Science Humor: A Wide Selection

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The discussion centers around a variety of science-related humor, showcasing anecdotes, jokes, and humorous theories. A notable story involves a NASA team during the Apollo mission who encountered a Navajo sheep herder, leading to a humorous mistranslation of a message intended for the moon. Another highlight is Chuck Yeager's playful exaggeration about a design flaw in the Bell X-1 aircraft, which he humorously attributed to complex aerodynamics rather than a simple cable routing issue. The thread also features the "Dark Sucker Theory," humorously positing that light bulbs "suck dark" instead of emitting light, and a fictitious element called "administratium," which humorously critiques bureaucracy in science. Various jokes illustrate the intersection of humor and science, such as the classic question about the nature of hell, which leads to a clever thermodynamic analysis. Overall, the content blends clever scientific concepts with humor, appealing to those with an interest in both science and comedy.
  • #101
It is supposed to represent a rotated 5, which has not (yet !) any asigned meaning in math.

If x is arbitrarily close to 8, then x-8 is arbitrarily close to zero, and \frac{1}{x-8} is arbitrarily large, that is \frac{1}{x-8} goes to ininity, which is represented by \infty. Apparently the guy did not know what \infty meant, so he interpreted the sign as a rotated eight. Naturally for him then \frac{1}{x-5} must go to rotated 5 when x is arbitrarily close to five. As you can see of course, the answer was the same : \frac{1}{x-5} must go to \infty too when x is close to five...

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Researchers in Fairbanks Alaska announced last week that they have discovered a superconductor which will operate at room temperature.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
  • #102
Right. I see it now. Not laughing but at least it makes sense.
=p
 
  • #103
The physicists and engineers at MIT faced off in a football game.

It was nearing the end of the 4th quarter and no one had scored. When a local factory whistle blew, the physicists assumed this was the game whistle; that the length of the game was only approximate, and in spite of the clock, the game was over. They left the field. The engineers executed the next seven plays perfectly but still had to settle with a field goal to win.
 
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  • #104
A physicist is walking in the street, hungry. He sees a bakery sign in a window, so gets in the shop, owned by a mathematician and asks for bread. The mathematician replies : "But we just sell signs" :-p

I think it was from Zee's Nutshell
 
  • #105
Every now and then, I use vi. :redface:

Don't laugh ! :mad: That wasn't a joke !
 
  • #106
I use only vi. No shame. I also use pine. At least I know what I'm doing :wink:
 
  • #107
The U.S. standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That is an exceptionally odd number.

Now, why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and the U.S. Railroads were built by English expatriates.

Why did the English build them that way? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

So why did the wagons have that particular odd spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So, who built those old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in Europe (and England) were built by Imperial Rome for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads? The ruts in the roads, which everyone had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels, were first formed by Roman war chariots. Since the chariots were made for (or by) Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.

The U.S. standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Specifications and bureaucracies live forever. So, the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's a** came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back end of two war horses. Thus we have the answer to the original question.

Now the twist to the story... When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two booster rockets attached to the side of the main fuel tank. These are Solid Rocket Boosters or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory had to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, the major design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's a**!

Don't you just love engineering?
 
  • #108
Imparcticle said:
Perspectives of the world:

Optomist- the glass is half full.
pessimist- the glass is half empty.
fatalist-the water will evaporate.
existentialist- the glass is.
feminist- all glasses are equal.
narcissist-look at me in the water!
polygamist-the more glasses the merrier.
evangelist-the glass must repent.
socialist-share the glass.
capitalist-sell the glass.
anarchist- break the glass.
psychologist- How does the water feel about the glass?

You forgot one
Engineer- the glass is two time its over the necessary design parameters
 
  • #109
In physics we learn that a horse is approximately a sphere.
 
  • #110
Cows too...according to the joke that ends with the physicist solving the low milk-yield problem saying : "Assume all cows are spherical..."
 
  • #111
Argentum Vulpes said:
The U.S. standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That is an exceptionally odd number.

Now, why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and the U.S. Railroads were built by English expatriates.

Why did the English build them that way? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

So why did the wagons have that particular odd spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So, who built those old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in Europe (and England) were built by Imperial Rome for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads? The ruts in the roads, which everyone had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels, were first formed by Roman war chariots. Since the chariots were made for (or by) Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.

The U.S. standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Specifications and bureaucracies live forever. So, the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's a** came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back end of two war horses. Thus we have the answer to the original question.

Now the twist to the story... When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two booster rockets attached to the side of the main fuel tank. These are Solid Rocket Boosters or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory had to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, the major design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's a**!

Don't you just love engineering?

 
  • #112
About 7 years ago, David Letterman invited a few people to his show, to tell jokes that would only be understood by a very small number of people. I still remember the mathematician's joke, because I actually understood how bad it was:

Professor: Can you give me an example of a compact topological space?
Student: The real numbers.
(Silence)
Professor: With what topology?
 
  • #113
Here's one I heard from Steven Wright:

In the middle of a job interview, I pulled out a book and started reading. The guy interviewing me said, "What are you doing?" I said, "Can I ask you a question?" He said yes. "If you're traveling at the speed of light in your car through space and you turned on you headlights, would they work?" He said, "I don't know". I said, I don't want to work for you and walked out.
 
  • Wow
Likes Demystifier
  • #114
Argentum Vulpes said:
The U.S. standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That is an exceptionally odd number.

Now, why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and the U.S. Railroads were built by English expatriates.

Why did the English build them that way? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

So why did the wagons have that particular odd spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So, who built those old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in Europe (and England) were built by Imperial Rome for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads? The ruts in the roads, which everyone had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels, were first formed by Roman war chariots. Since the chariots were made for (or by) Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.

The U.S. standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Specifications and bureaucracies live forever. So, the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's a** came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back end of two war horses. Thus we have the answer to the original question.

Now the twist to the story... When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two booster rockets attached to the side of the main fuel tank. These are Solid Rocket Boosters or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory had to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, the major design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's a**!

Don't you just love engineering?


This is not true (unless that's the joke?).
 
  • #115
Flying Penguin said:
This is not true (unless that's the joke?).
That's the joke, unfortunately a lot of people believed the information about the rail spacing and now this misinformation is posted all over the internet as fact. There is a bit of truth to the rockets having to fit through the tunnel though.
 
  • #116
I'm new so be nice.

I don't know if you've heard this before but...

A cave boy lived with his family in their cave next to the Hamilton family. Every day the cave boy would ride to school with the Hamilton boy until one day he came home and his mother said, "Son, if you commute with a Hamiltonian you're never going to evolve."

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
 
  • #117
I made this one up today while having lunch( :biggrin: I am vegetarian)

Q:Why did Dracula go to the circus?




A:Because,he wanted to get to the juggler!(jugular)? :smile:
 
  • #118
more of a math joke and most people've already heard it. anyways, here goes:

At New York's Kennedy International Airport today, an individual, later discovered to be a public school teacher, was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a setsquare, a slide rule, and a calculator.

Attorney General John Ashcroft believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. He is being charged with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-gebra is a very fearsome cult, indeed," Ashcroft said. "They desire average solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on a tangent in a search of absolute value. They consist of quite shadowy figures, with names like "X" and "Y ", and, although they are frequently referred to as "unknowns", we know they really belong to a common denominator and are part of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the great Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, "there are 3 sides to every triangle."

When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "If God had wanted us to have weapons of math instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes".
 
  • #119
lucifer said:
Attorney General John Ashcroft believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. He is being charged with carrying weapons of math instruction...

:smile: I hadn't heard that one before...it's hysterical! I love it! :smile:
 
  • #120
On the show "Planets", currently showing on the Science Channel (SCI), a review of the Voyager projects is presented and well worth the watch. From that show...

When the head of NASA was commenting on the rare alignment of the gas giants that made the Voyager project possible, he said: "The last time this happened, Thomas Jefferson was President, and he blew it!"
 
  • #121
lucifer said:
A funny joke...


Sadly i think that you could pass that through the media to the American people and they would buy it. Not as much out of gullibility as much as out the cultural antipathy towards intelligence and anyone who enjoys learning for its own sake.
 
  • #122
Q: What did the Nuclear Physicist have for lunch?
A: Fission Chips.
 
  • #123
Q:What is the coefficient of friction of a cat?
A: Mu

Q:What is the maximum speed a computer can attain falling through an atmosphere?
A:Terminal velocity.
 
  • #124
It is a bad sign when your physics grade is a complex number - having both a real and an imaginary part!
 
  • #125
Why do doctors and lawyers call what they do a "practice"?

...makes you feel kind of safe doesn't it?...
 
  • Haha
Likes CynicusRex
  • #126
http://home.comcast.net/~fsteiger/cartoon.gif
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #127
The guy on the left looks evil to me.
 
  • #128
A student, having had his fill with drawing graph after graph in senior high math class, told his teacher:
Mrs. Jones, I'll do algebra, I'll do trig, and I'll even do statistics, but graphing is where I draw the line!
 
  • Haha
Likes CynicusRex
  • #129
It has been discovered that research causes cancer in laboratory rats.

Q: How do you tell the sex of a chromosome?
A: Pull down its genes.

this is funny too (and a little mean):
http://www.juliantrubin.com/imagesb/bushorchimp.jpg
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #130
Lawyer: Dr. Jones, you said you saw the accident.
Dr. Jones: Yes, I did.
Lawyer: And it occurred right around midnight?
Dr. Jones: Yes, it did.
Lawyer: Midnight? Hmmm. Just how old are you?
Dr. Jones: 80
Lawyer: Congratulations! I hope to live so long. So tell me, do you feel a bit weaker, a bit slower, a bit harder of hearing than you were 20 years ago?
Dr. Jones: Yes.
Lawyer: Probably can't see as well, either?
Dr. Jones: Correct.
Lawyer: Be honest, now. Just how far can you see?
Dr. Jones: I can see the moon. How far is that? And it was full that night.
 
  • #131
What do you get if you cross a pig and a rat? Pig rat sin θ. I found this on the wall of one of the cubicles of the toilets in the Physics building at university. Terrible!
 
  • Like
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  • #132
Schrödinger's horse n. a strange creature that only appears dead once you've seen it a few times.
 
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  • #133
Gotta love high school...

So there's a chicken and an egg in bed right, the egg rolls off the chicken, lights a cigarette and says "well, I guess we solved that riddle".
 
  • #134
Quantum_Prodegy said:
...and an egg in bed right, the...
What is a Bed Right? :confused:

The Bob (2004 ©)
 
  • #135
the word 'right' is irrelevant to the joke, its just how its told "...and an egg in bed, the..." u can emit it, its just how the joke was told to me.
 
  • #136
oh come on does nobody get my joke? I thought it was funny...:D
 
  • #137
*shakes head*
 
  • #138
Quantum_Prodegy said:
oh come on does nobody get my joke? I thought it was funny...:D
I'm not an expert on humor, but I thought it was extremely funny, not your joke, watching you try explaining it and begging for laughs. THAT! is the true comedy.
 
  • #139
tribdog said:
I'm not an expert on humor, but I thought it was extremely funny, not your joke, watching you try explaining it and begging for laughs. THAT! is the true comedy.
I agree. You took the attention away from the joke by adding the right for [myself] to comment on. :smile:

The Bob (2004 ©)
 
  • #140
tribdog said:
I'm not an expert on humor...

obviously neither am i... :rolleyes:
 
  • #141
Quantum_Prodegy said:
oh come on does nobody get my joke? I thought it was funny...:D

I thought it was funny enough to immediately forward it to friends and family. :biggrin:
 
  • #142
In a scientific lecture, the lecturer wanted to get the scientists attention. He said "Pi is exactly three!" and all the scientists looked in amazement :bugeye:



:zzz:
 
  • Like
Likes Demystifier
  • #143
DrKareem been watching the simpsons have u?? ;)
 
  • #144
Relativists admit that the bible contains the "gospel truth".
 
  • #145
The Malloy Factor is the rate at which high energy physics experiments convert entire civilizations into little black holes. This also explains the origins of dark matter.
 
  • #146
Teacher : What's 7Q + 3Q ?
Student: 10Q
Teacher: haha. Your welcome.
 
  • Haha
Likes Demystifier
  • #147
Quantum_Prodegy said:
oh come on does nobody get my joke? I thought it was funny...:D

It was hilarious :smile:. I just got through wiping the tears from my eyes.
 
  • #148
:biggrin: woohoo
 
  • #149
Quantum_Prodegy said:
Gotta love high school...

So there's a chicken and an egg in bed, the egg rolls off the chicken, lights a cigarette and says "well, I guess we solved that riddle".

but... how did they solve any riddle? (let alone the "chicken or the egg" riddle) :confused:
 
  • #150
Grafitti on a college wall (for real):

To be is to do - Immanuel Kant
To be or not to be - William Shakespeare
Do-be-do-be-do - Frank Sinatra
 

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