Laughter, humour... and maths

What makes you laugh? We've all been asked this question at some point or another, but answering it can be trickier than you first imagined. Add maths to the equation, and things get trickier still. But why complicate things? Because that way we can bring you this riveting and exuberant book that shows us that humour and laughter are serious matters, vitally important to how humans understand the world.

The author frames humour as a superpower, a survival strategy or simply a different way of thinking, with origins, expressions and functions linked to philosophy, neurology and even economics. She covers observations, theories and examples from literary classics to contemporary stand-up comedy and from 19th-century economists to laboratory rats. Did you know that some jokes are just irresistible? Or what Diogenes and Herman José have in common?