Taking Laughter Seriously at the Supreme Court [study update]

Studies into possible implications of laughter episodes at the US Supreme Court were initiated in 2005 by Professor Jay D. Wexler (Boston University School of Law) who was the first to calculate the ‘Laughter Episodes Instigated Per Argument Average’ (LEIPAA) from the records of court proceedings. Details here in a 2016 Improbable Article. Then, in 2019, […]

Recent Progress in Automatic Sarcasm Detection

‘Sentiment mining’ – i.e. trying to gauge the Public’s attitude towards an institution, product, firm (etc. etc.) though automatic analysis of Social Media posts (etc. etc.) is now considered an essential tool for market researchers and ‘reputation managers’. But there are problems. One of which is sarcasm. Given its prevalence, serious errors can be introduced […]

Recent Progress in ‘Monty Python’ studies

Monty Python has not, repeat not, been ignored by academia. Here are links to but a few of the scholarly studies which look at, examine, discuss, evaluate, appraise, assess, analyse and otherwise probe the Monty Python oeuvre, and its wider, and narrower, implications, entailments, illations, connotations, inferences, and ramifications. ● Monty Python and the Mathnavi: […]

Philosophical disagreements on possible reason(s) ‘Why Flatulence is Funny’ – Professor Sellmaier v. Professor Spiegel

If you want a reliable method of raising a laugh, you can always resort to references of flatulence – a comedic ploy that goes back (at least) 2000 years. But the question as to why it’s considered funny, remains, to this day, a hotly debated subject. In 2013, Professor James Spiegel of the Philosophy Department at […]