posted
I thought they were very funny, and I requested them at lunch, but I didn't write them down and I need them. I use them as currency to bribe various mathemetician/engineering friends to do things for me, and I need to borrow a truck to pick up my bookcase.
*covers Dave's ears out of compassion* Could you refresh my memory? *looks appealing* I'm practically family...
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
R3 is all of three dimensions (the entire universe).
I'm afraid I need to leave one minute ago, so either you get to wait until about 4:30 EST or get other people to tell you. I promise to post some when I get back.
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<pedant> R3 is only (equivalent to) the entire universe if the entire universe is infinite and unbounded. Otherwise its (equivalent to) far more than the entire universe, as R3 is a mathematical concept for the entire space spanned by three orthogonal dimensions. </pedant>
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Well, we're pretty sure the universe is only unbounded and infinite in at most four dimensions. The other 7 dimensions would be really, really small, so it certainly wouldn't be the equivalent of R11.
In this case by the universe what is meant is the "touchable" universe -- places you could get to in a spacecraft if you had an infinite number of finite hops.
(edit: you know, assuming your spacecraft was physically impervious, protected you perfectly, and was able to pass through all kinds of matter)
posted
Admit it though, guys, you thought the joke was funny. Deep down inside, maybe in a place you're a little ashamed of, you thought it was a little funny.
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
True Fugu, but if you insist on getting that technical about a Yo Mama joke I'd like to point out that it was the wrong type of R for "Real Number".
Engineering joke 1: There are three engineers arguing about which profession God is, mechanical, electrical, or civil.
MechE: Look at the magnificent bone structure, the sockets and the links. God was clearly a Mechanical Engineer.
Electrical: No, look at the human nervous system, the amazing logic it posses and power, using minimal energy for processing. Obviously God is an EE.
Civil: I’m afraid you’re both wrong, and I have proof. Who else but a civil engineer would put a waste disposal line through a great recreational area?
posted
There’s a biologist, physicist, and mathematician sitting at a café, watching the people go past. The physicist notes a dark, empty looking house across from them. While they sit at the table, two people walk into the house, and half an hour later three walk out. The trio is quite confused as to this occurrence and discusses possible explanations.
Physicist: There must have been an error in our initial data. Biologist: Perhaps they reproduced. Mathematician: If one more person goes in there, the house will be empty.
posted
A mathematician and an engineer are applying for the same job. To see who gets it, the company puts them through a series of tests. First they are given a pot full of water on a chair and asked to boil it. The engineer picks up the pot, takes it to a nearby stove, turns on the stove and boils the water. The mathematician comes in and follows exactly the same procedure.
Then, they are asked to take a pot of water on the floor and boil it. So the engineer picks up the water, places it on the stove, turns the stove on, and boils it. The mathematician comes in, picks up the water an places it on the chair and declares the problem solved.
posted
A mathematician, engineer, and physicist are all applying for the same job. To see who gets it the company puts them through a series of tests. They are all asked individually to find the volume of a little red rubber ball.
The physicist takes the ball and submerges it in a container of water. He then measures the displacement of the water and rights down that as the volume.
The mathematician takes the ball and measures the circumference of it with a string. He uses that to find the volume.
The engineer takes the ball and looks up the serial number in his little red rubber ball table.
posted
Noah gathers up all the animals for the ark. He gets them aboard, it rains for 40 days and 40 nights and finally the water subsides. He releases all the animals out into the world and tells them they must procreate, as they are the only ones left of their species.
After a short time he goes around and visits all of the animals, to make sure they’re doing well. When he reaches the snakes he finds that there are still only two of them. He tells them they must reproduce or they will become extinct. “Tell you what”, reply the snakes, “cut down some trees and we’ll see what we can do”.
So Noah, confused but determined, cuts down a series of trees and leaves. He comes back a month later and discovers thousands of snakes, they’re ever where. “This is great!” he says, “but how did it happen?”
“Well,” reply the snakes, “we’re adders, we need logs to multiply”.
An engineer, physicist, and mathematician are all riding together on a train across Ireland. None of them have been there before so they’re having a wonderful time watching the scenery roll by. The engineer suddenly points out the window, “Look!” he exclaimed, “a black sheep! All the sheep in Ireland must be black.”
“No,” the physicist calmly answers, all we conclude from this is that one sheep in Ireland is black.
“I’m sorry, that’s still wrong” the mathematician pondered, “all we can conclude is that one half of one sheep is black.”
posted
What about the one with a priest, a lawyer and an engineer at the guillotine? (I may have mispelled that, my French is atrocious)
Posts: 575 | Registered: Jan 2004
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posted
Ooh, you know a Bain consultant? One of my friends who graduated last year got hired by Bain's Chicago branch as a consultant.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Its works because the first pot of water was on the chair, and it was boiled, so because the second one was made to be the same as the first, it too can be shown will be boiled.
Mathmatician: a solution exists Engineer: What exactly is the solution.
Posts: 1621 | Registered: Oct 2001
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posted
I know about 10 Bain consultants. They are very smart, have killer discussions, move in packs, dress much better than I enjoy doing, and throw fabulous parties. However, not so good with Trivial Pursuit, and I'm thinking they don't have enough geeky friends if they are so easily persuaded with mathemetician jokes.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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I actually started with the math jokes because he was trying so hard to NOT be geeky. As in, refusing to admit it. At first, I think he thought it was mockery. Nono, just bribery.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
I know a variant on the mathematician on pot joke.
There's a clearing in the woods, stocked with firewood ready to light, matches, a pot, a cooking tripod, and a pond.
A mathematician is taken there, and told: "Boil a pot full of water."
So, he lights the wood, fills the pot with water, places it in the tripod over the flames. Soon the water is boiling.
Then he is taken to a second clearing, where everything is the same as the first, except here, the fire has already been lit, and there is water in the pot. Same instructions.
So, the mathematician empties the water from the pot, smothers the fire . . .
. . . then lights the wood, fills the pot with water, places it in the tripod over the flames . . .
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
A mathematician, physicist, and engineer are all staying in the same hotel one night, each one on a different story. In the middle of the night the engineer wakes up and smells smoke. He runs into the hallway and sees a fire. He glances around, sees a fire hose, and uses it to put out the fire.
Later that night the physicist wakes up and smells smoke. He runs out into the hall and sees a fire. He glances around and sees a fire hose. He then calculates the water flow and pressure, decides it will be enough to stop the fire and proceeds to do so.
Even later that night the mathematician wakes up and spells smoke. He runs out into the hall and sees a fire. He glances around until he sees a fire hose, exclaims “Ah! A solution exists.” And goes back to bed.
posted
Those are pretty funny jokes, Hobbes. That Taalcon guy is crazy!
Your joke was good, too, sax. Except that the R comment about it not being the right R was right on.
I made up a math joke. It's really horrible. Here it is.
Did you hear about the mathematician with a lisp? He kept mixing up hyperbolic cosine and hyperbolic cotangent.
Posts: 1423 | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
OK, seriously, how am I supposed to type the R with the extra little line? I'm reasonably certain that it's not supported in either extended ASCII or Unicode. Or was the gripe that the 3 should have been superscripted?
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
No, I think it was about the R. There's no way you could have shown the R the correct way. It was just being anal and precise which is something mathematicians like to do. Sorry we spoiled your joke!
Posts: 1423 | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
Today was VERY stressful for me, both here and IRL. So that means, it's time for more math jokes!
An engineer thinks that his equations are an approximation to reality. A physicist thinks reality is an approximation to his equations. A mathematician doesn't care.
A topologist is a person who doesn't know the difference between a coffee cup and a doughnut.
A mathematician, a physicist, an engineer went to the races and laid their money down. Commiserating in the bar after the race, the engineer says, "I don't understand why I lost all my money. I measured all the horses and calculated their strength and mechanical advantage and figured out how fast they could run..."
The physicist interrupted him: "...but you didn't take individual variations into account. I did a statistical analysis of their previous performances and bet on the horses with the highest probability of winning..."
"...so if you're so hot why are you broke?" asked the engineer. But before the argument can grow, the mathematician takes out his pipe and they get a glimpse of his well-fattened wallet. Obviously here was a man who knows something about horses. They both demanded to know his secret.
"Well," he says, "first I assumed all the horses were identical and spherical..."
An engineer, a physicist and a mathematician were asked to hammer a nail into a wall. The engineer went to build a Universal Automatic Nailer -- a device able to hammer every possible nail into every possible wall. The physicist conducted series of experiments on strength of hammers, nails, and walls and developed a revolutionary technology of ultra-sonic nail hammering at super-low temperature. The mathematician generalized the problem to a N dimensional problem of penetration of a knotted one dimensional nail into a N-1 dimensional hyper-wall. Several fundamental theorems are proved. Of course, the problem is too rich to suggest a possibility of a simple solution, even the existence of a solution is far from obvious.
A mathematician and a physicist agree to a psychological experiment. The (hungry) mathematician is put in a chair in a large empty room and his favorite meal, perfectly prepared, is placed at the other end of the room. The psychologist explains, "You are to remain in your chair. Every minute, I will move your chair to a position halfway between its current location and the meal." The mathematician looks at the psychologist in disgust. "What? I'm not going to go through this. You know I'll never reach the food!" And he gets up and storms out. The psychologist ushers the physicist in. He explains the situation, and the physicist's eyes light up and he starts drooling. The psychologist is a bit confused. "Don't you realize that you'll never reach the food?" T he physicist smiles and replies: "Of course! But I'll get close enough for all practical purposes!"
One day a farmer called up an engineer, a physicist, and a mathematician and asked them to fence of the largest possible area with the least amount of fence. The engineer made the fence in a circle and proclaimed that he had the most efficient design. The physicist made a long, straight line and proclaimed "We can assume the length is infinite..." and pointed out that fencing off half of the Earth was certainly a more efficient way to do it. The Mathematician just laughed at them. He built a tiny fence around himself and said "I declare myself to be on the outside."
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
At Sachiko's request: the gullotine joke! (one of my favorites)
A priest, a lawyer and an engineer have all been sentenced to death by guillotine for crimes they had committed. The executioner asks the priest whether he wishes to face up or face down when he meets his fate. The priest states he would prefer to die face up which would enable him to be looking towards Heaven when he dies.
The priest is placed in the guillotine and the executioner releases the lever. The blade comes speeding down, but jams just short of the priest's throat. Taking this as a sign from God, the priest is released and set free.
Next, the lawyer is led to the guillotine, and hoping he will be as fortunate as the priest, he too decides to die face up. Again the blade is released and jams just inches away from his throat. As with the priest, the lawyer is released and set free.
Finally, the engineer is led to the guillotine. He also decides to die face up. Just as the executioner is about to release the lever, the engineer shouts, "Wait! I think I see what your problem is!"
posted
The engineer might solve the problem, but he wouldn't reveal the solution until he had a signed contract from the executioner.
Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Well, seeing people I care about tear each other to shreds, and knowing that anything I say will only exacerbate the problem is pretty stressful. Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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That's why your mama told you to stay out of that sort of thread. They just aren't nice. They CAN be nice, respectful, and calm, and when they are, there's nothing greater, but they usually aren't, put it that way. Posts: 5509 | Registered: May 1999
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Two atoms walk into a bar. One says to the other "I think I'm missing a proton." The other one says "are you sure?" "I'm positive"
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at the half the distance joke. And kind of glad I'm a physicist, with only a maths *minor*.![[Cry]](graemlins/cry.gif)
