Xindi Liu once showed me this picture (I hope I've got the name right)
She was looking into the uncanny at the time and considered the humor of this.
Animals are funny when we recognise human qualities in their appearance and behavior. This is a similar mechanism to uncanny valley theory (Mori 1970) where we find robots and similar appealing if they have human qualities until those human qualities are too close, then we notice, not what is human about them but what is not, and the result is disturbing.
The incongruity theory of humor needs a revisit. I feel there cognitive dissonance here is similar to the uncanny but the result of the dissonance is humor not fear.
Animals are funny when we recognise human qualities in their appearance and behavior. This is a similar mechanism to uncanny valley theory (Mori 1970) where we find robots and similar appealing if they have human qualities until those human qualities are too close, then we notice, not what is human about them but what is not, and the result is disturbing.
The incongruity theory of humor needs a revisit. I feel there cognitive dissonance here is similar to the uncanny but the result of the dissonance is humor not fear.