Saturday, July 30, 2016

Dark sense of humour could be early sign of dementia - study

News from the past.

15 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I was just listening to a Scott Adams periscope broadcast where he said he believes about half of the population doesn't have a sense of humor. That they get around that (sometimes perilous handicap) by bluffing. They bluff their way thru life without a sense of humor.

edutcher said...

Looks like Troop and I have already lost it.

Lem said...

I was just listening to a Scott Adams periscope broadcast where he said he believes about half of the population doesn't have a sense of humor. That they get around that (sometimes perilous handicap) by bluffing. They bluff their way thru life without a sense of humor

If you're on the Left, you're not supposed to have a sense of humor. You're supposed to be angry about all the racism, sexism, agism, genderism, and culturism out there.

Many of the rest are trying to make ends meet.

Trooper York said...

Dark humor?

Does that mean I can't make jokes about the moolies?

The Dude said...

Scott Adams is a hard leftist. Now that right there is funny, I don't care who you are.

ndspinelli said...

Lem, My observation over the decades is people @ extreme ends of the political spectrum tend to be humorless. My old man taught me to always be wary of humorless people and cheapskates. And, there is a significant overlap in those 2 demographics.

Chip Ahoy said...

The left's humor rests in their joyous and knowing and sanctimonious, and self-convincing, reiterating exaggerations and mischaracterizations of the hypocritical right. See Jon Stewart and his entire team of unfunny angry lying so-called comedians. Sometimes they're accidentally funny with the shit they make up.

1) Bush is briefed on on an airplane crash that killed four Americans and a Brazilian . Bush drops his head into his hands and goes silent, lifts his head and asks wearily, "okay, how many is a brazillion?"

2) Fake Bush quote that sounds perfectly Bush: "The problem with the French is they don't have a word for entrepreneur."

3) "Strategerie" from Wikipedia: coined by James Downey for SNL for Will Farrow. After the 2000 presidential election, people inside the Bush White House reportedly began using the term as a joke, and it later grew to become a term of art among them meaning oversight of any activity by Bush's political consultants. Bush's strategists also came to be known within the White House as "The Department of Strategery", or the "Strategery Group". A February 9, 2001, transcript of a CNN interview shows George Bush using the term, presumably as an intentional nod to the comedy sketch.[3] Affectionately embracing satirical portrayals has been a Bush tactic at other times as well, such as when he presented a self-parodying slide show at the May 2004 Radio and Television Correspondents Dinner about looking for weapons of mass destruction in the Oval Office[4] after the political comic strip Doonesbury satirically portrayed him on a similar comical search.

And more. Always just so. Just so reliably amusing. Just so reliably amusing along reliable lines. And THAT is goddamn funny. Becase they're all such fucking predictable dopes. Like little children doing stupid things. And stupid children reliably doing stupid things really is reliably just so amusing.

Kind of like me.

Know what Beethoven is doing? Decomposing.

Chip Ahoy said...

Here's something I found funny this morning. 10 years ago, Oct. 29, 2006, a Sunday, NYT published Liz Gorski 21X21 crossword puzzle. Now this allows for robust long entries that we like.

The title of the puzzle is "sandwich man"

Now give this a moment to sink in and spread out into idea-puddles. A man is going to be sandwiched in these long entries. It can be a man's name, repeated, or general, It can be the letters MAN smack dab in the middle, it can names of sandwiches. We'll be looking for something like that along the way.

Mind, when discover what the trick is then we win the game. We can quit anytime once we know that satisfied we cracked this puppy.

But it's nice to have all the main entries filled. That way you've proven, a bit like math, that you really do know the theme and can prove that it works with each one.

Solving all the fill 100% is just being a picayune nitpicking anal-retentive persnickety hagridden martinet. And we don't want to be that.

But if you MUST, then go back and fill in all the fill with its stuffing and fluff and gimmies and little misdirections that no longer apply. Go on. Slave.

So the puzzle solves with tremendous difficult because LIz is a true word maniac. Classical musician, she's employed by the symphony. She blows every body aways. We all love her so. Because she vexes us so teasingly. And when you get it you go, "Aw, BITCH!, you GOT me again. How I love you."

There's stuff like "modern wall hanging" = hdtv
"Place" = area [honestly, of all things, place could be ANYTHING even a verb]
"You got that right" = I'll say
"More furtive" = slyer
"Returnees from Mecca" = Hadjis [they needn't be returning to be hadjis]
"Not laugh out loud funny -- perhaps" = droll
"Place for a programme" = telliy
"Dance in France" = valse [waltz. That's impossibly rare. You should speak French to know it. The common expected answer is danse. or pas for step as in the very common phrase in ballet, pas de deux ]
"This is right ____ alley" = upmy [this is a gimmie]
"Mediterranean isl. = Sar [clue abbreviated so the answer is too]
"Keep from overheating in a way" = air coool
"Rococo" = florid
"They may make you sick" = germs
"Recipe amount" = one part
"Starr of NFL" = Bart
"Bach's _____ Joy of Man's Desiring =Jesu

"Military letters" = usaf
"Water carrier" = pail
"Kind of case in grammar" = obj
"Shetland turndown" = nae
"Slowly ascended = "crept up"
"Actress Kelly" = Moira

Chip Ahoy said...

So all of that fill solves the the first main entry.
"Cheery fellow in the neighborhood?"
= jollymrrogers

There's your man. The man that is sandwiched will all be "mr"

So now, all the remaining thematic entries will have "mr" separating two words to change a common MR that we all know into something contrived by Liz, and when we see them well all go, "Aw, Liz, you're a darling. You are. *smooch* We'll write nice things about her in NYT puzzle comments. We'll greet her warmly when we encounter each other at the crossword convention because generally Liz Gorski appeals to very serious word freaks.

The whole puzzle is blank except for the top left corner is filled in. And right here we already won. And now we can go straight to the remaining thematic entries and fill them in using our super power of knowing the theme. We can demonstrate our prowess to ourselves and amaze all around with the patience for this kind of crap. Doctors and lawyers and top professional people will marvel and instantly reassess their opinion of you as just another dumb fuckhead with a touch of Tourette's. You'll instantly get a little undeserved respect for your newfound authoritah. It happens in an instant. Confirmed by them asking you, "How did you know that?"

The second one is clued "Putting up a guy in the bath?"

I said that something darkly funny happened this morning. This is it. This is the funny thing that had me cracking up laughing. Because it's perfect, but it is obviously wrong and that is just such a shame.

The last word in the answer is Bubbles. So then it's "Mr. Bubbles."

I so badly wanted the phrase to be "blowing Mr. Bubbles" for "blowing bubbles.

See? Jolly Rogers is a normal phrase that Liz changed to Jolly Mr. Roger.

I wanted the phrase "blowing bubbles" to be changed to "blowing MR .Bubbles"

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Come on!

That's funny.

But it cannot be. That's WHY it's so funny. It simply cannot be. Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. Too bad. My own nefarious despair cracks myself up.

It must be something else. "House bubble" to "House Mr. Bubble. " Far less funny, L-i-i-i-i-i-i-z.

The next one is "roasted Mr. Peanut"

and the last one is "spring Mr. Clean"

Both clued goofily to make you go what?

So there we go. It's intended to be so impossible you don't arrive at all this until the very end after filling in all the fill-y fill fill, but we skipped and decoded the title and applied and it works and any double check that you choose proves them.

If I were to show this to Liz she'd be pissed off because she failed to flummox us all the way through. She WANTS it to be a trial so that all her work is paid off by your puzzling anguish so when you skip like this it gives them the sadz. And THAT'S funny.

ricpic said...

And what pray tell was the methodology of the "researchers" who linked a dark sense of humor with dementia?

And how would they define a "dark" sense of humor in the first place? There's about a hairsbreadth distance between a dark sense of humor and cynicism. Some of the cheeriest hail fellow well met business people you'd ever meet conceal a totally black take on humanity. I had an aunt and uncle of that type. They had a thriving hardware business on Canal Street. Always cheerful. Always friendly. And a totally cold "practical" take on the other guy. What's he worth to me. Beyond that...nothing. Okay, here's the thing: they were right. All the romantic illusions that clutter up our vision and take us down blind alleys or worse, who needs them? More to the point, what good are they? What use are they? Here endeth my tale.

edutcher said...

Sixty Grit said...

Scott Adams is a hard leftist

He sure don't write like one.

Trooper York said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Trooper York said...

Just punchlines. NSGW or if any SJW's are around.

Trooper York said...

That is not safe for work. Also some old Tiger Woods jokes but stick with it.

ndspinelli said...

Chip, Bingo! Jon Stewart is the archetype liberal comedian. Bill Maher as well. Jerry Seinfeld recently had another liberal comic, John Oliver on Comedians in Cars. It was interesting to me that Oliver did not get into politics. Seinfeld is probably liberal but he avoids politics. He has bravely blasted PC and has gotten a lot of shit from the left. The left go right for the jugular. The meme was Seinfeld is old, washed up, and unfunny. All evidence to the contrary. Seinfeld is smart as hell and a fucking pro. He's smarter than all these smug faux intellectual comics and those comics know it. Comedians are our guerrilla fighters against PC.

The Dude said...

Regardless of what he writes like, he supports Hillary. No one with any morals or intelligence would do that. He claims it's because he would be in danger if he didn't support her. Way to take a stand, cartoon boy.