sarcasm, knowledge and creativity

I’ve always preferred to keep my news and entertainment separate, which has always made me mildly uncomfortable with comedy news purveyors like Stewart, Colbert, and Oliver. But there is some evidence that better informed and more creative people are drawn to sarcasm. From Smithsonian:

Sarcasm seems to exercise the brain more than sincere statements do. Scientists who have monitored the electrical activity of the brains of test subjects exposed to sarcastic statements have found that brains have to work harder to understand sarcasm.

That extra work may make our brains sharper, according to another study. College students in Israel listened to complaints to a cellphone company’s customer service line. The students were better able to solve problems creatively when the complaints were sarcastic as opposed to just plain angry. Sarcasm “appears to stimulate complex thinking and to attenuate the otherwise negative effects of anger,” according to the study authors.

The mental gymnastics needed to perceive sarcasm includes developing a “theory of mind” to see beyond the literal meaning of the words and understand that the speaker may be thinking of something entirely different. A theory of mind allows you to realize that when your brother says “nice job” when you spill the milk, he means just the opposite, the jerk.

Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-science-of-sarcasm-yeah-right-25038/#QlY3dyz2ZcXfK45p.99
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I remember that after living abroad and returning to the United States, the all-pervasive sarcasm and irony in our media and culture is one thing that really struck me. And while living abroad, I found I had to tone down my ironic tone because people from other cultures often didn’t pick up on it, at least at first.

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