of rationality, especially the lowest reasonable (...) principles. Turned to the second part of this side of reasonable. I will inquire how emotional beliefs, desires, and behaviors contribute to the rationality. I will present a very general biological hypothesis: emotions by controlling highlights the characteristics of perception and reasoning, so that we remove the difficulties due in particular to lead to paralysis; they are being simulated by a simplified perception of information, thus limiting our practice and cognitive choice. How are we to understand emotional or axiological rationality? I pursue analogies with both the cognitive and the strategic models, testing them against intuitions about emotional desires. We distinguish two different classes of desires, the subjective and the objective, and propose that emotions have a semantics that derives from "paradigmatic scenarios", in terms of which our emotional repertoire is learned and the formal objects of our emotions fixed. This fits in well with emerging facts about how our emotional capacities develop, and it can also be squared with the general principles of rationality, particularly minimal rationality. In the second part, I return to the perspective of rationality. I ask how emotions contribute to the rationality of beliefs, desires, and behavior. I proffer a very general biological hypothesis: Emotions spare us the paralysis potentially induced by a particular predicament by controlling the salience of features of perception and reasoning; they temporarily mimic the informational encapsulation of perception and so circumscribe our practical and cognitive options. (shrink)

Does humour make us human, or do the cats and dogs laugh along with us? On Humour is a fascinating, beautifully written and funny book on what humour can tell us about being human. Simon Critchley skilfully probes some of the most perennial but least understood aspects of humour, such as our tendency to laugh at animals and our bodies, why we mock death with comedy and why we think it's funny when people act like machines. He also looks at (...) the darker side of humour, as rife in sexism and racism and argues that it is important for reminding us of people we would rather not be. (shrink)

The article critically reviews the Incongruity Theory of Humor reaching the conclusion that it has to be essentially restructured. Leaving aside the question of scope, it is shown that the theory is inadequate even for those cases for which it is thought to be especially well suited – that it cannot account either for the pleasurable effect of jokes or for aesthetic pleasure. I argue that it is the resolution of the incongruity rather than its mere apprehension, which is that (...) source of the amusement or aesthetic delight. Once the theory is thus restructured, the Superiority Theory of Humor and the Relief Theory can be seen as supplementary to it. (shrink)

The (im)moral character of art works often affects how we respond to them. But should it affect our evaluation of them as art? The article surveys the contemporary debate whilst outlining further lines of argument and enquiry. The main arguments in favour of aestheticism, the claim that there is no internal relation between artistic value and moral character, are considered. Nonetheless the connection between art's instructional aspirations and artistic value, as well as the ways in which works solicit responses from (...) us, underwrite the claim that a work's moral character can be directly relevant to a work's value as art. Various competing accounts of how the relationship goes, ethicism, moderate moralism and immoralism, are considered. The article goes on to elaborate novel considerations in favour of a suitably qualified cognitive immoralism and suggests avenues of further enquiry with respect to the moral character of art works. (shrink)

Gut Reactions is an interdisciplinary defense of the claim that emotions are perceptions of changes in the body.

Abe and his friend Sol are out for a walk together in a part of town they haven't been in before. Passing a Christian church, they notice a curious sign in front that says "$1,000 to anyone who will convert." "I wonder what that's about," says Abe. "I think I'll go in and have a look. I'll be back in a minute; just wait for me." Sol sits on the sidewalk bench and waits patiently for nearly half an hour. Finally, (...) Abe reappears. "Well," asks Sol, "what are they up to? Who are they trying to convert? Why do they care? Did you get the $1,000?" Indignantly Abe replies, "Money. That's all you people care about." Ted Cohen thinks that's not a bad joke. But he also doesn't think it's an easy joke. For a listener or reader to laugh at Abe's conversion, a complicated set of conditions must be met. First, a listener has to recognize that Abe and Sol are Jewish names. Second, that listener has to be familiar with the widespread idea that Jews are more interested in money than anything else. And finally, the listener needs to know this information in advance of the joke, and without anyone telling him or her. Jokes, in short, are complicated transactions in which communities are forged, intimacy is offered, and otherwise offensive stereotypes and cliches lose their sting—at least sometimes. _Jokes_ is a book of jokes and a book about them. Cohen loves a good laugh, but as a philosopher, he is also interested in how jokes work, why they work, and when they don't. The delight at the end of a joke is the result of a complex set of conditions and processes, and Cohen takes us through these conditions in a philosophical exploration of humor. He considers questions of audience, selection of joke topics, the ethnic character of jokes, and their morality, all with plenty of examples that will make you either chuckle or wince. _Jokes:_ more humorous than other philosophy books, more philosophical than other humor books. "Befitting its subject, this study of jokes is... light, funny, and thought-provoking.... [T]he method fits the material, allowing the author to pepper the book with a diversity of jokes without flattening their humor as a steamroller theory might. Such a book is only as good as its jokes, and most of his are good.... [E]ntertainment and ideas in one gossamer package."—_Kirkus Reviews_ "One of the many triumphs of Ted Cohen's Jokes-apart from the not incidental fact that the jokes are so good that he doesn't bother to compete with them-is that it never tries to sound more profound than the jokes it tells.... [H]e makes you feel he is doing an unusual kind of philosophy. As though he has managed to turn J. L. Austin into one of the Marx Brothers.... Reading Jokes makes you feel that being genial is the most profound thing we ever do-which is something jokes also make us feel-and that doing philosophy is as natural as being amused."—Adam Phillips, _London Review of Books_ "[A] lucid and jargon-free study of the remarkable fact that we divert each other with stories meant to make us laugh.... An illuminating study, replete with killer jokes."—Kevin McCardle, _The Herald_ "Cohen is an ardent joke-maker, keen to offer us a glimpse of how jokes are crafted and to have us dwell rather longer on their effects."—Barry C. Smith, _Times Literary Supplement_ "Because Ted Cohen loves jokes, we come to appreciate them more, and perhaps think further about the quality of good humor and the appropriateness of laughter in our lives."—Steve Carlson, _Christian Science Monitor_. (shrink)

When theorists have studied humor, they often assumed that laughter was either a necessary or a sufficient condition of humor. It is neither. Although humorous events usually evoke laughter, they do not do so invariably. Humor may evoke smiles or smirks which fall short of laughter. Thus it is not a necessary condition. Nor is it a sufficient condition. People may laugh because they are uncomfortable (nervous laughter), they may laugh at someone (derisive laughter), they may laugh because they are (...) insane or mentally imbalanced (hysterical laughter), or they may laugh because they are physiologically induced to do so (as when someone tickles them relentlessly). Perhaps these other forms of laughter are philosophically interesting, but they are not forms of humor and so are beyond the reach of this essay. (shrink)

I argue that genuine moral flaws never enhance amusement, but they sometimes detract.I argue against comic immoralism--the position that moral flaws can make attempts at humor more amusing.Two common errors have made immoralism look attractive.First, immoralists have confused outrageous content with genuine moral flaws.Second, immoralists have failed to see that it is not sufficient to show that a morally flawed joke is amusing; they need to show that a joke can be more amusing because of the fact that it is (...) morally flawed.I argue that the immoralist lacks a plausible account of how this could be the case.I reject immoralism and argue for comic moralism—the position that moral flaws can make attempts at humor less amusing. (shrink)

Republic is the central work of the western world's most famous philosopher. Essentially an inquiry into morality, Republic also contains crucial arguments and insights into many other areas of philosophy. It is also a literary masterpiece: the philosophy is presented for the most part for the ordinary reader, who is carried along by the wit and intensity of the dialogue and by Plato's unforgettable images of the human condition. This new, lucid translation by Robin Waterfield is complemented by full explanatory (...) notes and an up-to-date critical introduction. (shrink)

Søren Kierkegaard, the nineteenth-century Danish philosopher rediscovered in the twentieth century, is a major influence in contemporary philosophy, religion, and literature. He regarded Either/Or as the beginning of his authorship, although he had published two earlier works on Hans Christian Andersen and irony. The pseudonymous volumes of Either/Or are the writings of a young man and of Judge William. The ironical young man's papers include a collection of sardonic aphorisms; essays on Mozart, modern drama, and boredom; and "The Seducer's Diary." (...) The seeming miscellany is a reflective presentation of aspects of the "either," the esthetic view of life. Part II is an older friend's "or," the ethical life of integrated, authentic personhood, elaborated in discussions of personal becoming and of marriage. The resolution of the "either/or" is left to the reader, for there is no Part III until the appearance of Stages on Life's Way. The poetic-reflective creations of a master stylist and imaginative impersonator, the two men write in distinctive ways appropriate to their respective positions. (shrink)