Humor Percentage is an observer’s assessment of how large a part humor plays in an overall humor event.

Very roughly speaking, if jokes are 100% humor, jokes with a deeper point might be 70-90% humor, jokes within a song might be 30-70% humor, and jokes during a jury summation might be 5-15% humor – a percentage so low that the term ‘joke’ doesn’t really apply. Additionally, observer perspectives vary. Even if you were somehow able to divine a precise percentage for a single observer, others would see more humor or less humor in the same example.

It’s not at all necessary to pinpoint any kind of precise number. It is fortunate that this is not necessary, because it’s also not possible.

Your subconscious assessment of the humor percentage for a given humor event determines the extent to which your humor quality assessment contributes to your overall evaluation. Similar quality analyses for all full context things (literary quality, entertainment quality, dramatic quality, persuasiveness quality, pedagogic quality, etc.) are well outside the scope of Clash Theory. At the personal level, your conscious and subconscious evaluation of all of these things merge together to generate your overall reaction.

Return to Context

Return to the first Full Context component Density

Continue to the third Full Context component Humor Harmony