I read it as a joke of increasing absurdity. Sniffing pepper makes people sneeze so that one works (besides the trying to make a plant sneeze part). He got a bit distracted by experiment 2 and mixed up the involuntary reactions sneezing and tickling and tries to tickle it with a feather. He then gets further distracted between experiment 2 and 3, and tests feet which are commonly ticklish.
When I break it down like this you can see that it is a very funny joke, as one can always tell from a detailed explanation of the joke.
I also don’t get it. Not everything that smells causes you to sneeze. None of the methods actually make sense. A feather tickles you, not makes you sneeze. And the pepper? The experiment is invalid. Did not disprove the hypothesis, needs more testing.
If I read it, will I understand why “feet” is in the sneeze-causing list?
I read it as a joke of increasing absurdity. Sniffing pepper makes people sneeze so that one works (besides the trying to make a plant sneeze part). He got a bit distracted by experiment 2 and mixed up the involuntary reactions sneezing and tickling and tries to tickle it with a feather. He then gets further distracted between experiment 2 and 3, and tests feet which are commonly ticklish.
When I break it down like this you can see that it is a very funny joke, as one can always tell from a detailed explanation of the joke.
The smell?
I also don’t get it. Not everything that smells causes you to sneeze. None of the methods actually make sense. A feather tickles you, not makes you sneeze. And the pepper? The experiment is invalid. Did not disprove the hypothesis, needs more testing.