Ｑ38.What is essential for humor?

Ａ. A trick is essential for humor.

　　In comedy acts or comedic skits, if a person guesses the end, the laughter decreases by half. If you can predict the end, the humor also decreases. Why is this?
　　The people who can predict the outcome of a trick are the trick's performer and the person watching. Spectators feel guilty which suppresses the humor because they knew the outcome but didn't stop the performer. Being able to predict the outcome makes you stand in the performer's position.
　　I don't know whether it is done deliberately or unconsciously, but we can use complicated techniques to make others laugh such as making boring jokes in succession to temporarily subduing the audience and then the audience laughs at the comedian's awkwardness.
　　Making a retort after a bad joke can make people laugh because the comedian making the bad joke becomes the trick's recipient. Comedians such as Matsumura Kunihiko or Murakami Shoji use this technique.
　　Most funny things are in some way an act of failure, but we do not laugh unless we understand why it failed. If you see someone slip and fall on a snow-packed road you may feel it is funny, but if you see someone float as if weightless and tumble on the asphalt road it would look like a supernatural phenomenon and surprise you so you would not laugh.
　　In order to feel something is funny we must understand the cause of the failure, therefore if we don't know why a failure occurred we won't feel it is funny.
　　This is because not knowing places the person on the trick's recipient side. The recipients don't understand what is happening at the time. They feel that they are taken in by the trick.
　　We would not laugh if the person who falls down is covered in a blood and stops moving. We do not laugh for something serious. This is because in cases like these the strength of different emotions such as fear or surprise drive away humor.
　　Also, we do not laugh if we stand on the same side as the recipient of the laughter. It is nearly impossible to laugh if it is your child that is being laughed at. The reason for this is because we feel we are taken in by the trick too.
　　However, we can laugh with the trickster if we are in relax situation in which we don't need to take responsibility even if we are laughed at. Of course, we do not laugh in situations which make us responsible for the failure.
　　If we are laughed at but free of responsibility we are able to laugh because we are able to see the trick from the spectator's viewpoint.
　　With this we can explain the logic of puns.
　　Puns can be divided into two groups. The first group is puns that everyone admires, says, "wow!", and then laughs after hearing it. The second one is puns that everyone corrects with laughter and say, "That's not right!"
　　The first type of puns are an intentionally mistaken remark. An intentionally mistaken remark is a kind of trick. This type of pun shows what the recipient says as being caught in the trick.
　　The second type of puns express the response of the trick's recipient. The recipient is shown as still misunderstanding, in other words, this type of pun expresses the confusion and shock after a trick is received.
　　Puns can be called tricks with words.