A teacher feeling upset decided to take it out on her students. She announced, "Students who think they're stupid, stand up!" After a few seconds, only one child slowly rose. The teacher looked at him and asked, "Do you think you're stupid?"
"No..." the child replied, "...I just didn't want to see you standing there alone."
The Dog That Doesn't Bite
A man walking down the street saw another man approaching with a dog on a leash. He asked, "Does your dog bite?" The other man replied, "No, my dog doesn't bite."
The first man patted the dog, only to have his hand bitten.He shouted, "Didn't you say your dog doesn't bite?" The other man answered, "But that's not my dog."
The Idiot Across the River
An idiot was walking along a river when he spotted another idiot on the opposite bank. The first idiot yelled, "How can I get to the other side?" The second idiot immediately replied, "You're already there!"
These jokes share a common thread: they all make the reader feel superior. This feeling arises because the characters in the jokes appear foolish, misunderstanding an obvious situation (like the idiot across the river) or making those in positions of authority look ridiculous (like the teacher and the child).There's a famous distinction between comedy and tragedy: "If you fall into an uncovered manhole, it's comedy. But if I fall in..." My findings provide empirical support for this observation.
The stronger the sense of superiority a joke evokes, the more heartily people laugh. If a disabled person slips on a banana peel, most find it unfunny. But replace the disabled person with a traffic cop, and nearly everyone bursts out laughing immediately.