Laughter arises only from reversibility, not from transgression

Evidence

Another aspect as surprising as the absence of an opposing term: the remainder makes you laugh. Any discussion on this theme unleashes the same language games, the same ambiguity, and the same obscenity as do discussions of sex or death. Sex and death are the great themes recognized for unleashing ambivalence and laughter. But the remainder is the third, and perhaps the only one, the two others amounting to this as to the very figure of reversibility. For why does one laugh? One only laughs at the reversibility of things, and sex and death are eminently reversible figures. — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 473

Categorization

• QUESTION: This claim that one only laughs at reversibility (not at transgression or surprise) is provocative and worth testing against comedy theory — Bergson’s mechanical encrustation theory would be the obvious rival.
• XREF: Contrasts with Bergson’s theory of laughter (the mechanical encrusted upon the living) and Freud’s joke-work as transgression release — Baudrillard’s reversibility account is a genuinely competing theory. — connects to: Laughter arises only at the reversibility of opposed terms — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 473; Audience laughter at gratification signals repression, not mere immaturity — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry: Selected Essays…, 341; Humor’s timing depends on silence marking the rupture of expected order — George Michelsen Foy, Zero Decibels: The Quest for Absolute…, 260

Broader Connections

• Humor’s timing depends on silence marking the rupture of expected order #expands (0.80) — George Michelsen Foy, Zero Decibels, 260
• Audience laughter at gratification signals repression, not mere immaturity #complicates (0.72) — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 341