Bar Joke

An exercise for people who are out of shape: Begin with a five-pound potato bag in each hand. Extend your arms straight out from your sides, hold them there for a full minute, and then relax. After a few weeks, move up to ten-pound potato bags. Then try 50-pound potato bags, and eventually try 100-pound potato bags. Once you feel confident at that level, put a potato in each bag.

DEFINITION OF A JOKE: “A joke conveys information in a funny way.”

Content of the Joke: That you can start gaining muscles by holding potato bags and slowly adding more weight to them.

In a funny way: I would say so yes.

MECHANISM OF A JOKE: “A joke adds information in a way that triggers a sudden cognitive shift.”

The information that triggers the cognitive shift are the words “ put a potato in each bag” which suddelny let us realize that the bags, up until this point, where empty.

THE FORMULA: “Disappoint an assumption by fulfilling a second assumption in a surprising and satisfying way.”

Assumption: That the bags where already full with potatoes.

A second assumption is fulfilled: Yes. That the bags were empty.

Surprising: Yes, because no one would start with empty bags.

Satisfying: Yes. Because it fulfills all three conditions (Humorous, Harmless, Compatible)

Humorous: Yes. Because

1) Behavior (The tendency to laugh or to grin): Yes.
2) Cognitive (Something is intellectually perceived as “funny”): Yes.
3) Emotional (The positive feeling of amusement): Yes.

Harmless: Yes.

Harmless according to the Benign Violation Theory: The norm of how we train to gain muscle (by actually starting with at least some weight) is violated but harmless.

Is it still in a way compatible with the original assumption: Yes. Because we simply didn’t expect someone to give fitness advice with empty bags of potatos but we can’t fault the logic of the joke because the bags got bigger and thus heavier.

Unexpected Change that turns out to be benign: Yes. The change from full bags to empty bags was unexpected but benign.