• "I need to change my course to Psychology. Wait, how do you spell psychology?"
• Professor: "....ergo, marriage is sacred".
  Student: "Wait a second... was Ergo Catholic?"
• "Hume's spoon is broken into analytic, synthetic, and-- wait, did I just say 'spoon'? It's definitely 'fork'. Sorry about that, I'm not good with utensils."
  - My philosophy of the mind professor
• Coming out of the theatre after watching episode three, i hear the following:
  "DUDE! That was so awesome! I can't wait for them to make number four! "
• "I want some coffee."
  "What size?"
  "Coffee."
  "Size, sir?"
  "You know, coffee!"
  "What size, sir."
  "COFFEE."
• At the movie theater tonight -
  "I'd like a water please."
  "A large or a small?"
  "Oh, a large I guess."
  "I'm sorry, we're out of large." (This is said without checking to see if they have any water. She KNEW they were out of the large.)
  "... Then I guess I'll have a small one."
• a bunch of us were hanging out a few years ago and someone mentioned that Mountain Dew cuased low sperm count. Suddenly one girl got really quiet. Then she said "In girls too?"
• A friend of mine picked up an avacado and said 'Oh hey, a raw guacamole'
• Her: (overheard conversation) I'm a huge Lord of the Rings fan. I'm, like, THE biggest fan in the world. I'm a total geek.
  Me: (joining in) No shame in that. Tolkien's the man.
  Her: ...who?
  Me: Tolkien. The guy who... wrote it...
  Her: They're making it into books now?

quote:

---

I have rarely been more embarassed for someone in an academic setting.

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Be glad you didn't go to my high school.
 

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Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
 
And speaking of high school...

Senior Girl: Ok, so, like, if a guy gets an [erection] in a swimming pool...like, do all the girls get pregnant?
 

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Posted by Nell Gwyn (Member # 8291) on :
 
One girl at the school I went to in London argued vehemently that Chicago is a state.

Another one declared that it rains a lot in London because "it's near the ocean and the wind just kind of picks up all the water and throws it at us."

Yet another girl, after having said one of many dumb things, was told affectionately, "You just get blonder every day." Her response? A very confused, "But I haven't done anything to my hair!"


 

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Posted by Carrie (Member # 394) on :
 
I read the title of this thread and went "WHAT THE FRACK!?!?!"

Glad to see it's celebrating stupid people.


Incidentally, did you know that Thomas Jefferson both wrote the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1492 and freed the slaves in 1924?
 

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Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
 

quote:

---

"I'm sorry, we're out of large." (This is said without checking to see if they have any water. She KNEW they were out of the large.)
"... Then I guess I'll have a small one."

---

quote:

---

Girl (interrupting again): No, Jung--J-U-N-G. Jung.

---

quote:

---

"But I haven't done anything to my hair!"

---

quote:

---

"I want some coffee."
"What size?"
"Coffee."
"Size, sir?"
"You know, coffee!"
"What size, sir."
"COFFEE."

---

 

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Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
After watching a movie that I think took place sometime in the early 1900s or something, we start discussing it in class.

Student asks a question.

Teacher: ...and his daughter died of cancer.

Other student: They actually had cancer back then?!?!
 

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Posted by blacwolve (Member # 2972) on :
 
My personal favorite. On the last day of my astronomy class last semester we talked about life in the universe and the ways we've attempted to make contact with alien life. At the end of the lecture one girl raised her hand, very confused, to ask "How can we be sure that aliens will speak English?"
 

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Posted by Brian J. Hill (Member # 5346) on :
 
I was an academic-team geek in H.S. Once, during a practice, our coach asked the question: "According to an old adage, [blank] makes the heart grow fonder." One of the girls raised her hand, and said "Love?--no, that's wrong, I meant to say Abstinence."
 

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Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
 

quote:

---

I was an academic-team geek in H.S. Once, during a practice, our coach asked the question: "According to an old adage, [blank] makes the heart grow fonder." One of the girls raised her hand, and said "Love?--no, that's wrong, I meant to say Abstinence."

---

 

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Posted by Juxtapose (Member # 8837) on :
 
In my sophomore year of high school I took a trip with the band to Orlando, Fl. Standing in line for a ride (I forget which) at Epcot Center, I overheard this exchange between a friend and a random passer-by (he was clearly American).

Random Passer-By: Where y'all from?
Friend: Hilo.
RPB: Where's that?
Fr: Hawai'i.
RPB: Oh...where's that?
Fr: ....In the middle of the Pacific Ocean...

There may have been more; I wouldn't know because I was rolling around laughing.
 

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Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
 
Man to tour assistant: "So, when will we be changing our dollars in for Alaskan money?"
 

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Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
 

quote:

---

a bunch of us were hanging out a few years ago and someone mentioned that Mountain Dew caused low sperm count. Suddenly one girl got really quiet. Then she said "In girls too?"

---

-o-

(FWIW, I think Augustine argued essentially this thread's titular assertion.)
 

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Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Icarus:
(FWIW, I think Augustine argued essentially this thread's titular assertion.)

---

• Amanda: "I had to save all my stuff today at work. They formatted my hard drive. I couldn't use it for like an entire hour."
  Wayne: "It took an hour ?"
  Amanda: "Yeah. Well, he had to format my printer too."
• Teacher: "You need to know your symbolism for this test. Matthew is the man, lion is Mark, ox is Luke, eagle is John.
  Girl: Umm, is this .. a code?
  Teacher: They are the Apostles.
  Girl: Is this a children's story?
  Teacher: ... wuh ... It's Christian religious symbolism.
  Girl: Ohhh! I didn't know animals could become apostles!
  Teacher: Okay, I'll back up.
• Friend 2: Fish don't eat other fish! That's cannibalism.
  Friend 1: No, big fish eat little fish, and little fish eat--
  Friend 2: But that's like Michael Jordan eating Tammy [our 4'8" Asian girl friend]!
  The rest of us: ...
  Friend 1: I think fish eat different species of fish.
  Friend 2: But Tammy and Michael Jordan are different species! She's a girl, a different race, and short!
• guy: girl, what nationality are you?
  me: ...american.
  guy: ...
  me: you mean ethnicity?
  guy: yeah that
  me: korean
  guy: so what do you talk, like chinese or something?

 

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Posted by quidscribis (Member # 5124) on :
 
My motto: people are dumb.

I've never been proven wrong yet...
 

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Posted by JennaDean (Member # 8816) on :
 
And are you a people?
 

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Posted by ricree101 (Member # 7749) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by quidscribis:
My motto: people are dumb.

I've never been proven wrong yet...

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quote:

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That is very true. In fact, it has been proven that around half of the people in the world are below median intelligence.

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So true
 

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Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
 
What about the other half?
 

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Posted by Fyfe (Member # 937) on :
 
This one isn't so much stupid as just funny.

French professor: Qu'est-ce que tu as mange ce matin?
Kid: Uh--j'ai mange des oeufs.
FP: Combien?
Kid: ...
FP: Combien?
Kid: ...
FP: How many?
Kid: Uh. They were scrambled.
FP: ...
Kid: Beaucoup?
 

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Posted by Palliard (Member # 8109) on :
 
From on old SNL skit with Steve Martin:

"I can't believe that out of all the conversations we've had, not one of you guys ever mentioned that hemlock is poisonous."
 

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Posted by Primal Curve (Member # 3587) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Fyfe:
This one isn't so much stupid as just funny.

French professor: Qu'est-ce que tu as mange ce matin?
Kid: Uh--j'ai mange des oeufs.
FP: Combien?
Kid: ...
FP: Combien?
Kid: ...
FP: How many?
Kid: Uh. They were scrambled.
FP: ...
Kid: Beaucoup?

---

quote:

---

• guy: girl, what nationality are you?
  me: ...american.
  guy: ...
  me: you mean ethnicity?
  guy: yeah that
  me: korean
  guy: so what do you talk, like chinese or something?

---

quote:

---

Teacher: Then, after Lou Gehrig died from ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease, as it's now known. . .

Joe (to the girl sitting next to him): Man, how'd he not see that coming?

Girl (dead serious): Yeah, that is a coincidence.

---

 

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Posted by sarcare (Member # 8736) on :
 
Hey Shanna, I think I had that same essay! Except the theses was that Plato would not have believed anything as silly as Christianity, because he was "like, logical or something."

I would say that grading papers is one of my favorite places to find these little gems of wisdom.

Here are two of my favorites,
“If one of the ten commandments is thou shall not kill why did the Aztecs believe God would be happy w/ their sacrifices?”
“Why did Mary Tudor take the name Elizabeth I when she came to the throne?”


My all time favorite studentism I have taped up on my desk. In that essay the student wrote that the French do not like the United States to this day because the US failed to help the French in their revolution, and that furthermore Marie Antoinette was executed because she didn't know how to play nice, but this was ok, because women had recently gained the right to die.
 

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Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
 
Then, of course, there was the episode of The Man Show were Adam & Jimmy set up a booth with a big sign saying "End Women's Suffrage!" and got hundreds of signatures on their petition. Mostly from women.
 

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Posted by Little_Doctor (Member # 6635) on :
 
Last week in my history class:

Teacher: Okay, since It's MLK day on monday, your homework will be due on tuesday.

Girl in my class: Wait...When was he president again?

Class: Laughter

Girl: Wasn't he the first black president?

An argument between class and girl ensues. The teahcer makes no effort to settle it, becasue he is too busy laughing.
 

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Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
 
I've got some notes on various favorite "student moments" I collected when I was teaching, but my favorite essay title ever comes from a student in an ESL class I taught at one point: A Time when I Less Than Perfect English Got Me Into Funny
 

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Posted by Ryan Hart (Member # 5513) on :
 
In a US History course:

Teacher: In the 17th century, what was the main export of Newfoundland?

Student: Ice!
 

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Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
 
Playing Taboo last night:

Juxtapose: "This...organism...uh...could be in your house..."
Me: "Llama!"
Juxtapose: "No, it's not an animal."
Me: "Cockroach!"
Juxtapose: "NOT an animal!"
Me: "Uh, cockroaches AREN'T animals."

At which point he gave me a look that there can never, and will never be an emoticon for.
 

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Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 
...why was a llama the first thing you thought of?
 

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Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
 
I don't actually remember what the first animal I shouted was - llama seemed like a fitting substitute?
 

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Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 
Silly erosomniac.

Here's one:
Back in my senior year of high school, my band traveled from Hawaii to California for the Holiday Bowl. We marched a parade, and in one of the pauses I heard a guy exclaim, "Wow! It's amazing that they can practice and get this good without electricity!"
 

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Posted by lem (Member # 6914) on :
 
We were debating whether America should go to the metric system or not. There was an older woman in the class who was completely against it; everyone else agreed metric is better. Nothing could dissuade her from her opinion.

After much heated debate, the professor asked her why she was so opposed to the metric system. Her response:

"When I buy a a liter pop I want to know it's a litter of pop!!"
 

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Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
 
Me: We'd like to serve a dinner for about 300 people.

Caterer: For that many I recomend our two meat buffet. You get two types of meat, two hot sides, a salad and a dessert.

Me: Great. One of our guests is allergic to pork, so we'd like to avoid that.

Caterer: In that case I recommed the baked ham and either the roast beef or the roast turkey.

Me: Ham is pork.

Caterer: Oh no, we have roast pork too -- they're seperate selections.
 

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Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
 
Cockroaches are members of the animal kingdom, though not mammals (or even vertebrates).

Sorry, erso, I think your friend was right.
 

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Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
 
Cockroaches most definitely are animals.
 

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Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
 
Is there an echo in here?
 

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Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
dkw, how did you respond to that? I'd be speechless. And then I might have tried to explain to him, as if he was a 2 year old, why ham is pork, regardless of what their selection is.
 

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Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
 

quote:

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A Time when I Less Than Perfect English Got Me Into Funny

---

 

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Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
This one was pretty funny, even though I understood what the person meant, but anyways:

Girl: I saw that episode of 7th Heaven. I'm so sad that this is their last season.

Someone else: Yeah, they're cancelling it after this season.

Girl: They're not cancelling it! They're just not making any more episodes!
 

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Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 
From a friend:
in my lab for biology of the brain, a senior bio major asks, 'well, if you didn't use part of your brain, wouldn't it rot and cause infection?'
 

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Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
 
GaalDornick, I said something along the lines of "Thank you, we'll discuss the options and get back to you if we decide to book the event."

And then I called a different caterer.
 

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Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
 
You're obviously much nicer than me.
 

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Posted by erosomniac (Member # 6834) on :
 

quote:

---

Cockroaches are members of the animal kingdom, though not mammals (or even vertebrates).

Sorry, erso, I think your friend was right.

---

quote:

---

In fact, it has been proven that around half of the people in the world are below median intelligence.

---

quote:

---

Oy. I'm agnostic and I know what World is meant figuratively to mean the Universe.

---

You know, though, it'd be really interesting if your afterlife varied depending on which planet you were inhabiting at the time of your death.
 

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Posted by Carrie (Member # 394) on :
 
From one of the papers I graded last semester:

"Immediately after Augustus' death and instant defecation, he was worshipped by all the people."
 

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Posted by Vasslia Cora (Member # 7981) on :
 

quote:

---

Very true, but I've always maintained that 90% are below average intelligence

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by dkw:

Me: Ham is pork.

---

But...but...but ham's not the other white meat! It's pinkish red!
 

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Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :
 
Honors Sociology: Are there like, any people other than Eskimo's that live in Antartica?

Professor: *silence*
 

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Posted by Eaquae Legit (Member # 3063) on :
 
Latin 463 student: "I don't understand. What does -que mean?"

(Errr... for those non-Latin students, this class is one step away from a Master's level and this person was asking what the word "and" was. This is a topic covered in the first six weeks of the first class of Latin.)
 

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Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :
 
Two guys walking out of class:

Guy 1: "Dude, I think I failed the test."

Guy 2: "Waddya get?"

Guy 1: "13 out of 30"

Guy 2: "Dude, that's like ... a 50%!"


'nuff said.

Also, while this may have been one of those 'you had to be there ones', in my Honors Sociology class we were talking about a trade the Orlando Magic recently made. The teacher refers to the guy traded for as "A big galoop" (Teach probably forgot the guys name, which is Darko Milicic or something). A guy walks in and sit down and asks the guy sitting next to him, who had been there for the whole conversation, in which Darko Milicic's name had, in fact, been mentioned, who the Magic had traded for. The guy responds "Some guy name Galoop".
I really had to try hard not to laugh out loud.
 

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Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
 
Hey, order of magnitude, 13/30 does equal 50%.
 

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Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :
 
hm? Really? I thought it was 15.
 

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Posted by dantesparadigm (Member # 8756) on :
 
I was in my honors Freshman Science class last year, and apparently they let just about anyone in them. The teacher was doing a demonstration to show that at certain wavelengths sound waves bounce back and increase in volume (echo). To show this he was holding a tuning fork over a tube of water and raising and lowering the level by lifting a tank of water connected by a hose up and down.

There was a girl in the class who was absolutely amazed by this, until she finally said "wait a minute, the water is changing levels every time you move that thing!" Apparently she had thought that the tuning fork was changing the level of water. I fell out of my chair laughing at her and I got a detention.
 

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Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
 
Yes, that's why I said 'order of magnitude'. It's what is technically known as an approximation.
 

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Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :
 
So on this forum, this kid who thinks he's smart talks about how he laughed at someone who, in his mind, demonstrated stupidity. Then this real smart person put the not-so-smart kid in his place by exposing the kids own ignorance.


Let me tell ya, it was a riot!


lol
 

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Posted by Uprooted (Member # 8353) on :
 
Me, teaching a 9th-grade honors English class and trying to determine the students' familiarity with Thoreau: Have any of you read or heard of the book Walden ?

Class: silence

Cute blonde girl: OOOH! Yeah! I love that book!

Me: (rather surprised that CBG is a fan of Thoreau, awaiting further explanation)

CBG: There's this little guy, and you have to find him in the picture!

Class: That's Where's Waldo?, you idiot!!

That one of the more memorable chuckles from my very brief teaching career. But she was a good kid, with an innocence and willingness to participate that I found refreshing. She was consistently open and enthusiastic with none of the world-weary cynicism a lot of those kids already had as 9th-graders. But she did contribute her fair share of bloopers!
 

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Posted by Celaeno (Member # 8562) on :
 
My religious studies professor: Time and space and matter...those are two dimensions.
 

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