speak humor, be humorous

Chapter 35 Humor Method (1)
Humor is a quality, a quality that induces joy, entertains in a pleasant way; humor is an indicator, an indicator of the intellectual level of the mind.When interacting with people, hide some sharpness in the method, or cover the sharpness with some skills, which can create a humorous and relaxed effect without losing self-esteem.The method is an indispensable brick and tile for building a humorous capital building.

Absurd words: create an illusion

The life of this kind of humor lies not only in the fact that the characters are fascinated by one point, but also in that no matter how extreme it is, the fascination point will not disappear, but will be strengthened.Not all fools constitute humor, and not all fools have the same level of humor.In order to make foolishness interesting, at least try to make its stupid words and stupid actions lead to obvious absurdity.It is naturally important that absurdity has results, but what is more important is the process leading to absurdity, allowing readers to see how the logical relationship between the antecedents and consequences of absurdity is distorted step by step, link after link.

It's hard to find an absurd premise because it's absurd but the characters in the story are sincere.If he does not sincerely stick to the false premise, he is not insane.

There is a story of "The Blind Man Eating Fish" in "Xiao Lin Guang Ji" edited by Cheng Shijue of the Qing Dynasty.It is said that a group of blind men eat fish together, but there are few fish and many people, so they have to cook soup in a big pot.The fish jumped out of the pot, and the blind man didn't know it.They have never eaten fish, and they don't know the taste of fish.Everyone gathered in front of the pot, drank clear water soup, and praised in unison:

"Good soup! Good soup!"

The fish jumped onto the feet of a blind man, and the blind man shouted: "The fish is not in the pot!" All the blind men sighed: "Amitabha, fortunately, the fish is outside the pot. If it were really in the pot, we would all die. gone."

It is clear water soup without fish, but the blind man is praising "good fresh soup". This is the absurd premise of this story.This is naturally an exaggerated illusion, but it cannot be completely nonsense, and it must have some basis, so people who eat fish are designed to be blind so that they cannot see, and it is specifically stated that they have never eaten fish.Without these two points, this premise cannot be established.If the premise cannot be established, the logical basis of the above story will collapse.

The real absurdity of this foundation is an illusion, a subjective fascination, not self-deception, because it is sincere.And because of that, it's fascinating to watch.But just having such a little obsession, the effect is still very limited and not strong enough, and the effect has to be amplified to make the blind man's logical absurdity stronger, so there is the following climax: I don't know if there is no fish, I think it is fresh, It's justifiable, now that I know that there are no fish, the illusion of freshness has not disappeared, but it has led to the rejoicing of not being fresh.

There are stories about Liu Ling's addiction to alcohol in several joke books in ancient times: his friend (or wife) promised to let him get drunk enough, and then steamed the wine in a vat, and when the wine was ready, he pushed it in the vat and covered it.

After three days, there was no movement in the tank, and Liu Ling thought that she was satisfied now.When I opened the vat, Liu Ling was sitting drunkenly on the wine lees, and it took a long time before she raised her head and said:
"You said you want to get me drunk enough, but why do you let me sit here idle?"

Alcoholism is an obsession, which is not humorous. Humor arises from obsession to the extreme and hallucinations.After soaking in the wine tank for three days and finishing the wine, I still feel like I haven't drunk it.Under normal circumstances, everyone may be fascinated, but if the conditions change slightly, people will understand it by themselves, that is, they have realized it, but this is not the case in the way of humor.

A little obsession belongs to the method of true ignorance and stupidity, and the one with the strongest effect is because of being deluded but not enlightened.

Stealing the beam and changing the pillar: secretly replace the original meaning

Swapping is to drastically shift and transform the connotation of concepts, so that expectations are lost and accidents occur.The more covert the exchange is, the greater the gap between the connotation of the concept, and the stronger the effect of humor.Humor is an emotional way of thinking, which has similarities and differences with people's usual rational way of thinking.For the similarities, people can spontaneously grasp the differences without careful study; as for the differences, although many people with a strong sense of humor have grasped them, they don’t know why, while those with a weak sense of humor often use their usual If the thinking method replaces the humorous thinking method, the result will naturally be the disappearance of the sense of humor.Humorous thinking differs from ordinary rational thinking in at least two respects: first, in the use and formation of concepts; and second, in the method of reasoning.Here we mainly talk about the special performance of concepts in humor.

Usually, people have a basic requirement when they think rationally, that is, the meaning of the concept must be stable, the two parties must discuss the same thing, or the premise of the same concept must be consistent when they speak or write.If they don't agree, it becomes a dialogue of the deaf -- each speaks for himself.If in one's own speech or article, the meaning of the same concept is changed over and over again, it is incoherent.

It may seem unbelievable, but it happens so easily.Because the same concept often does not have only one meaning, especially those basic and commonly used concepts often have many meanings.If the person who speaks and writes the article is not particular, it will often lead to the transfer of the concept, although the concept has not changed literally.In scientific research, political life, or business, the meaning of a concept changes contextually in such a frightening way.Therefore, Aristotle in ancient Greece stipulated in his logic that concepts should be unified when thinking about problems. He called it the "law of identity".Violation of this rule is called "stealthly changing the concept", that is to say, you have not changed the literal meaning, but you have secretly changed the meaning contained in it, which is absolutely not allowed.

But humorous thinking does not belong to this type. It is not entirely practical and rational, it is mainly emotional.Emotion and rationality are a natural pair of contradictions, which are destructive to ordinary thinking, but may be constructive to a sense of humor.

There is such a dialogue:
Teacher: "Today we teach subtraction. For example, if your brother has 5 apples and you take 3 from him, what will happen?" Child: "Well, he will definitely beat me up."

For mathematics, this is completely stupid, because concepts are swapped.The meaning of "what is the result" mentioned by the teacher obviously refers to the meaning of how much is left, which belongs to the category of quantitative relationship, but the child transfers it to the personnel relationship of taking his brother's apple without his permission.

However, for the formation of a sense of humor, it is good to silently transfer or secretly change such concepts.A careful analysis reveals the ingenuity of the designer of this dialogue.He could have asked the teacher to ask how much is left, but the concept of "remaining" is difficult to transfer in such a context, so he switched to "result" with a relatively flexible meaning.This is convenient for children to secretly convert the result of subtraction into the result of taking apples.It can be said that the formation of this kind of sense of humor lies in the ability to secretly and silently transfer the connotation of the concept to a large extent.

Mechanical imitation: apply rote regardless of changes

The mechanical imitation method is in the ever-changing life, no matter how the situation changes, mechanically copying what is applied to one thing on another thing, just mechanically imitating it, making it clumsy and ridiculous.

Bergson pointed out in his book "On Laughter" that the comic is "a mechanical thing embedded in a living thing".In the ever-changing life, it is certainly funny to suddenly insert a mechanical and rigid performance.In the comedy performed by Chaplin, the jokes that take advantage of the mechanical rigidity of the characters are everywhere.There is a movie clip: On a highly mechanized and automated assembly line, all the actions of a worker are assimilated by the action of turning a screw, so that when he sees a button on a woman’s dress, he has to use it as a screw to turn it, and the result is a joke out of nowhere.

There was a student, Mr. taught him three words "you, me, him" and used them to make sentences. "You, you are my student; I, I am your husband; he, he is your classmate."

After the student returned home, he told his father happily, pointing to his father, he said, "You, you are my student; I, I am your husband." He pointed to his mother again, "She, she is your teacher." classmate."

The father was very angry when he heard this: "Why am I your student? I, I am your father; you, you are my son; she, she is your mother." The wronged student came to the school, Blame Mr.: "Sir, you taught me wrong, it should be like this: You, you are my son; I, I am your father; she, she is your mother."

Both the student and his father are so stupid that they don't understand that changes in situations should lead to changes in language expression, they are mechanical and rigid, and they are silly and ridiculous.

There are also many examples of this kind of humorous stories produced by being silly in our country's folk jokes.

There was a young man who was not good at talking.One day, a neighbor gave birth to a son, and everyone went to congratulate him, and he also went.His father specially told him not to say any unlucky words during the banquet, and he happily agreed.

During the banquet, he didn't say a word, just drinking and eating meat.After eating, someone asked him why he didn't speak, and he said: "See you, I didn't say anything today. If this child dies, it's none of my business!"

Although the young man didn't say anything at the banquet, the assumption at the end still didn't take into account "what shouldn't be said at this time", which made people dumbfounded.

Tom: "I don't think the new math teacher is doing too well."

Bill: "Why?"

Tom: "Yesterday he told us 5+1=6."

Bill: "What's wrong?"

Tom: "But today he said 4+2=6."

I don't know how to adapt, but only know how to memorize mechanically, which also produces a silly and ridiculous humorous effect.

Willie's son went to play in his aunt's room, and when he came back to his father, he took a small bag of candy, saying it was from his aunt.

Dad asked, "Did you say 'thank you'?"

"Ah, I forgot." The son immediately ran to his aunt's room to thank him, and when he came back, he said to his father, "Actually, I don't need to thank my aunt."

"Why?" Dad asked.

"My aunt said, 'You're welcome, boy.'"

Children's thinking is generally simple and linear, showing consistency, and often making jokes because of it.

Distorting the classics: making ridiculous interpretations of the classics
Distorting classics is to use well-known ancient or modern classic articles and sentences as the background, and then make distorted and absurd explanations. The greater the distance between the old and new meanings and semantics, the more ridiculous and witty.

Among the ways to lead to absurdity, the one with the stronger comic effect is to distort the classics, because the classics have the most solemn meaning and the language is well-known. Once there is a small distortion, the contrast with the original meaning will be extremely strong.

In my country, classical books are mostly in classical Chinese, which is far from everyday spoken language. Usually, not to mention distorting it, even translating it into spoken language or dialect of modern Chinese may cause great semantic contrast and produce disharmony. Feeling funny.For example, in a Tang poem, it is written that a man is moved by a girl and follows him, which is very poetic.However, if it is translated into "stalking" in modern Chinese, not only is it not poetic at all, but it seems very serious.Another example is that when a language worker translates the frivolous youth of the Tang Dynasty into "A Fei" in modern Chinese, it becomes extremely funny. It is quite stable, and has been deposited in people's unconsciousness for thousands of years. As long as there are slight errors in semantics and style, people are very sensitive, so that before they have time to realize why, they may laugh.

The "Tang Yan Lu" written in the Tang Dynasty records that there was a master of humor named Shi Dongtong under the emperor Gaozu of the Northern Qi Dynasty. He was very good at winning the battle of wit and humor by distorting the classics.

Once when Shi Dongtong visited the Imperial College, some doctors of Confucian classics were arguing that 72 of Confucius' disciples could stretch their ambitions in official career.The stone moving tube came in and asked: "Among the 72 people, how many wear hats and how many don't?" The doctor said: "There is no record in the scriptures."

Shi Dongtong said: "Mr. reading, why didn't you pay attention to Confucius' disciples: 30 of them wore hats, and 42 didn't wear hats." The doctor asked him: "According to what article?"

Shi Dongtong said: "The Analects of Confucius says 'five or six crowned people', five or six thirty;

Originally, Confucius talked about his aspirations and ideals with Zeng Zi and other favorite disciples in "The Analects". Roaming in the wind in the fields by the river is exactly what I wished for.This is a very famous article in "The Analects of Confucius", but here Shi Dongtong misinterpreted the approximate number "five to six people" and "six to seven people" into the multiplication of five six and six seven, and then compared it with the disciples of Confucius The 72 sages are attached, which seems very discordant, so it is full of humorous interest.

There are many stories about this stone moving tube in the "Tang Yanlu" of the Tang Dynasty. The following is a distorted classic "Book of Filial Piety":

Gaozu of the Northern Qi Dynasty once gathered Confucian scholars for a discussion meeting, and the debate was very lively.Shi Dongtong asked the doctor, "Sir, what is Tian's surname?" The doctor thought that the Northern Qi emperor's surname was Gao, so he replied, "The surname is Gao." Your own surname. You should quote the text, and don’t pick up on other people’s wisdom.” The doctor said, “Which scripture has a heavenly surname?”

Shi Dongtong said: "Sir, you don't read at all. You haven't seen the "Book of Filial Piety" that says: 'The way of father and son is also the nature'. Isn't this clearly stated: the surname is 'also'?"

The trick of Shi Dongtong distorting the classics here is to use the sounds of "sex" and "surname".In particular, "Ye" in the original text is a modal function word without any real meaning. Shi Dongtong has turned the function word into a substantive word in violation of the law, which seems particularly far-fetched and therefore very funny.

There is a famous saying in Sima Qian's "Historical Records", called "One Promise, Thousand Gold". It is said that during the Qin and Han Dynasties, Ji Bu, a general who fought with Liu Bang to fight the world, as long as he promised, no amount of money could change it.There is a joke that twists the allusion:
A woman asked her husband: "How do you explain 'One Promise, Thousand Gold'?"

Mr. said: "A 'thousand gold' person is also a lady; a 'one promise' is also a promise. It means: miss, you promise once."

Turning the allusions of historical heroes into the language medium of courtship in front of us through the misinterpretation of the meaning of the words, the degree of humor will be as great as the distance between the two.For those who are determined to speak humorously, they should have a deep understanding of this law.Even if ordinary people want to make suggestive expressions, they tend to tend to be aggressive.However, aggressiveness is easy to be lyrical, but it is not easy to produce dissonance, inappropriate sense of humor and sense of humor.If you want to make your speech humorous, you should look at it from a distance that is not very suitable, and use the example from a distance as the best.Ancient classics are generally very far away from ordinary people.It is both distant and distorted, so it is easy to be humorous.Ancient or not ancient is not the most critical point of the problem, the most critical is still misinterpretation.

Strong words: make sense out of reason
"Arguing with reason" means that in various interactions, the party who is obviously irrational for various reasons always tries to find out a reason to prove that he is reasonable, because the reason itself is irrational, and humor is born in the middle.

Generally speaking, people who are in trouble are eager to break free, which of course requires skill.You can completely start from the words you have given others, argue wittily, argue with strong words, and insist on making unreasonable reasonable and mistakes right, so as to protect yourself.And in an unfavorable environment, the more self-protective it is, the easier it is to get out of it, and the more humorous it is.This situation is easier to manifest in daily communication, because daily communication is generally relaxed and harmonious. If you occasionally make a mistake and fall into a passive position, you can cover it up with strong words and a full sense of humor.

A computer salesman is trying to persuade a man to buy his computer: "I'm selling this computer, which is the most advanced computer that can answer any question you ask."

"Okay then," said the man impatiently, "ask it if it knows where my father is?" The salesman typed the question into the computer, and a few seconds later the computer displayed the following message: "He is currently fishing in Scotland."

"What a mistake," said the man, "my father died three years ago!"

The salesman shrugged. "Yes, your mother's husband died three years ago, but your biological father is indeed fishing in Scotland right now."

In order to sell computers, salesmen inevitably exaggerate and boast about the performance of computers.Faced with the customer's censure, the salesman wanted to be perfunctory, but unexpectedly fell into the customer's questioning, which seemed very embarrassing.Instead of panicking, he cleverly used the incomplete identity between "mother's husband" and "biological father" to create a "father" for customers, producing unexpected humorous effects.Of course, this kind of strong rhetoric is a bit too much. Although he can get out of trouble cleverly, he may offend customers, and he will inevitably fall short.

Although the salesman's use of strong words is a bit inappropriate, he does provide us with a way to get out of the predicament and create humor: using some reasons that are not reasons, we can get out of the predicament and have both humor in the right environment.

When you accidentally fall into the trap of language and are very embarrassed, you may be helpless, and your face will turn red; you may be angry or frustrated; you may be at a loss.But none of this helps, you have to find another way.At this time, the harshness of the objective situation requires you to mobilize the potential of your thinking and make extraordinary performances.Because your spirit is in a very excited and active state, the words you say are often witty and humorous, making people forget the embarrassment you have had in laughter.

(End of this chapter)