More Than Pun and Games

We should start the summary of this show with a philosophy pun, but unfortunately we Kant. In this episode, John and Ken explore puns. As any regular listener of the show will know, John is a fan word play—but Ken? Let’s just say he doesn’t think it’s that punny. That of course doesn’t deter John, and he sets off to convince Ken that puns are more than just funny—they may also be important to philosophy. While puns may make us laugh (or groan), John argues that any student of language should be fascinated by puns, for studying puns is truly to study semantics, and the deepest nuances of meaning.

Ken remains skeptical, but the two guests pun(t) off to the Roving Philosophical Reporter Shuka Kalantari to give some examples of puns (see below). After Shuka’s segment, John and Ken welcome the week’s guest John Pollack, a former speechwriter for President Bill Clinton, award-winning punster, and author of The Pun Also Rises. Pollock describes how he loved puns from an early age, but didn’t recognize them as important until later in life. As he explains to the two hosts, puns are not always jokes; indeed, Pollock argues that they are the “humanity’s first hyperlinks”—a creative way of connecting disparate subjects.

John and Ken are interested in what Pollock has to say—and even Ken laughs at some of the puns he shares. But both remain skeptical over one of Pollock’s stronger points: that puns are foundational in the progress of civilization itself. Pollock says that he too once thought puns were just jokes, but he came to realize that one of humanity’s greatest technologies—the phonetic alphabet—was based on puns. As Pollock describes, an alphabet based on sounds first developed by ancient peoples using different hieroglyphs as puns for similar-sounding concepts. John and Ken are suitably impressed, and, after some talk about how puns are used in some countries to get around censorship laws, the three take questions from callers in the radio audience. The show ends with the three discussing the neuroscience of a knock-knock jokes and Pollock sharing stories of President Clinton’s love of puns.

Roving Philosophical Report (seek to 7:36): Shuka Kalantari explores the world of puns, from an actual neurological disease that makes one constantly make puns to the subtle wordplay of Shakespeare that can take modern audiences by surprise.

Sixty-Second Philsopher (seek to 46:30): Ian Shoales looks at how prevalent puns are in pop-culutre, from the action movie stars’ one-liner to the simple jokes in children books.