The Philosophy of Humor: What Makes Something Funny?
The Philosophy of Humor: What Makes Something Funny?
What makes something funny? This essay reviews some theories of what it is for something to be funny.
Honestly a lot of it is probably timing and delivery.
That explains some of the how but doesn't do much to explain the why.
tl;dr "i dunno"
Humor, like beauty, is relative.
This reveals, for most scholars of humor, that the superiority theory misses the mark. After all, sometimes things are funny without resulting from superiority, and some feelings of superiority don’t make things funny.[4]
It seems the author misunderstands “The Superiority Theory of Humor”. It’s not superiority in itself that’s funny -- it’s the thought or projection of superiority (esp. miscalculation/misplacement thereof) where humor manifests. The banana peel slip seems like a bad example. You’re not laughing at someone’s failure to see and avoid the hazard; you’re laughing at the situation that the person is going through.. that they were just walking along thinking in deep concentration about something other than their path and they are suddenly going for an unplanned ride.
There mere fact that people are fallible is not funny. Though I say that as an adult. Perhaps there is a schadenfreude factor among children or less developed brains.
It’s the mechanical encrusted upon the living. Like, obviously. Duh.