Creativity, humor and cognition

In this paper we explore some aspects of the scientific study of creativity, by focusing on intentional attempts to create instances of linguistic humor. We argue that this sort of creativity can be accounted for within the framework of an influential cognitive approach, but this framework does not provide a recipe for producing novel instances of humor; in fact, it may even preclude humoristic effects. We start by identifying three great puzzles that arise in attempting to naturalize some core traits of creativity, and some ways they have been addressed by cognitive studies. We then consider what we call ‘creative humor’, which exhibits the core features of creativity previously identified. We then explore how an important (class of) cognitive approach(es) to human communication can account for creative humor. We conclude by drawing some morals and pointing out some limitations for cognitive approaches to creativity.