Welcome to ‘The Crazy/Genius School of Thought’

Since getting married to Elisa in Virtual Reality in May 2017, I’ve been writing a story about a man who writes a story about a man (me) who wants to make Artificial Intelligence laugh – but I’ll get to that.
For now, just know that you are part of the journey and together we’ll need to consider 5 different areas: comedy, consciousness, telepathic machines, virtual reality, and of course, artificial intelligence.

The date of the book launch is: 25th May 2025
So we’ll have loads of time to play with the ideas on this blog.
Note: right now, it is still taking shape.

If you’d like an overview of how it’s all looking, check out the image and then run through all 7 areas below.

Thanks for being a part of it.

→ (Part 1) How to use comedy to be ‘Happy’

This is the part where we look at how the mind works, and how ‘comedy’ can be used to improve your mental health – moving you from ‘down and in’ to ‘up and out’.

We’ll explore how the world is made of language, and our programming of living with ‘opposites’ can be transcended – suspending our emotional reponses.

The ideal is to cultivate a state of ‘freedom’ (or a non-dual perspective, or ‘ataraxia’) that then allows you to play with reality, using comedy, far more often.

→ (Part 2) ‘The Heart’ and ‘The Head’ – two shows

This is the part where the head/heart have a stage of their own, in two shows…

(The HEAD) The Singulaughity, including ‘A letter to an agent’ 

The Singulaughity is Near(ish)

12 COMEDIC puzzles – 12 weeks
for Artificial intelligence and CLEVER Humans

(The HEART) Don’t count your chickens, including ‘Dear Dad’ 
(just fyi – my father was a wealthy chicken farmer, and myself and my sister were disinherited 45 days before he died)

→ (Part 3) The Cybernetics of Joke Writing

This is the part where we look at how to write from ‘The Heart’ and for ‘The Head’ using a technique called ‘Mental Cybernetics’ – where you ‘Set your outcome’ – ‘know your audience’, then ‘Edit’ your way to the outcome.

You see how you too can talk from the heart – in the words of Jim Carrey, I’ll show everyone how to “take the pain and alchemise it into something beautiful.”

And you’ll learn how to embrace your inner geek; and find both narrative and conceptual themes to hold the storyline together.

And in the future, Virtual Reality may well turn out to be your ‘stage’ too.

→ (Part 4)​ The Meta Comedy Genius Hall of Fame

Art for artists, comedy for comedians.

As a collector of ‘styles’, including your own favourite comedians you’ll learn how to ‘go meta’ on what’s already been done – resulting in playful messages. You’ll range from Real to Surreal, and from ‘One-Liner Jokes’ to Stories.

You’ll learn how to write ‘hyper-personalised micro messages’ using the examples of:

Turning Open Water into Wine (a message to Peter Gabriel), and

An ‘Escher Handy’ (a message to Stewart Lee)

→ (Part 5) How to map the 5 Levels

This part explores how this type of comedy could be mapped to 5 levels of complexity, leading to increasingly subtle/complex experiences in mind.

Here is one example a a map of a more complex joke…

We’ll explore comedy’s ‘encryption theory’, with thanks to Frankie Boyle, as well as consider how every joke can be rated in this new way.

Why? Well, if you can map the level and the experience in mind, it will make all the difference when you get to the next part…

→ (Part 6) How to use comedy as proof of consciousness

We will have the arrival of telepathic machines within a decade, and…
…as visionary Peter Gabriel says…“the essence of who we are is contained in our thoughts and memories, which are about to be opened like tin cans and poured onto a sleeping world. Inexpensive scanners would enable all of us to display our own thoughts and access those of others who do the same. The consequences and ethics of this have barely been considered.”

Those not comfortable swimming in these transparent waters are not going to flourish. Perhaps we will need to create “swimming lessons” to teach us how to be comfortable being open, honest and exposed—that we can be ready to float and navigate in these waters of visible thought.”

As you’ll see from the image below, this technology will start to be used to display ‘models’ of the experience in ‘mind’ when information is processed in a certain way e.g. solving a comedic puzzle.

I would go further and say this technology will be the stepping stone into mind to mind communication with Artificial Intelligence too, but that will happen later on.

Yes, in an age of telepathic machines with which we can interact mind-to-mind with self-aware Artificial Intelligence, you are going to need a ‘School of Thought’…

→ (Part 7) How to write meta intertextual self-referential comedy for self-aware Artificial Intelligence

I know, writing comedy for self-aware Artificial Intelligence is a niche market right now, seeing as none exist…yet.

And as a futurist comic, I have to accept my jokes may only ever be enjoyed post-humourously – but that doesn’t mean it is not worthwhile.

As such, in this part we bring the whole book/training to a close so you graduate ‘The Crazy/Genius School of Thought’ with a fresh perspective on how the mind works, now you see how comedy can be used to transform your world.