That would certainly explain Haldane’s observation on theology.
“Doctor, doctor - I’ve got some strange symptoms that you can make a witty remark about”!
"The teacher says “Johnny, I’m going to ask you a question that can be mis-interpreted and answered in a lewd manner”.
“Waiter, I’m going to make a comment on my meal, so that you can cleverly put me down”.
Have I simply heard these too often to find them funny anymore? Have I lost my sense of humor? Have the jokes become predictable? Repetitious? Were they never funny to begin with?
Polish jokes. You don’t hear those anymore, not even recycled as dumb blonde jokes. As an aside, I’m a white guy who once was meeting a number of friends for lunch at a bar. I arrived at the same time as two of them, on African American, one Puerto Rican. The bartender looks up and I could just see it on his face.
Some humor is timely. Some is timeless.
Charlie Chaplin was once the most famous person on earth and thought of as a living god of comedy.
OTOH, fart jokes go back to antiquity.
The third joke in the OP (the one about arriving at the gates of Heaven) has legs.
A man arrives at the gates of Soviet Heaven. Asked why he should be admitted, he replies, “My father was a religious authority, a rabbi. I was a writer. And after inheriting a large amount of money, I married a baroness”
The gatekeeper is livid. “And you think you deserve to be admitted to Soviet Heaven?!”
“Well”, the man offered, “I was hoping my name might help. It’s Karl Marx”.
Replace Karl Marx with Rush Limbaugh arriving at Conservative Heaven, and describe him as a draft-dodging, drug addicted, radio entertainer. Rinse, repeat.
What do you call three members of a commonly stereotyped group in an everyday situation?
How many people from any categorized group does it take to screw in a light bulb?
People in this profession ‘do it’ in some way related to the name of their profession.
I would kill myself if old, trite premise jokes were the only humor in the universe. But, I do think that jokes premised with cliché set-ups can lead to interesting punchlines if people invest some cleverness them. Interesting because of and in spite of the tired set-up
The expectations are so low that you can set-up an “out there” punchline that works especially well because of it’s unexpected oddness and WTFness.
For example:
Two men walk into a bar. The first one says to the the second one, "Two men walk into a bar. The first one says to the second one, 'Two men walk into a bar. The first one says to the second one…(ad infinitum)
Is it gut-spinning ha-ha funny? Not at all but it caught my attention and momentarily sent my brain into an Escher etching.
Now that I think of it, maybe it should be:
“Two men walk into Escher’s Tavern (etc).”
Why did the chicken cross the Möbius strip?
To get to the same side.
My WAG is that you’ve heard them enough that few are novel, and few new ones are being told.
Like most things there is a fashion to funny. Some clothes, songs, foods, work as well now as they did fifty years ago; many we can’t imagine wearing, listening to, eating now. Other than ironically or nostalgically. Jokes should be different?
And then there"s Doonesbury (from memory): Q: What’s the difference between the Hindenburg and Rush Limbaugh? A: One’s a flaming nazi gasbag; the other is just a blimp.
I think jokes that play on the idiom can be quite funny.
A priest, a minister, and a rabbi walk into a bar, and the bartender says, “What is this, a joke!?”
And of course, that’s an old formula, too.
not truly a joke, it’s called “playing the dozens” mostly a Black cultural thing
I’m so over blond jokes. I like the one in which the clever blond gets a great discount on parking her luxury car in New York City, though.
I’m in Germany and maybe that makes a cultural difference, but I think that I heard the last blonde joke about 25 years ago.
I remember this from the National Lampoon Radio Hour back in the 70s (Oh, turns out it was done by Brian Doyle-Murray).
But much more complex…
A man walks into a nightclub with a beautiful girl on his arm.
The show begins and the comedian comes out for his first show of the evening.
The comedian says "A man walks into a nightclub with a beautiful girl on his arm.
The show begins and the comedian comes out for his second show of the evening.
The show begins and the comedian says “A man walks into a nightclub with a beautiful girl on his arm”.
Just then a man in the front row stands up and says “I think I’ve heard this before”.
The comedian says “Maybe you caught my first show of the evening”.
The man says “No, I just walked in here”.
The comedian says “Well it was a guy looked just like you - walked in with a beautiful girl on his arm, could have been your twin brother”.
The man says “My twin brother’s dead”.
The comedian says “What is this, a wake?”.
The man says “I don’t have to stand for this”.
And he stands up and he walks outside.
And the comedian says “Are you out there? I can hear you breathing.”.
The man says “I’m holding my breath”.
The comedian says “Well I’m holding you wife”.
Just then the man says “That’s not my wife”.
And he walks back into the nightclub with another beautiful girl on his arm.
“Who’s that lady I’m seeing you with” the comedian says.
The man says “This is my wife. That other lady is my dead twin brother’s wife.
You can take her if you want her”.
And the comedian says “Not unless you say please”.
Just then, a man walks into a nightclub with a tattoo of a beautiful girl on his arm eating elbow macaroni.
The comedian says “Is that girl from Italy?”.
The man says “No just hungry”.
Just then a man walks into the nightclub, he comes riding into the nightclub, on a pony, with a feather stuck in his hat.
“What do you call that?” the comedian asks.
“An entrance” the man says “But forget that”.
“Just give me a beer and give my pony a jockey”.
The bartender says “I think that pony’s had enough already”.
“Well make it a short jockey” the man says.
“And while you’re at it give that lady’s lawyer some briefs”.
The lady stands up and says “I can defend myself, your Honor”.
And the lawyer says “But I’ll defend her honor, your Honor”.
The judge says “Well on her or off her, make up your mind”.
The comic says “Definitely on her, that’s the best offer I’ve had all day”.
“Well take it or leave it” says the judge.
“Couldn’t we just drop it?” says the comedian.
He says “Well you better drop leaflets before you bomb”.
And the comedian says “I’m already bombing”.
He says “Maybe it’s your material”.
He says “You don’t think it fits?”.
He says “Well it could be let out a little”.
The comedian says “How much do you think it will cost me?”.
He says “It’ll cost you an arm and a leg”.
The comic says “Well listen, could you put it on the cuff?”.
The tailor says “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. We’ll forget the leg and I’ll just charge you an arm”.
And a beautiful arm it is.
“OK” says the comedian and the tailor cuts off the comedian’s arm and gives him the suit.
The tailor calls his girlfriend and asks her to go out on the town with him in order to celebrate.
He calls on his girlfriend and gives her the beautiful arm as a gift.
She wears it around her neck just like a stole and they go out on the town.
The man walks into a nightclub with a beautiful arm on his girl.
The show begins and the one-armed comedian comes out for his last show of the evening.
He does his act, and the audience stands up and gives him a hand.
Soviet heaven arrives to YOU.
Pull my finger.