Recently a good friend of mine reminded me of the Humor or Something Nothing Funny Continuum that we discovered together about 10 years ago. We went to have dinner together when he reminded me of the Continuum and recorded my response in the video below.
The Nothing Something Funny Continuum
from aaroneous
So here is the principle as it has been outlined in the video above, and the image to the left. There is a relationship between all things humorous that requires these elements work together in order to accomplish the end of being humorous. So something (say a joke in this example) is just a bundle of words that may be said in any number of ways without being funny, in many cases it may only be the individual that (although they probably don’t realize it) understands how to access the power of the continuum (Since my friend Aaron, and I and I guess now You the reader are the only ones that even know that the continuum exists I will say that I am sure this assumption is correct). But when this bundle of words is then combined with Nothing (say a proper amount of silence before executing the punch line) that bundle of words then becomes funny to the listener.
So let’s look at the inverse of the continuum. If we have an individual sitting in a chair reading a book which is a common situation you may find. So that person may find the situation funny when all of the sudden out of seemingly Nothing their cat jumps from behind the chair they are sitting in to attack a bird sitting outside the window on the window sill. The cat smashes into the window falling into a heap on the floor, it then gets up and runs out of the room. The individual then spends the next 15 to 30 minutes in various fits of laughing as they contemplate the Nothing that then turned to Something and was therefore very funny.
So there you have it, Nothing+Something=Funny as well as Something+Nothing=Funny and even Funny + Something = Nothing. You get the Picture.
