No kidding! The Funniest Jokes in History!
bodhi
London - The world's funniest joke, voted by popular demand over the
Internet, was unveiled on Wednesday by the British Association for the
Advancement of Science (BA) after an experiment lasting three months.
Famed fictional detective Sherlock Holmes and his gruff assistant
Doctor Watson pitch their tent while on a camping expedition, but in
the middle of the night Holmes nudges Watson awake and questions him.
HOLMES: Watson, look up at the stars and tell me what you deduce.
WATSON: I see millions of stars, and if there are millions of stars,
and if even a few of those have planets, it is quite likely there are
some planets like earth, and if there are a few planets like earth out
there there might also be life.
HOLMES: Watson, you idiot! Somebody stole our tent.
The BA said the joke was the most popular among 10,000 submitted, being
chosen as the best by 47% of the 100,000 people from more than 70
countries who took part.
The jokes can be seen, made and rated on www.laughlab.co.uk.
Source: Reuters Thursday 20 December 2001
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Top joke in Scotland: I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my
grandfather. Not screaming in terror like his passengers.
Top joke in England: Two weasels are sitting on a bar stool. One
starts to insult the other one. He screams, "I slept with your
mother!" The bar gets quiet as everyone listens to see what the other
weasel will do. The first again yells, "I SLEPT WITH YOUR MOTHER!"
The other says, "Go home dad you're drunk."
Top joke in USA: A man and a friend are playing golf one day at their
local golf course. One of the guys is about to chip onto the green
when he sees a long funeral procession on the road next to the course.
He stops in mid-swing, takes off his golf cap, closes his eyes, and
bows down in prayer. His friend says: "Wow, that is the most
thoughtful and touching thing I have ever seen. You truly are a kind
man." The man then replies: "Yeah, well we were married 35 years."
Top joke in Belgium: Why do ducks have webbed feet? To stamp out
fires. Why do elephants have flat feet? To stamp out burning ducks.
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Scientists Identify "Funniest Jokes"
The world's funniest joke has been unveiled by scientists at the end of
the largest study of humour ever undertaken.
For the past year people around the world have been invited to judge
jokes on an internet site and contribute quips of their own. The
LaughLab experiment - conducted by psychologist Dr Richard Wiseman,
from the University of Hertfordshire - attracted more than 40,000 jokes
and almost two million ratings.
The joke which received the highest global ratings was submitted by
31-year-old psychiatrist Gurpal Gosall, from Manchester. It is:
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The Funniest Jokes in History
by Martha Brockenbrough
http://encarta.msn.com/column_humormain_tamimhome/The_Funniest_Jokes_in_History.html
You may have heard it said that you'll never eat sausage again after
you see how it's made. I don't see how that could be true. There's
nothing disgusting about stuffing ground-up meat parts into a tightly
stretched tube of animal intestines--nothing disgusting at all.
Likewise, talking about the evolution and history of humor is a
guaranteed laugh riot. Or is it?
For example, the Roman orator Cicero advised budding speakers that
physical deformity is always a great source of comic material.
Perhaps the Romans got this nasty habit from the Greeks, who liked to
make fun of their leader Pericles for having a head shaped like an
onion. Some thanks poor Pericles got for having the Parthenon built,
and for transforming Athens into a center for art and literature. (You
won't get to see Pericles's head, by the way. Sculptors hid the point
on his head with a helmet.)
Over time, our definition of what is funny has changed. Today, people
do not find birth defects and other physical differences to be a
laughing matter.
Then what do we find funny? If you believe the scientists at Britain's
Laugh Lab, the following joke is number one--according to the nearly 2
million people from around the world who visited the site and rated
jokes:
A couple of New Jersey hunters are out in the woods when one of them
falls to the ground. He doesn't seem to be breathing, his eyes are
rolled back in his head. The other guy whips out his cell phone and
calls emergency services. He gasps to the operator: "My friend is
dead! What can I do?" The operator, in a calm soothing voice says:
"Just take it easy. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead."
There is a silence, then a shot is heard. The guy's voice comes back on
the line. He says: "OK, now what?"
This joke, on the other hand, was rated "fowl":
Q. Why are chickens considered good employees?
A. Because they work around the cluck.
Maybe the chicken joke isn't the funniest in the world, but I laughed
as hard at it as I did at the one about the New Jersey hunters. Which
is to say, not very hard.
This just goes to show that we all have different tastes when if comes
to humor, and also that the people who liked this joke are idiots.
Oops--now I've done it.
Part II: Jokes and the superiority complex
Yes, I just made a joke at the expense of all the well-meaning people
who thought the New Jersey hunters joke was funny. Who knows? Perhaps
you thought it was funny (you poor misguided thing).
So, why did I do it? Humor experts would probably argue that's the
first reason people make jokes: It makes us feel superior.
A second theory of humor, says M. Thomas Inge, the Blackwell Professor
of English and Humanities at Randolph Macon College, is that we find
comedy in incongruity.
"It's the difference between what we expect and what we get," he
explains. So, if we see a dignified-looking man walk down the street
and slip, we get a chuckle.
The third theory of humor is that it provides a release from things
that are painful. This goes a long way toward explaining nervous
laughter, and I'm betting it's also why people like to start speeches
with jokes. It breaks the ice. Even the New Jersey hunters joke might
do in that sort of situation.
Of course, we didn't always have these tidy explanations of humor.
Part III: Ancient thoughts about humor
People have been studying humor for thousands of years. The Greek
philosopher Aristotle discussed comedy in the second book of Poetics,
which has been lost. He also wrote about it in Nichomachean Ethics,
where he analyzed jokes and laughter and came out in favor of tasteful
jokes.
Aristotle's teacher, Plato, criticized buffoonery and laughter more
severely. In fact, laughter was forbidden at Plato's Academy. And
Plato's teacher, Socrates, took it a step farther when he said, "One
ought to use laughter as one uses salt--sparingly."
Despite the popularity of the ancient comic plays by Aristophanes,
humor wasn't universally smiled upon back then. In fact, it was viewed
by some as being downright dangerous. For example, during festivals,
the Greeks dressed a prostitute in a veil and had her mock the most
prominent citizens in town, by name. (Today, Jon Stewart performs this
function on Comedy Central's Daily Show.)
Some people found this funny because it inverted the social order: The
lowliest person was making fun of the most exalted. Others, however,
found disrupting society's rules and mores for a mere laugh to be
unsettling and unacceptable.
Later, Roman philosopher and statesman Cicero (in addition to his
unfortunate ideas about making fun of physical differences) argued that
the proper role of humor was to correct bad behavior without being
offensive. This theory would explain why we all love Miss Manners so
much.
This is not to say that jokes weren't popular. Around AD 450 (a few
hundred years after Cicero), someone compiled a book of 265 jokes
called Philogelos, which translates to "laughter lover." Remarkably,
some are still funny. For example, "A witty young student ran out of
money and sold his school books. He wrote to his father and said,
'Congratulate me, father, for I am already making money from my
studies.'"
And of course, long before people wrote joke books or tackled the topic
in philosophical texts, people have been doing things to get laughs. If
you consider humor in the broadest sense--an action done in a prankish
spirit--then even monkeys can be funny, according to Salvatore Attardo,
professor of linguistics at Youngstown State University.
Part IV: Modern findings
I must say I like the modern findings about humor much better than
Plato's conclusion that laughter is bad news.
Professor Attardo is full of fun facts about humor:
* Laughter does not always follow a joke. Often, we laugh to signal
our audience that what's coming next is funny.
* Languages like French and English are better at puns because more
of their words are monosyllabic. It's easier to find homophones for
one-syllable words than for longer ones.
* On average, one out of 10 dinner table conversational gambits is
funny.
This last nugget intrigued me, so I begged Attardo for more
information. What it means, he explained, is that every tenth comment,
on average, is humorous.
Linguist Deborah Tannen conducted the study that produced these results
(at a dinner table, which makes me wonder whether lunch and breakfast
tables would yield the same hilarity). A German study by Helga Kotthoff
confirmed the ten percent rule, although her study was conducted in
more of a cocktail-party situation.
Nobel Prize winners' speeches contain less humor, Attardo adds. But the
text-messages Egyptians send on mobile devices contain up to 85 percent
humor. The moral of this, it seems, is to find Egyptian friends and add
them to your e-mail buddy list.
Once you have permission from your mummy, of course.
-------------------------
Scientists Devise Perfect Joke Formula
The mathematical equation for the perfect joke has been revealed by
scientists. It is
c=(m+nO)/p
This formula was worked out by Helen Pilcher and Timandra Harkness. As
well as being scientists, the pair are also stand-up comedians who make
up the Comedy Research Project. They run this in collaboration with
the Science Museum's Dana Centre in London. In the formula, c is the
funniness of the joke; m is the "comic moment" which is arrived at by
multiplying the punchline's funniness rating by the length of the
joke's buildup. nO is the number of times the subject undergoes a
pratfall, multiplied by the "ouch factor" - the social and physical
pain of the indignity involved. The total is divided by the number of
puns, p.
According to the equation, if a joke consists of a long "shaggy dog
story", it doesn't require such a funny punchline as a shorter
wisecrack. Puns are seen as dissipating the power of a joke because
they tend to encourage groans rather than laughter.
Source:www.ananova.com Monday 14 June 2004
----------------------------
Funniest Joke in the World
Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch
http://www.jumpstation.ca/recroom/comedy/python/joke.html
Opening Scene:
A suburban house in a boring looking street. Zoom into upstairs window.
Serious documentary music. Interior of small room. A bent figure
(Michael Palin) huddles over a table, writing. He is surrounded by bits
of paper. The camera is situated facing the man as he writes with
immense concentration lining his unshaven face.
Voice Over:
This man is Ernest Scribbler... writer of jokes.
In a few moments, he will have written the funniest joke in the
world... and, as a consequence, he will die... laughing.
Ernest stops writing, pauses to look at what he has written... a smile
slowly spreads across his face, turning very, very slowly to
uncontrolled hysterical laughter... he staggers to his feet and reels
across room helpless with mounting mirth and eventually collapses and
dies on the floor.
Voice Over:
It was obvious that this joke was lethal...
no one could read it and live...
Ernest's mother enters. She sees him dead, she gives a little cry of
horror and bends over his body, weeping. Brokenly she notices the piece
of paper in his hand and picks it up and reads it between her sobs.
Immediately she breaks out into hysterical laughter, leaps three feet
into the air, and falls down dead without more ado. Cut to news type
shot of commentator standing in front of the house.
Commentator:
This morning, shortly after eleven o'clock, comedy struck this little
house in Dibley Road. Sudden... violent... comedy.
Police have sealed off the area, and Scotland Yard's crack inspector is
with me now.
Inspector:
I shall enter the house and attempt to remove the joke.
About now an upstairs window in the house is fiung open and a doctor,
rears his head out, hysterical with laughter, and dies hanging over the
window sill. The commentator and the inspector look up and then
continue as if they are used to such sights.
Inspector:
I shall be aided by the sound of sombre music, played on gramophone
records, and also by the chanting of laments by the men of Q
Division...
(Points to a group of dour looking policemen standing nearby)
The atmosphere thus created should protect me in the eventuality of me
reading the joke.
(He gives a signal.)
The group of policemen start groaning and chanting biblical laments.
The Dead March is heard. The inspector squares his shoulders and
bravely starts walking into the house.
Commentator:
There goes a brave man. Whether he comes out alive or not,
this will surely be remembered as one of the most courageous
and gallant acts in police history.
The inspector suddenly appears at the door,
helpless with laughter, holding the joke aloft.
He collapses and dies.
Cut to film of army vans driving along dark roads.
Voice Over:
It was not long before the Army became interested in the military
potential of the Killer Joke. Under top security, the joke was hurried
to a meeting of Allied Commanders at the Ministry of War.
Cut to door at Ham House.
Soldier on guard comes to attention as dispatch rider
hurries in carrying armoured box.
Notice on door:
"Conference. No Admittance"
Dispatch rider rushes in.
A door opens for him and closes behind him.
We hear a mighty roar of laughter...
A series of doomphs as the commanders hit the floor or table. Soldier
outside does not move a muscle.
Cut to a pillbox on the Salisbury Plain.
Track in to slit to see moustachioed top brass
peering anxiously out.
Voice Over:
Top brass were impressed. Tests on Salisbury Plain confirmed the joke's
devastating effectiveness at a range of up to fifty yards.
Cut to shot looking out of slit in pillbox.
Camera zooms through slit to distance where a solitary figure is
standing on the windswept plain.
He is a bespectacled, weedy lance-corporal (Terry Jones) looking cold
and miserable.
Pan across to fifty yards away where two helmeted soldiers are at their
positions beside a blackboard on an easel covered with a cloth.
Cut in to corporal's face-registening complete lack of comprehension as
well as stupidily.
Man on top of pillbox waves flag.
The soldiers reveal the joke to the corporal.
He peers at it, thinks about its meaning,
snickers, and dies.
Two watching generals are very impressed.
Generals:
Fantastic.
Cut to a Colonel talking to camera.
Colonel:
All through the winter of '43 we had translators working, in joke-proof
conditions, to try and produce a German version of the joke. They
worked on one word each for greater safety. One of them saw two words
of the joke and spent several weeks in hospital. But apart from that
things went pretty quickly, and we soon had the joke by January, in a
form which our troops couldn't understand but which the Germans could.
Cut to a trench in the Ardennes. Members of the joke brigade are
crouched holding pieces of paper with the joke on them.
Voice Over:
So, on July 8th, I944, the joke was first told to the enemy
in the Ardennes...
Commanding NCO:
Tell the... joke.
Joke Brigade:
(together)
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!...
Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
Pan out of the British trench across war-torn landscape and come to
rest where presumably the German trench is. There is a pause and then a
group of Germans rear up in hysterics.
Voice Over:
It was a fantastic success. Over sixty thousand times as powerful as
Britain's great pre-war joke...
Cut to a film of Chamberlain brandishing
the "Peace in our time" treaty.
...and one which Hitler just couldn't match.
Film of Hitler rally. Hitler speaks; subtitles are superimposed.
Hitler:
SUBTITLE
MY DOG'S GOT NO NOSE
A young soldier responds:
SUBTITLE
HOW DOES HE SMELL?
Hitler:
SUBTITLE
AWFUL'
Voice Over:
In action it was deadly.
Cut to a small squad with rifles making their way through forest.
Suddenly one of them sees something and gives signal at which they all
dive for cover. From the cover of a tree he reads out joke.
Corporal:
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!...
Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
Sniper falls laughing out of tree.
Joke Brigade:
(charging)
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!...
Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
They chant the joke.
Germans are put to fight laughing, some dropping to ground.
Voice Over:
The German casualties were appalling.
Cut to a German hospital and a ward full of casualties still laughing
hysterically.
Cut to Nazi interrogation room.
An officer from the joke bngade has a light shining in his face.
A Gestapo officer is interrogating him; another stands behind him.
Nazi:
Vott is the big joke?
Officer:
I can only give you name, rank,
and why did the chicken cross the road?
Nazi:
That's not funny!
(slaps him)
I vant to know the joke.
Officer:
All right. How do you make a Nazi cross?
Nazi:
(momentarily fooled)
I don't know... how do you make a Nazi cross?
Officer:
Tread on his corns.
(does so; the Nazi hops in pain)
Nazi:
Gott in Hiramell That's not funny!
(mimes cuffing him while the other Nazi claps his
hands to provide the sound effct)
Now if you don't tell me the joke, I shall hit you properly.
Officer:
I can stand physical pain, you know.
Nazi:
Ah... you're no fun. All right, Otto.
Otto starts tickling the officer who starts laughing.
Officer:
Oh no - anything but that please no, all fight I'll tell you.
They stop tickling him.
Nazi:
Quick Otto. The typewriter.
Otto goes to the typewriter and they wait expeaantly. The officer
produces piece of paper out of his breast pocket and reads.
Officer:
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!...
Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
Otto at the typewriter explodes with laughter and dies.
Nazi:
Ach! Zat iss not funny!
Nazi burts into laughter and dies.
A German guard bursts in with machine gun,
The British officer leaps on the table.
Officer:
(lightning speed)
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja!...
Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
The guard reels back and collapses laughing.
British officer makes his escape.
Cut to a film of German scientists working in laboratories.
Voice Over:
But at Peenemunde in the Autumn of '44,
the Germans were working on a joke of their own.
A German general is seated at an imposing desk.
Behind him stands Otto, labelled "A Different Gestapo Officer".
Bespectacled German scientist/joke writer enters room. He clean his
throat and reads from card.
German Joker:
Die ist ein Kinnerhunder und zwei Mackel uber und der bitte schon ist
den Wunderhaus sprechensie. 'Nein' sprecht der Herren 'Ist aufern
borger mit zveitingen'.
He finishes and looks hopeful.
Otto:
We let you know.
He shoots him. Film of German sdentists.
Voice Over:
But by December their joke was ready,
and Hitler gave the order for the German V-Joke
to be broadcast in English.
Cut to 1940's wartime radio set with couple anxiously listening to it.
Radio:
(crackly German voice)
Der ver zwei peanuts, valking down der strasse, and von vas...
assaulted! peanut. Ho-ho-ho-ho.
Radio bunts into "Deutschland Uber Alles".
The couple look at each other and then in blank amazement at the radio.
Cut to modern BBC 2 interview.
The commentator in a woodland glade.
Commentator (Eric Idle):
In 1945 Peace broke out. It was the end of the Joke.
Joke warfare was banned at a special session of the Geneva Convention,
and in I950 the last remaining copy of the joke was laid to rest here
in the Berkshire countryside, never to be told again.
He walks away revealing a monument on which is written:
"To The Unknown Joke".
Camera pulls away slowly through idyllic setting.
Patriotic music reaches crescendo.
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namaste;
bodhi
Read the blog the National Security Agency is trying to SHUT DOWN!!!
http://psychedelictourist.blogspot.com
Bradley K. Sherman
Funniest Joke of the 21st Century: George W. Bush
--bks
Charles
> Funniest Joke of the 21st Century: George W. Bush
>
> --bks
And a burning duck that is getting stomped on by elephants.
Callisto
How about a burning Bush being stomped over?
Come to think, God spoke to Moses through a burning Bush....