{jokes} Physics Jokes

[tezuka87]

Here's a good one:

The following concerns a question in a physics degree exam at the University of Copenhagen:

"Describe how to determine the height of a skyscraper with a barometer."

One student replied:

"You tie a long piece of string to the neck of the barometer, then lower the barometer from the roof of the skyscraper to the ground. The length of the string plus the length of the barometer will equal the height of the building."

This highly original answer so incensed the examiner that the student was failed immediately. He appealed on the grounds that his answer was indisputably correct, and the university appointed an independent arbiter to decide the case. The arbiter judged that the answer was indeed correct, but did not display any noticeable knowledge of physics. To resolve the problem it was decided to call the student in and allow him six minutes in which to provide a verbal answer which showed at least a minimal familiarity with the basic principles of physics. For five minutes the student sat in silence, forehead creased in thought. The arbiter reminded him that time was running out, to which the student replied that he had several extremely relevant answers, but couldn't make up his mind which to use. On being advised to hurry up the student replied as follows:

"Firstly, you could take the barometer up to the roof of the skyscraper, drop it over the edge, and measure the time it takes to reach the ground. The height of the building can then be worked out from the formula H = 0.5g x t squared. But bad luck on the barometer.

"Or if the sun is shining you could measure the height of the barometer, then set it on end and measure the length of its shadow. Then you measure the length of the skyscraper's shadow, and thereafter it is a simple matter of proportional arithmetic to work out the height of the skyscraper.

"But if you wanted to be highly scientific about it, you could tie a short piece of string to the barometer and swing it like a pendulum, first at ground level and then on the roof of the skyscraper. The height is worked out by the difference in the gravitational restoring force T = 2 pi sqrroot (l/g).

"Or if the skyscraper has an outside emergency staircase, it would be easier to walk up it and mark off the height of the skyscraper in barometer lengths, then add them up.

"If you merely wanted to be boring and orthodox about it, of course, you could use the barometer to measure the air pressure on the roof of the skyscraper and on the ground, and convert the difference in millibars into feet to give the height of the building.

But since we are constantly being exhorted to exercise independence of mind and apply scientific methods, undoubtedly the best way would be to knock on the janitor's door and say to him 'If you would like a nice new barometer, I will give you this one if you tell me the height of this skyscraper'."

The student was Neils Bohr, the first Dane to win the Nobel prize for Physics.

Any more Physics jokes to share? Bet there are plenty more.... :)
Maybe physics isn't that horrible a subject, eh... :D

[tezuka87]

"Theory is when you know how it works but it still doesn't. Practice is when it works but you don't know why. In the Department of Physics, theory and practice are joined together: nothing works and no one knows why!"


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At the physics exam: 'Describe the universe in 200 words and give three examples.'


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The experimentalist comes running excitedly into the theorist's office, waving a graph taken off his latest experiment. 'Hmmm,' says the theorist, 'That's exactly where you'd expect to see that peak. Here's the reason (long logical explanation follows).' In the middle of it, the experimentalist says 'Wait a minute', studies the chart for a second, and says, 'Oops, this is upside down.' He fixes it. 'Hmmm,' says the theorist, 'you'd expect to see a dip in exactly that position. Here's the reason...'.


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What is the difference between a physicist, an engineer, and a mathematician?

If an engineer walks into a room and sees a fire in the middle and a bucket of water in the corner, he takes the bucket of water and pours it on the fire and puts it out.

If a physicist walks into a room and sees a fire in the middle and a bucket of water in the corner, he takes the bucket of water and pours it eloquently around the fire and lets the fire put itself out.

If a mathematician walks into a room and sees a fire in the middle and a bucket of water in the corner, he convinces himself there is a solution and leaves.

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Why did the chicken cross the road?

Issac Newton: Chickens at rest tend to stay at rest, chickens in motion tend to cross roads.

Albert Einstein: Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed the chicken depends on your frame of reference.

Aristotle: It is the nature of chickens to cross roads.

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There is this farmer who is having problems with his chickens. All of the sudden, they are all getting very sick and he doesn't know what is wrong with them. After trying all conventional means, he calls a biologist, a chemist, and a physicist to see if they can figure out what is wrong. So the biologist looks at the chickens, examines them a bit, and says he has no clue what could be wrong with them. Then the chemist takes some tests and makes some measurements, but he can't come to any conclusions either. So the physicist tries. He stands there and looks at the chickens for a long time without touching them or anything. Then all of the sudden he starts scribbling away in a notebook. Finally, after several gruesome calculations, he exclaims, 'I've got it! But it only works for spherical chickens in a vacuum.'

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You enter the laboratory and see an experiment.
How will you know which class is it?
If it's green and wiggles, it's biology.
If it stinks, it's chemistry.
If it doesn't work, it's physics.

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Q: How many theoretical physicists specializing in general relativity does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Two. One to hold the bulb and one to rotate the universe.







[/b]

[tezuka87]

Q: What is the difference between Mechanical Engineers and Civil Engineers?
A: Mechanical Engineers build weapons, Civil Engineers build targets.


The graduate with a Science degree asks, "Why does it work?"
The graduate with an Engineering degree asks, "How does it work?"
The graduate with an Accounting degree asks, "How much will it cost?"
The graduate with an Arts degree asks, "Do you want fries with that?"


To the optimist, the glass is half full.
To the pessimist, the glass is half empty.
To the engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.


Q: How do you drive an engineer completely insane?
A: Tie him to a chair, stand in front of him, and fold up a road map the wrong way.


Q: When does a person decide to become an engineer?
A: When he realizes he doesn't have the charisma to be an undertaker.


Q: What do engineers use for birth control?
A: Their personalities.


Q: How can you tell an extroverted engineer?
A: When he talks to you, he looks at your shoes instead of his own.


Q: Why did the engineers cross the road?
A: Because they looked in the file, and that's what they did last year.


There was an engineer who had an exceptional gift for fixing all things mechanical. After serving his company loyally for over 30 years, he happily retired. Several years later his company contacted him regarding a seemingly impossible problem they were having with one of their multi-million dollar machines. They had tried everything and everyone else to get the machine fixed, but to no avail. In desperation, they called on the retired engineer who had solved so many of their problems in the past.

The engineer reluctantly took the challenge. He spent a day studying the huge machine. At the end of the day he marked an "x" in chalk on a particular component of the machine and proudly stated, "This is where your problem is." The part was replaced and the machine worked perfectly again.

The company received a bill for $50,000 from the engineer for his services. They demanded an itemized accounting of his charges. The engineer responded briefly:

One chalk mark..................$1

Knowing where to put it.........$49,999

It was paid in full and the engineer retired in peace.


A programmer had been missing from work for over a week when finally someone noticed and called the cops. They went round to his flat and broke down the door. They found him dead in the still running shower with an empty bottle of shampoo next to his body. Apparently he'd been washing his hair.

The instructions on the bottle said:

1. Wet hair
2. Apply shampoo
3. Lather
4. Rinse
5. Repeat


The Top 10 Things Engineering School didn't teach

10. There are at least 10 types of capacitors.
9. Theory tells you how a circuit works, not why it does not work.
8. Not everything works according to the specs in the databook.
7. Anything practical you learn will be obsolete before you use it, except the complex math, which you will never use.
6. Always try to fix the hardware with software.
5. Engineering is like having an 8 a.m. class and a late afternoon lab every day for the rest of your life.
4. Overtime pay? What overtime pay?
3. Managers, not engineers, rule the world.
2. If you like junk food, caffeine and all-nighters, go into software.
1. Dilbert is a documentary.

[tezuka87]

You might be an engineer if . . .

. . . you have no life and can prove it mathematically.

. . . you enjoy pain.

. . . you know vector calculus but you can't remember how to do long division.

. . . you chuckle whenever anyone says 'centrifugal force'.

. . . you've actually ever used every single function on your graphing calculator.

. . . when you look in the mirror, you see an engineering major.

. . . it is sunny and 70 degrees outside, and you are working on a computer.

. . . you frequently whistle the theme song to 'MacGyver'.

. . . you always do homework on Friday nights.

. . . you know how to integrate a chicken and can take the derivative of water.

. . . you think in 'math'.

. . . you've calculated that the World Series actually diverges.

. . . you hesitate to look at something because you don't want to break down its wave function.

. . . you have a pet named after a scientist.

. . . you laugh at jokes about mathematicians.

. . . the Humane Society has had you arrested because you actually performed the Schroedinger's Cat Experiment.

. . . you can translate English into Binary.

. . . you can't remember what's behind the door in the science building which says "Exit".

. . . you have to bring a jacket with you, in the middle of summer, because there's a wind-chill factor in the lab.

. . . you are completely addicted to caffeine.

. . . you avoid doing anything because you don't want to contribute to the eventual heat-death of the universe.

. . . you consider any non-science course 'easy'.

. . . when your professor asks you where your homework is, you claim to have accidentally determined its momentum so precisely, that according to Heisenberg it could be anywhere in the universe.

. . . the 'fun' center of your brain has deteriorated from lack of use.

. . . you'll assume that a 'horse' is a 'sphere' in order to make the math easier.

. . . you understood more than five of these indicators.

. . . you make a hard copy of this list and post it on your office door.

. . . you think it might be a neat idea to send this message to all of your friends in the form of email.

. . . you know the glass is neither half full nor half empty; it's simply twice as big as it needs to be.

[tezuka87]

Comprehending Computer Scientists-Take One

Several professors were asked to solve the following problem: "Prove that all odd integers are prime."

Mathematician: 3 is a prime, 5 is a prime, 7 is a prime, 9 is not a prime - counter-example - claim is false.

Physicist: 3 is a prime, 5 is a prime, 7 is a prime, 9 is an experimental error, 11 is a prime ...

Engineer: 3 is a prime, 5 is a prime, 7 is a prime, 9 is a prime, 11 is a prime ...

Computer Scientist: 3's a prime, 5's a prime, 7's a prime ... segmentation fault

[bluez_aspic]

Sex life of an electron:

One night when his charge was at full capacity, Micro Farad decided to get a cute little coil to discharge him. He picked up Millie Amp and took her for a ride on his megacycle. They rode across the wheat stone bridge, around the sine wave, and into the magnetic field next to the flowing current.

Micro Farad, attracted by Millie's characteristic curve, soon had her field fully excited. He laid her on the ground potential, raised her frequency, lowered her resistance, and pulled out his high voltage probe. He inserted it in parallel and began to short circuit her shunt. Fully excited, Millie cried out, "ohm, ohm, give me mho". With his tube at maximum output and her coil vibrating from the current flow, her shunt soon reached maximum heat. The excessive current had shorted her shunt, and Micro's capacity was rapidly discharged, and every electron was drained off. They fluxed all night, tried various connections and hookings until his bar magnet had lost all of its strength, and he could no longer generate enough voltage to sustain his collapsing field. With his battery fully discharged, Micro was unable to excite his tickler, so they ended up reversing polarity and blowing each other's fuses.

[tezuka87]

Dr. Schlambaugh, a senior lecturer at the Chemical Engineering Department,University of Oklahoma, is known for posing questions on final exams like: "Why do airplanes fly?"

In May a few years ago, the "Momentum, Heat and Mass Transfer " exam paper contained the question:

"Is Hell exothermic or endothermic? Support your answer with proof."

Most students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law or similar. One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we must postulate that if souls exist, they must have some mass. If they do, then a mole of souls also must have a mass. So, at what rate are souls moving into hell and at what rate are souls leaving? I think we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it does not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving.

As for souls entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Some religions say that if you
are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there are more than
one of these religions, and people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all people and all souls go to
Hell. With the birth and death rates what they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change in the volume of Hell. Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the ratio of the mass of the souls and volume needs to stay constant.

[Answer 1] So, if Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature in Hell willincrease until all Hell breaks loose.

[Answer 2] Of course, if Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase in souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure
will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it? If we accept the postulate (given to me by Teresa Banyan during freshman year) that "it'll be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you", and taking into account that I still have not succeeded in having sexual relations with her, then [Answer 2] cannot be correct;
...... thus, Hell is exothermic.

The student got the only A.

[tezuka87]

A mathematician, a physicist and an engineer were each given the following problem to solve.

A school dance floor included a straight line down the middle dividing the floor in two equal halves. Boys were lined up against one wall and girls against the opposite wall, each facing the centre line. They were instructed to advance in stages towards the centre line every ten seconds, where the distance from the person to the centre line at each stage is equal to one-half the distance at the past stage.

i.e.: If the starting distance from the wall to centre line was D, the progressive series of distances at t = 0, 10 seconds, 20 seconds...10n seconds to the centre line is (D, D/2, D/4, D/8, .....D/2n)

The question is, when will they meet at the middle?

The mathematician said that they would never meet.

The physicist said they would meet when time equals infinity.

The engineer said that in one minute they would be close enough for all practical purposes.

[tezuka87]

A physics professor at a state university in Michigan was famous for his animated lectures. He was short and thin with wild white hair and an excited expression. In lecture he would through himself from the
top of desks and throw frisbees to students in the back row to illustrate various principles.

One day in class he was spinning on an office chair holding weights in each hand when he lost his balance and tumbled into the first row.

He apologized to his class for going off on a tangent.

[tezuka87]

Three men: a project manager, a software engineer, and a hardware engineer are helping out on a project. About midweek they decide to walk up and down the beach during their lunch hour. Halfway up the beach, they stumbled upon a lamp. As they rub the lamp a genie appears and says "Normally I would grant you three wishes, but since there are three of you, I will grant you each one wish."

The hardware engineer went first. "I would like to spend the rest of my life living in a huge house in St. Thomas with no money worries." The genie granted him his wish and sent him on off to St. Thomas.

The software engineer went next. "I would like to spend the rest of my life living on a huge yacht cruising the Mediterranean with no money worries." The genie granted him his wish and sent him off to the Mediterranean.

Last, but not least, it was the project manager's turn. "And what would your wish be?" asked the genie.

"I want them both back after lunch" replied the project manager.



A mathmatician, a physicist, and an engineer were all given a red rubber ball and told to find the volume.
The mathmatician carefully measured the diameter and evaluated a triple integral.
The physicist filled a beaker with water, put the ball in the water, and measured the total displacement.
The engineer looked up the model and serial numbers in his red-rubber-ball table.

[tezuka87]

During the heat of the space race in the 1960's, NASA decided it needed a ball point pen to write in the zero gravity confines of its space capsules.

After considerable research and development, the Astronaut Pen was developed at a cost of $1 million. The pen worked and also enjoyed some modest success as a novelty item back here on earth.

The Soviet Union, faced with the same problem, used a pencil.

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An engineer, a mathmatician and an arts graduate were given the task of finding the height of a church steeple (the first to get the correct solution wins a $1000).

The engineer tried to remember things about differential pressures, but resorted to climbing the steeple and lowering a string on a plumb bob until it touched the ground and then climbed down and measured the length of the string.

The Mathematician layed out a reference line, measured the angle to the top of the steeple from both ends and worked out the height by trigonometry.

However, the arts graduate won the prize. He bought the vicar a beer in the local pub and he told him how high the church steeple was.

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An engineering student is walking along when a fellow student arrives on a new bicycle. Impressed, he asks, "Where did you got this beautiful bicycle?"

"Well," the second engineering student says, "A couple of days ago I was just walking along when this georgeous blonde pulls up, hops off the bike, rips off all her clothes, and says 'take what you want'."

The other engineering student nods and says "Good choice. The clothes probably wouldn't have fit."

Three freshman engineering students were sitting around talking between classes, when one brought up the question of who designed the human body.

One of the students insisted that the human body must have been designed by an electrical engineer because of the perfection of the nerves and synapses.

Another disagreed, and exclaimed that it had to have been a mechanical engineer who designed the human body. The system of levers and pullies is ingeniuos.

"No," the third student said "your both wrong. The human body was designed by an architect. Who else but an architect would have put a toxic waste line through a recreation area?"

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The physician can bury his mistakes, but the architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.
Frank Lloyd Wright


Doctors bury their mistakes, architects just plant ivy.
A shorter version of the same saying


Lawyers hang their blunders, doctors bury theirs, architects plant vines and teachers send theirs into politics.
A longer version of the same saying

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Real Engineers consider themselves well dressed if their socks match.
Real Engineers buy their spouses a set of matched screwdrivers for their birthday.
Real engineers have a non-technical vocabulary of 800 words.
Real Engineers repair their own cameras, telephones, televisions, watches, and automatic transmissions.
Real Engineers say "It's 70 degrees Fahrenheit, 25 degrees Celsius, and 298 Kelvin" and all you say is "Isn't it a nice day?"
Real Engineers wear badges so they don't forget who they are. Sometimes a note is attached saying "Don't offer me a ride today. I drove my own car".
Real Engineers' politics run towards acquiring a parking space with their name on it and an office with a window.
Real Engineers know the "ABC's of Infrared" from A to B.
Real Engineers know how to take the cover off of their computer, and are not afraid to do it.
Real Engineers' briefcases contain a Phillips screwdriver, a copy of "Quantum Physics", and a half of a peanut butter sandwich.
Real Engineers don't find the above at all funny.

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[tezuka87]

The Dictionary: what engineers say and what they mean by it

Major Technological Breakthrough
Back to the drawing board.

Developed after years of intensive research
It was discovered by accident.

The designs are well within allowable limits
We just made it, stretching a point or two.

Test results were extremely gratifying
It works, and are we surprised!

Customer satisfaction is believed assured
We are so far behind schedule that the customer was happy to get anything at all.

Close project coordination
We should have asked someone else; or, let's spread the responsibility for this.

Project slightly behind original schedule due to unforeseen difficulties
We are working on something else.

The design will be finalized in the next reporting period
We haven't started this job yet, but we've got to say something.

A number of different approaches are being tried
We don't know where we're going, but we're moving.

Extensive effort is being applied on a fresh approach to the problem
We just hired three new guys; we'll let them kick it around for a while.

Preliminary operational tests are inconclusive
The darn thing blew up when we threw the switch.

The entire concept will have to be abandoned
The only guy who understood the thing quit.

Modifications are underway to correct certain minor difficulties
We threw the whole thing out and are starting from scratch.

Essentially complete.
Half done.

Drawing release is lagging.
Not a single drawing exists.

Risk is high, but acceptable.
100 to 1 odds, or with 10 times the budget and 10 times the manpower, we may
have a 50/50 chance.

Serious, but not insurmountables, problems.
It will take a miracle.

Not well defined.
Nobody has thought about it.

Requires further analysis and management attention.
Totally out of control.

The project is designed for high availability.
Malfunctions will be blamed on the operators mistakes.

This project has low maintenance requirements.
We wouldn't let the technicians change a light bulb, much less fool around with our baby.

The software is being developed without excessive process overhead.
The documentation will be written in clear and lucid Chinese.

The delivery is scheduled for the last quater of next year.
This leaves us plenty of time to decide who to blame for it being late.

[tezuka87]

You Might Be an Engineer if...

*
your favorite James Bond character is "Q".
*
you see a good design and still have to change it.
*
you still own a slide rule and you know how to use it.
*
your family haven't the foggiest idea what you do at work.
*
in college you thought Spring Break was metal fatigue failure.
*
you have modified your can-opener to be microprocessor driven.
*
you are better with a Karnaugh map than you are with a street map.
*
you think the real heroes of "Apollo 13" were the mission controllers.
*
you take a cruise so you can go on a personal tour of the engine room.
*
* you think "cuddling" is simply an unproductive application of heat exchange
you have owned a calculator with no equal key and know what RPN stands for.
*
you make four sets of drawings (with seven revisions) before making a bird bath.
*
you have trouble writing anything unless the paper has horizontal and vertical lines.
*
your ideal evening consists of fast-forwarding through the latest sci-fi movie looking for technical inaccuracies.
*
you think the value of a book is directly proportionate to the amount of tables, charts and graphs it contains.

[tezuka87]

How many first year engineering students does it take to change a light bulb?
None. That's a second year subject.

How many second year engineering students does it take to change a light bulb?
One, but the rest of the class copies the report.

How many third year engineering students does it take to change a light bulb?
"Will this question be in the final examination?"

How many civil engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
Two. One to do it and one to steady the chandelier.

How many electrical engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
None. They simply redefine darkness as the industry standard.

How many computer engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
"Why bother? The socket will be obsolete in six months anyway."

How many mechanical engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
Five. One to decide which way the bulb ought to turn, one to calculate the force required, one to design a tool with which to turn the bulb, one to design a comfortable - but functional - hand grip, and one to use all this equipment.

How many nuclear engineers does it take to change a light bulb?
Seven. One to install the new bulb and six to figure out what to do with the old one for the next 10,000 years.

[tezuka87]

So a mathematician, an engineer, and a physicist are out hunting
together. They spy a deer in the woods.

The physicist calculates the velocity of the deer and the effect of
gravity on the bullet, aims his rifle and fires. Alas, he misses; the
bullet passes three feet behind the deer. The deer bolts some yards,
but comes to a halt, still within sight of the trio.

"Shame you missed," comments the engineer, "but of course with an
ordinary gun, one would expect that." He then levels his special
deer-hunting gun, which he rigged together from an ordinary rifle, a
sextant, a compass, a barometer, and a bunch of flashing lights which
don't do anything but impress onlookers, and fires. Alas, his bullet
passes three feet in front of the deer, who by this time wises up and
vanishes for good.

"Well," says the physicist, "your contraption didn't get it either."

"What do you mean?" pipes up the mathematician. "Between the two of
you, that was a perfect shot!"

How they knew it was a deer:

The physicist observed that it behaved in a deer-like manner, so it
must be a deer.

The mathematician asked the physicist what it was, thereby reducing it
to a previously solved problem.

The engineer was in the woods to hunt deer, therefore it was a deer.