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SCIENCE JOKES #3
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* A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems.
* Why did the mathematician name his dog "Cauchy"?
Because he left a residue at every pole.
* Algebraic symbols are used when you do not know what you are talking
about.
* 1+1=3 for large values of 1
* There are three kinds of mathematicians; those who can count, and those
who can't.
* What's the contour integral around Western Europe?
Zero, because all the Poles are in Eastern Europe!
Actually, there are some Poles in Western Europe, but they are
removable!
* An English mathematician (I forget who) was asked by his very
religious colleague, "Do you believe in one God?"
"Yes, up to isomorphism!"
* What is a compact city?
It's a city that can be guarded by finitely many near-sighted policemen!
* My geometry teacher was sometimes acute, and sometimes obtuse, but always,
he was right.
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The ark lands after The Flood. Noah lets all the animals out. Says, "Go
and multiply." Several months pass. Noah decides to check up on the
animals. All are doing fine except a pair of snakes. "What's the problem?"
says Noah. "Cut down some trees and let us live there," say the snakes.
Noah follows their advice. Several more weeks pass. Noah checks on the
snakes again. Lots of little snakes, everybody is happy. Noah asks, "Want
to tell me how the trees helped?" "Certainly," say the snakes. "We're
adders, we need logs to multiply."
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And now for something completly different...
Prime Numbers !!!
* Accountant: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime, deducting 10%
tax and 5% other obligations.
* Economist: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is not prime. Look, the
prime rate is dropping.
* Manager: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 - Now let's take a positive
attitude here
* Lawyer: According to Math vs Logic, 9 was judicially declared prime
* Politician: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is composite, 11 is
prime, we can ignore 9 because the primes have a majority.
* Corrupt Politician: For a sufficent donation, 9 can be reclassified
* Linguist: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 aaah. I can make 9 a
prime.
* Statistician: 100% of the sample 5, 13, 37, 41 and 53 is prime, so all odd
numbers must be prime.
* Psychiatrist: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is prime but trying to
suppress it, 11 is prime...
* Sociologist: is it right to call numbers odd?
* Sociologist: 3 is a number, 3 is prime, all numbers are prime.
* Philosopher: why don't we just call all the odd numbers prime and call all
the prime numbers odd, that way all the odd numbers would be prime
* Philosopher: 3 is prime. Hum, that's an interesting statement, I'll get
one of my research students to look into that.
* Multiculturalist: Pfui! There you go, classifying numbers into categories.
* Theologian: 3 is prime and that's good enough for me!
* Theologian: Before God all numbers - even, odd and prime - are created
equal.
* Christian: I'm sure the Bible says that all odd numbers are prime.
* Pope: 9 is prime. If you think otherwise, prepare to be damned
* Cosmologist: 3 is prime, yes it is true...
* Engineer: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is ... well, if you
approximate, 9 is prime, ...
* Mathematician: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, proof by induction.
* Physicist: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is not prime, 11 is
prime, 13 is prime, 9 must be experimental error.
* Computer Scientist: 3 is prime, 3 is prime, 3 is prime...
* Computer Scientist: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is...
segmentation fault - core dumped
* Computer Programmer with a TRS-80: 3 is prime, Out of Memory
* Computer Scientist with a Pentium: 3 is prime, 5 is prime, 6.9999978 is
prime...
* DOS program: 3 is prime. No-one will ever need any more than 3.
* Windows program: 3 is prime. Wait.
* Mac program: Now why would anyone want to know about that? That's not user
friendly. You don't worry about it, we'll take care of it for you.
* The computer programmer method is: "3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9
is prime, 9 is prime, 9 is prime, 9 is..."
Oops, let's try that again: "3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is ...
3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is ... 3 is ..."
Um, right. Okay, how about this: "3 is not prime, 5 is not prime, 7 is not
prime, 9 is not prime..."
So much for the beta releases. Ship this: "3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is
prime, 9 is a feature, 11 is prime..." and put on the cover "More prime
numbers than anyone else in the industry!"
Coming soon: "3 is a prime, 4 is a feature, 5 is a prime, 6 is a feature,
7 is a prime, 8 is not yet implemented, 9 is our backwards compatibilty
module, ..."
* UNIX program:
$ prime
usage: prime [-nV] [--quiet] [--silent] [--version] [-e script] --catenate
--concatenate | c --create | d --diff --compare | r --append | t --list |
u --update | x -extract --get [ --atime-preserve ] [ -b, --block-size N ]
[ -B, --read-full-blocks ] [ -C, --directory DIR ] [ --checkpoint ] [ -f,
--file [HOSTNAME:]F ] [ --force- local ] [ -F, --info-script F
--new-volume-script F ] [ -G, --incremental ] [ -g, --listed-incremental F
] [ -h, --dereference ] [ -i, --ignore-zeros ] [ --ignore-failed- read ] [
-k, --keep-old-files ] [ -K, --starting-file F ] [ -l, --one-file-system ]
[ -L, --tape-length N ] [ -m, --modification-time ] [ -M, --multi-volume ]
[ -N, --after-date DATE, --newer DATE ] [ -o, --old-archive, --portability
] [ -O, --to-stdout ] [ -p, --same- permissions, --preserve-permissions ]
[ -P, --absolute- paths ] [ --preserve ] [ -R, --record-number ] [ [-f
script-file] [--expression=script] [--file=script-file]
prime: you must specify exactly one of the r, c, t, x, or d options
For more information, type "prime --help"
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A biologist, a statistician, a mathematition and a computer scientist are
on a photo-safari in Africa. They drive out on the savannah in their jeep,
stop and scout the horizon with their binoculars.
The biologist: "Look! There's a herad of zebras! And there in the middle:
A white zebra! It's fantastic! There are white zebras! We'll be famous!"
The statistician: "It's not significant. We only know there's one white
zebra."
The mathematician: "Actually, we only know there exists a zebra which is
white on one side."
The computer scientist: "Oh no! A special case!"
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A doctor, a lawyer and a mathematician were dicussing the relative merits
of having a wife or mistress.
The lawyer says, "For sure a mistress is better. If you have a wife and
want a divorce, it causes all sorts of legal problems."
The doctor says, "It's better to have a wife because the sense of security
lowers your stress and is good for your health.
The mathematician says, "You're both wrong. It's best to have both so that
when the wife thinks you're with the mistress and the mistress thinks
you're with your wife, you can do some mathematics.
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A mathematician and a farmer are sitting in a train driving through the
country. As they drive past a large herd of cows the farmer mumbles to
himself, "I wonder how many cows that were..."
The mathematician, having heard, says to the farmer, "729."
Baffled, the farmer answers, "How did know that?"
The mathematician replies, "Easy, I counted the legs and divided by four."
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Lemmas & Theorems
* Theorem: A cat has nine tails.
Proof: No cat has eight tails. A cat has one tail more than no cat.
Therefore, a cat has nine tails.
* Lemma: All horses are the same color.
Proof (by induction):
Case n=1: In a set with only one horse, it is obvious that all
horses in that set are the same color.
Case n=k: Suppose you have a set of k+1 horses. Pull one of the
these horses out of the set, so that you have k horses. Suppose
that all of these horses are the same color. Now put back the
horse that you took out, and pull out a different one. Suppose
that all of the k horses now in the set are the same color. Then
the set of k+1 horses are all the same color. We have k true =>
k+1 true; therefore all horses are the same color.
* Theorem: All horses have an infinate number of legs.
Proof (by intimidation):
Everyone would agree that all horses have an even number of
legs. It is also well-known that horses have forelegs in front
and two legs in back. 4+2=6 legs, which is certainly an odd
number of legs for a horse to have! Now the only number that is
both even and odd is infinity; therefore all horses have an
infinite number of legs.
However, suppose that there is a horse somewhere that does not
have an infinite number of legs. Well, that would be a horse of
a different color; and by the Lemma, it doesn't exist.
* Theorem: All positive integers are equal.
Proof: It is sufficien to show that for any two positive integers, A and
B, A=B. Further, it is sufficient to show that for all N>0, if A and B
satisfy {max(A, B)=N}, then A=B.
Proceed by induction.
If N=1, then A=B, being positive integers, must both be 1.
Assume that the theorem is true for some value k. Take A and B with max(A,
B)=k+1. Then max((A-1), (B-1)) = k. And since (A-1)=(B-1), it must be A=B.
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Personal stories
* Von Neumann supposedly had the habit of simply writing answers to homework
assignments on the board (the method of solution being, of course,
obvious) when he was asked how to solve the problems. One time one of his
students tried to get more helpful information by asking if there was
another way to solve the problem. Von Neumann looked blank for a moment,
thought, and then answered, "Yes."
* Weiner was in fact very absent minded. The following story is told about
him: When they moved from Cambridge to Newton his wife, knowing that he
would be absolutely useless on the move, packed him off to MIT while she
directed the move. Since she was certain that he would forget that they
had moved and where they had moved to, she wrote down the new address on a
piece of paper, and gave it to him. Naturally, in the course of the day,
an insight occurred to him. He reached in his pocket, found a piece of
paper on which he furiously scribbled some notes, thought it over, decided
there was a fallacy in his idea, and threw the piece of paper away. At the
end of the day he went home (to the old address in Cambridge, of course).
When he got there he realized that they had moved, that he had no idea
where they had moved to, and that the piece of paper with the address was
long gone. Fortunately inspiration struck him. There was a young girl on
the street and he conceived the idea of asking her where he had moved to,
saying, "Excuse me, perhaps you know me. I'm Norbert Weiner and we've just
moved. Would you know where we've moved to?" To which the young girl
replied, "Yes daddy, mommy thought you would forget."
* The great logician Bertrand Russell (or was it A.N. Whitehead?) once
claimed that he could prove anything if given that 1+1=1.
So one day, some smarty-pants asked him, "Ok. Prove that you're the Pope."
He thought for a while and proclaimed, "I am one. The Pope is one.
Therefore, the Pope and I are one."
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...collected by Mic