Jokes about engineers, physicists and mathematicians. And how they help understand.

There is a fairly large cultural and approach-to-the-world gap between people like engineers, physicists, software developers, etc, and people from softer disciplines. The differences appear in style of comms, interests, approach to many things.

Sometimes jokes help to illustrate these differences.

So here are a few. If you don’t get the jokes, I can’t help you. But they all illustrate a serious point.

People think differently. Empirical thinkers, theoretical thinkers, precise thinkers, creative thinkers, and sloppy thinkers. Make allowances. Be patient.

2+1

A professor of maths asked a maths student, a physics student, and an engineering student to add 2 plus 1 and to present the answer.

The maths student looked puzzled and said “Three. It’s three.”

The physics student said “Well….Heisenberg, you know? So 2 plus 1 is somewhere between 2.999999999999999…. and 3.000000000000000… Somewhere in there. I can’t be sure.”

The engineering student said “Well, 2 plus 1 is 3. We all know that. But we’d better call it 9.”

New Bike

An engineering undergrad met his friends for lunch on Saturday. He had a nice new bicycle. Carbon frame. Disk brakes. Everything. His friends checked it out and asked where and when and how he’d gotten it.

“Well”, he said, “I was coming out of the labs late last night and walking across the campus. Across the grass, just over there. There must have been a party on campus somewhere. This pretty girl must have been at the party, I guess. Really pretty. She cycled over to me, dropped her bike on the ground, took off all her clothes, stood in front of me with her arms wide and said ‘Take whatever you want’”.

Shoes

How can you identify an extrovert engineer?

They’re the one looking at your shoes.

Sheep

An arts student, an engineering student and a maths student were on the train from London to Edinburgh. As they crossed the Border region, there were fluffy white sheep scattered all over the hillsides.

Just after they crossed the border into Scotland, a lone black sheep stood near the track as they passed, nose facing north along the track.

“Look!” shouted the arts student, “All the sheep in Scotland are black!”

“Don’t be silly” said the engineering student, “All we can say is that at least one of the sheep in Scotland is black”.

“Sloppy thinking there” said the mathematics student. “All we can say is that at least one of the sheep in Scotland is black on at least one side”.

Sheep Inside

A maths student, a physics student and an engineering student were given a challenge. The challenge was to enclose the sheep on a nearby hillside inside a fence in the most elegant possible way.

The engineering student went up on the hill and built a circular fence, inside which the sheep all just barely fitted. It was the minimum fencing material required per sheep enclosed. Very elegant, they thought.

Then the physics student went up and built a square fence with a gate. They stood at the gate and when a sheep randomly wandered up to the gate from the outside would open the gate and let it in. When a sheep randomly wandered up to the gate from the inside, they’d keep the gate closed. It took a while, but eventually all the sheep were inside the fence. And all in defiance of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics. Very elegant, they thought.

The mathematics student went up on the hill, built a little fence around where they were standing and then defined where they were standing as Outside.

Engineers and Business

Paddy Englishman, Paddy Scotsman and Paddy Irishman were all builders. Paddy Englishman was a Masters Graduate from Imperial College London School of Engineering. Paddy Scotsman was a Masters Gradual from Heriot-Watt School of Engineering. Paddy Irishman was a builder with a bit of sales experience but no particular technical education.

Westminster City Council asked the three Paddies for fixed-price bids to build some new roads in and around Westminster, and they scheduled a presentation from each of the three gentlemen one after the other, each to present in private session to the gathered members of the City Council.

Paddy Englishman’s bid was ￡3 million. “Well gentlemen” he said, “My bid is ￡3 million. That’s one million pounds in materials, one million in labour, and one million to cover overheads and profits.”

Paddy Scotsman’s bid was ￡6 million. “See here” he said, “My bid is ￡6 million. A higher price, but better value. That’s two million in materials, two million in labour, and two million to cover overheads and profits. All good proper Scottish materials and workmanship too. None of yer English rubbish.”

Paddy Irishman’s bid was ￡9 million. “How are yez lads” he said. “My bid, as you can see, is ￡9 million. That’s ￡3 million for you, ￡3 million for me, and I’ll give the bloody job to Paddy Englishman.”

Xeno’s Swimsuit Model

A maths professor did a test. They took a philosophy student, a physics student and an engineering student into the lab.

Across the room was a swimsuit model, beckoning and winking at the young students. They were all suddenly quite enthusiastic to cross the lab.

But first the maths professor explained Xeno’s paradox to them. How, if they wanted to cross the room they’d have to go half-way first. And then half the remaining distance. And then half the remaining distance. And so on. And that, in this way, they could never get all the way across the room. It would take an infinte number of steps. It was impossible.

The philosophy student thought about it for a second then sat down on the ground and started to cry. “Life is futile” they wailed. “There is no point in living”.

The physics student thought about it for a second, then sat down and stared wistfully across the room at the model. “An infinite number of steps” they said. “Ultimate defeat by the Planck length. I could never get all the way across the room.“ They sighed and looked again across the room.

The swimsuit model waved once more, and winked.

The engineering student had been standing quietly. Now, they started to move and walked half-way across the room. There they stopped and seemed to be thinking. The maths professor caught up and said “You realize, you can never get the whole way across the room, right? It would take an infinite number of steps.”

The swimsuit model waved and beckoned.

The engineering student nodded slightly and then went quarter of the way across the room…half the remaining distance. The professor repeated the question. “You realize” they said “that you can never get the whole way across the room.”

“Yeah” said the engineering student as they walked one eighth of the way across the room….half the remaining distance. “I’m thinking about that. You might be right. Maybe I can never get the whole way across the room. But I’m making good progress here and even if I can’t get the whole way across the room I think I can get close enough for all practical purposes.”

(note…this joke, while hopefully illustrative, is also ludicrous. No engineering student would have any idea what to say to a swimsuit model if they did make it across the room. “

The balloon ride (an old old joke)

Three sales executives in the tech industry were in a hot air balloon. They’d gone for an industry day out, as they did each year. Lunch, followed by champagne, followed — this year — by a hot air balloon ride. Three executives and one balloonist in each balloon.

Unfortunately they had not chosen a suitable day, weather-wise. Fog closed in around the balloons and they were soon lost. It’s dangerous to land a balloon unless you know where you are. Powerlines, motorways, cows, expanses of water…they can all ruin an otherwise perfectly good landing.

Nevertheless, the evening was drawing in and they had to land. Or to try. Down they went, descending gradually.

Then, for a brief moment, they could see the ground and three people standing beside the road with some kind of building in the misty background.

“Hey” shouted the balloonist in desparation, “Where are we? Can you tell me PLEASE! I need to know where we are!”

“Sure” shouted one of the people. “You’re 25m above local ground level. That’s 142m above mean sea level as defined in WGS84. You’re at 37.211 Degrees North and -121.806 Degrees longitude. You’re in the Pacific Time Zone.”

The fog closed in again, blanking out the ground and muffling all sound.

“Damn” said the balloonist. “I have no idea what they were on about. That wasn’t much use and it might have been our last chance. It’s getting dark.”

“Heck no” said one of the execs. “I know exactly where we are. If we drift over this way for another two minutes you can put this thing down anywhere. It’ll be all open ground.”

“What? How? What?” asked the others in confusion. “Easy” said the exec. “That’s the IBM Research facility down there. It’s surrounded by open ground.”

“But how? How do you know?” asked the others.

“Where else could you get someone to answer a simple question with such excess detail?” said the exec. “With such precise and totally useless detail? Those are IBM Research engineers. I’d bet my life on it. It’s taken me 15 years to understand what they’re talking about even some of the time but it’s finally paid off!”

The ballon landed safely.

The point?

What, you might ask, is the point of all these jokes?

Well, it’s easy. Different tasks and situations require different skills. Different people think and communicate in different ways.

There’s advantage in being able to understand where others are coming from. The tech isn’t always the point…but sometimes it is.