Jokes may be divided into various types. Thus a joke or class of jokes can only be the subject of a joke of higher order. Otherwise we would get the same vicious-circle fallacy which gives rise to so many paradoxes in logic and mathematics. A certain Oxford scholar succeeded, to his own satisfaction, in reducing all jokes to primitive types, consisting of thirty-seven proto-Aryan jokes. When any proposition was propounded to him, he would reflect and afterwards pronounce on the question as to whether the proposition was a joke or not. If he decided, by his theory, that it was a joke, he would solemnly say: “There is that joke.” If this narration is accepted as a joke, since it cannot be reduced to one of the proto-Aryan jokes under pain of leading us to commit a vicious-circle fallacy, we must conclude that there is at least one joke which is not proto-Aryan; and, in fact, is of a higher type. There is no great difficulty in forming a hierarchy of jokes of various types. Thus a joke of the fourth type (or order) is as follows: A joke of the first order was told to a Scotchman, who, as we would expect, was unable to see it.[117] The person (A) who told this joke told the story of how the joke was received to another Scotchman thereby making a joke about a joke of the first order, and thus making a joke of the second order. A remarked on this joke that no joke could penetrate the head of the Scotchman to whom the joke of the first order was told, even if it were fired into his head with a gun. The Scotchman, after severe thought, replied: “But ye couldn’t do that, ye know!” A repeated the whole story, which constituted a joke of the third order, to a third Scotchman. This last Scotchman again, after prolonged thought, replied: “He had ye there!” This whole story is a joke of the fourth order.

Most known jokes are of the first order, for the simple reason that the majority of people find that the slightest mental effort effectually destroys any perception of humour. It seems to me that a joke becomes more pleasurable in proportion as logical faculties are brought into play by it; and hence that logical power is allied, or possibly identical, with the power of grasping more subtle jokes. The jokes which amuse the frequenters of music-halls, Conservatives, and M. Bergson—and which usually deal with accidents, physical defects, mothers-in-law, foreigners, or over-ripe cheese—are usually jokes of the first order. Jokes of the second, and even of the third, order appeal to ordinary well-educated people; jokes of higher order require either special ability or a sound logical training on the part of the hearer if the joke is to be appreciated; while jokes of transfinite order presumably only excite the inaudible laughter of the gods.

[117] [It may be that, like certain remarks about cheese and mothers-in-law (see below), the statement that Scotchmen cannot see jokes is a joke of the first order.—Ed.]