The House's own work
The Laugh-Meter
US provisional 64/079,341 — scoring a genuine laugh by its burst signature, with the bullshit-meter that rejects a faked one.
Tickle Theory
Pain + pressure + pull-the-rug = funny. The unifying recipe behind the comedy, the songcraft, and the pacing.
The Rug-Pull pain-gate
The joke as an A-beta counter-signal that gates the pain fiber — comedy as self-administered analgesia.
Content-as-Medicine
Personalized, voice-flavored, dosed, closed-loop, adjunct-never-replace — "a medicine cabinet made of laughs."
The established roots
Gate-Control Theory of Pain
Melzack & Wall (1965) — a competing signal can "close the gate" on pain. The physiological basis for the rug-pull relieving hurt.
Benign Violation Theory
McGraw & Warren — things are funny when a violation feels simultaneously wrong and okay. Our "so real it's funny, never enough to hurt" is this line, engineered.
Incongruity & Relief
The classical accounts — the setup builds an expectation; the punchline breaks it (incongruity) and discharges the tension (relief). The mechanics of the pull.
ZONEfulness — Joseph Dowling
The flow / "zoneful" state we design toward: fun as the release, not the strain.
A living bibliography — sources are added as the book and the filings grow. Nothing here is medical advice; the house is wellness and mood-support, adjunct to your real care.