Why scientists can’t laugh

A a newly published study of more than 500 articles at scientific conferences in two years set out to prove whether scientists are funny, which is a funny, if not a very productive use of time. The results were about what you’d expect: two-thirds of the joke attempts resulted in polite laughter or silence, and only 9% managed to get the room laughing. The biggest laughs, and unsurprisingly, came from technical snafus, such as malfunctioning slides and cut mics. (Nothing brings an audience together faster than watching something go wrong for someone else.)

Anyone who has attended a conference on any topic, anywhere, knows that scientists are not the only ones who throw bombs. Humor is hard to pull off in front of an unwarmed audience. Although SNL calls its opening segment a “cold open” — the audience didn’t laugh at anything, making the first laugh all the more difficult.

About 40% of the conversation was just avoiding jokes, which is safe but probably takes up too much of the afternoon. Great fun – for any science – makes the conversation memorable. “Even though there is a lot of fun in dating, it’s hard to keep dating. he told Naturewhich also spoke to one of the eight (!) co-authors of the study.