In a recent episode of House, a patient was diagnosed with bradycardia. If you're like me, you suspect that bradycardia is that disease that was first diagnosed in either Marcia or Greg, the older sister and brother respectively of the Brady Bunch.
Apparently, though, bradycardia and the Bradys are unrelated. The medical term refers simply to a too-slow heart rate.
Okay, I just wanted to throw that dumb pun out there. Other than that, I got nuttin'.
Showing posts with label puns. Show all posts
Showing posts with label puns. Show all posts
01 December 2011
24 July 2011
The State, Its Revenue, and Its Enemies
Let me think this through in simple terms, fitting for a simple guy like me.
I have a credit card that has a $6,000 credit limit. I go along happily spending for awhile until one day I find that I've hit the limit, and stores/bars/vending machines are spitting my card back out at me.
So I scrape together $1,000, pay it, and now I'm below the limit again. I can go back to using my plastic and (bonus), the credit card company, happy to have received the $1,000 payment, increases my limit to $10,000.
Something like that has been the history of the US legislatively imposed Treasury debt limit, and various increases thereof.
What do I do for a living? I sell widgets, let us suppose. I work on commission, so the more widgets I sell, the more money I get. [Okay, this part doesn't seem at first blush to fit the analogy, but it will in time. Work with me here.] The problem is, how to raise that $1,000 quick so I can (a) render my card limit immediately irrelevant and (b) likely get it raised into the bargain?
Along comes someone named Lancelot Giggler who tells me that I could sell a lot more widgets if I charged less as a commission. Perhaps I could offer some portion of my commission as a rebate to buyers. Enough new buyers will mean a higher total income, means I pay the credit card company.
Now, let's imagine that there are a variety of different opinions about the social value of Faille and the widgets he sells. There is a faction who believes that if I died, or (let's be less bloodthirsty here) if I lost a lot of weight because of a starvation diet, and wasn't able to sell widgets any more, then the world would be better off, because the social net value of widget salesmen, or of chubby ones anyway, is negative.
So we have Lancelot Giggler on the one hand and we have the Faille Starvers on the other.
This is where I get confused. Aren't Giggler and the Starvers taking up quite contrary positions? If Giggler is telling the truth about the effects of commissions cuts on my sales, then he is describing a way in which I can make more sales and remain chubby and prosperous. If the Starvers believe him, they'll want to dissuade or prevent me from doing that.
Right?
I have a credit card that has a $6,000 credit limit. I go along happily spending for awhile until one day I find that I've hit the limit, and stores/bars/vending machines are spitting my card back out at me.
So I scrape together $1,000, pay it, and now I'm below the limit again. I can go back to using my plastic and (bonus), the credit card company, happy to have received the $1,000 payment, increases my limit to $10,000.
Something like that has been the history of the US legislatively imposed Treasury debt limit, and various increases thereof.
What do I do for a living? I sell widgets, let us suppose. I work on commission, so the more widgets I sell, the more money I get. [Okay, this part doesn't seem at first blush to fit the analogy, but it will in time. Work with me here.] The problem is, how to raise that $1,000 quick so I can (a) render my card limit immediately irrelevant and (b) likely get it raised into the bargain?
Along comes someone named Lancelot Giggler who tells me that I could sell a lot more widgets if I charged less as a commission. Perhaps I could offer some portion of my commission as a rebate to buyers. Enough new buyers will mean a higher total income, means I pay the credit card company.
Now, let's imagine that there are a variety of different opinions about the social value of Faille and the widgets he sells. There is a faction who believes that if I died, or (let's be less bloodthirsty here) if I lost a lot of weight because of a starvation diet, and wasn't able to sell widgets any more, then the world would be better off, because the social net value of widget salesmen, or of chubby ones anyway, is negative.
So we have Lancelot Giggler on the one hand and we have the Faille Starvers on the other.
This is where I get confused. Aren't Giggler and the Starvers taking up quite contrary positions? If Giggler is telling the truth about the effects of commissions cuts on my sales, then he is describing a way in which I can make more sales and remain chubby and prosperous. If the Starvers believe him, they'll want to dissuade or prevent me from doing that.
Right?
19 May 2011
Bergson and Humor
I enjoyed the recent article in SLATE outlining five theories of humor, and why none explains the field. The point, apparently, is to introduce and justify a sixth theory, one based on evolutionary biology and advocated by Matthew Hurley at al.
But I do think author Nina Shen Rastogi misunderstood one of the five, specifically the "mechanical theory." In her account, this is the view of philosopher Henri Bergson, who "believed that it is inadaptability or rigidity -- the repetitive nature of our personalities -- that is the source of humor."
Rastogi thinks this is wrong, because many examples of rigidity aren't funny at all, and because puns aren't mechanical, but ARE funny. Her example of a non-mechanism witticism comes from Douglas Hofstadter, "Email is the happy medium between male and female."
Aside from the fact that the email pun doesn't quite manage to split my sides, Rastogi is off base here. Bergson's view was that humor arises from the juxtaposition of the vital and the mechanical, the living and the routine.
Consider slapstick physical comedy. A man slips on a banana peel. He starts wheeling his arms around to try to restore his balance. That's funny. Why? Because he began the scene as a human being, a vital purposive creature, and ended it as a system of off-balance levers.
Puns are another example of Bergson's point (not a counter-example)! After all, what is more vital than language? What more mechanical than the classification of words by their mere sound, regardless of their actual meaning?
But I do think author Nina Shen Rastogi misunderstood one of the five, specifically the "mechanical theory." In her account, this is the view of philosopher Henri Bergson, who "believed that it is inadaptability or rigidity -- the repetitive nature of our personalities -- that is the source of humor."
Rastogi thinks this is wrong, because many examples of rigidity aren't funny at all, and because puns aren't mechanical, but ARE funny. Her example of a non-mechanism witticism comes from Douglas Hofstadter, "Email is the happy medium between male and female."
Aside from the fact that the email pun doesn't quite manage to split my sides, Rastogi is off base here. Bergson's view was that humor arises from the juxtaposition of the vital and the mechanical, the living and the routine.
Consider slapstick physical comedy. A man slips on a banana peel. He starts wheeling his arms around to try to restore his balance. That's funny. Why? Because he began the scene as a human being, a vital purposive creature, and ended it as a system of off-balance levers.
Puns are another example of Bergson's point (not a counter-example)! After all, what is more vital than language? What more mechanical than the classification of words by their mere sound, regardless of their actual meaning?
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