World’s Funniest Joke By Corey Ullman LONDON (Reuters) ~ After a year of painstaking scientific research, the world’s funniest joke was revealed on Thursday.
In a project described as the largest-ever scientific study into humor, the British Association for the Advancement of Science asked Internet users around the world to submit their favorite jokes and rate the funniness of other people’s offerings.
More than 40,000 jokes from 70 countries and two million critiques later, this is it:
“Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn’t seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other man pulls out his phone and calls emergency services.
He gasps to the operator: “My friend is dead! What can I do?” The operator, in a calm, soothing voice replies: “Take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.”
Silence, then a shot is heard.
Back on the phone, the hunter says, “Ok, now what?”
Researchers found significant differences between nations in the types of jokes they found funny.
People from the UK, the Republic of Ireland, Australia and New Zealand Preferred gags involving word play, such as:
PATIENT: “Doctor, I’ve got a strawberry stuck up my bum.” DOCTOR: “I’ve got some cream for that.”
Americans and Canadians favored jokes where people were made to look stupid.
TEXAN: “Where are you from?”
HARVARD GRAD: “Harvard, where we do not end our sentences with prepositions.”
TEXAN: “OK, where are you from, jackass?”
Meanwhile, many Europeans liked gags that were surreal or made light of Serious subjects such as illness, death and marriage:
A patient says, “Doctor, last night I made a Freudian slip, I was having dinner with my mother~in~law and wanted to say: ‘Could you please pass the butter?’
“But instead I said: ‘You silly cow, you have completely ruined my life.”‘
I think I must have a more European outlook on humor, because I cried from laughing at that last one!
Na
