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81 Answers 81

a pure and applied mathematician were sitting in a bar, when they spotted a hot chick 2 meters away. However, this was a weird place where they could take one 1 meter step and each consecutive would have to be half of the length of the previous one.

The pure mathematician was sad because he knew he could never get to the girl. The applied one was happy because he knew that for all practical purposes he can get close enough.

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The pure mathematician knew he could make the time gap between each step also half of the previous, and get their in a finite amount of time. –  Steven Gubkin May 31 '11 at 12:51

A creation of my own:

Q:What did the simplicial set say to the fibrant replacement functor?

A:"Oh, I'm so horny..."

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Abstruse Goose is great for maths and physics jokes.

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I first heard this on an episode of the Big Bang Theory, I don't know the origin.

The physicist asks the mathematician: "Why did the chicken cross the road?"

The mathematician ponders a while and then replies: "I have a solution, but it only works for a spherical chicken in a vacuum."

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Q: What did the threefold blown up at two points say while waiting in a long line for a restroom?

A: I have to pee too.

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Posterior Analysis: when a statistician looks at the rear end of a member of the appropriate sex.

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Quite a few mathematics / academic jokes here.

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An infinite number of mathematicians walk into a bar. The first one orders a beer, the second one orders half a beer, the third one a quarter of beer and so on. After a while of this happening, the bartender says "Come on guys! So many people and not even a couple of beers??".

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Test to tell the difference between a Physicist or a Mathematician

Consider the following scenario: A room with a sink at the far end with a working cold water faucet plus a table with the following items on top – small bucket, ring stand, Bunsen burner, and a pack of matches. The problem is to boil water.

If the individual picks up the bucket from the table, walks to the sink and fills the bucket from the faucet, brings it back to the table, sets it on the ring stand, puts the Bunsen burner under the stand, and then lights the burner and waits for the water to boil … this establishes the base line but does not separate which it the Physicist and which is the Mathematician.

Test scenario 2: The bucket is now sitting on the floor under the table and the problem is again to boil water.

If the individual picks up the bucket from under the table, walks directly to the sink and fills the bucket from the faucet, brings it back to the table, sets it on the ring stand, puts the Bunsen burner under the stand, and then lights the burner and waits for the water to boil … this proves that this individual is the Physicist.

However, if the individual picks up the bucket from under the table and places it back on top of the table thus reducing the current problem to a form that they have previously solved … this proves that this individual is the Mathematician.

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For actual humour, rather than simply bad puns, I recommend the books:

  • A Random Walk in Science
  • More Random Walks in Science

As well as the odd bad pun, they also contain many anecdotes demonstrating that scientists (and mathematicians) are also human. A few that have stuck in my memory: just about every "mathematics of big game hunting" method, the various "proof by ...", a (genuine!) article co-authored by a cat, and a disturbing article on refereemanship.

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Check out the book 777 Mathematical Conversation Starters by John de Pillis. The subject of the book is mathematics topics to talk about, but it is also full of interesting quotes, jokes, and cartoons.

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In a math party, all were having a good time. y was the dj, everybody was Riemmanly drunk. Then, when the x saw e^x on a corner crying, he asked: - Hey e^x, why don't you integrate ? - Because I keep always the same!!!

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Ugh, why aren't these posted yet:




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If we can formalize the property of "being a good math joke" good enough to construct a Turing Machine that checks it, then I think we can conclude they don't exist.

The reason is that in that case we can construct a Turing Machine (say of length N) that checks each possible string, and stops only if a good math joke was found. The busy beaver function on N establishes an upper bound for the number of strings the machine needs to check until we can conclude that it wouldn't halt (and therefore no good math jokes exist).

Based on empirical evidence, it may be possible that all those cases have already been checked (with negative answer), which implies my thesis.

(I'm being ironical, I like much of the jokes posted in here :P)

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His reply, "It's 1-x."

-William Mauritzen

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After a 1-dimensional collapse, what did the 1-simplex show that new chick from logistics?

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Q: What's purple and commutes? A: An abelian grape!

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The answer to the question posed in the title "Do Good Math Jokes Exist" is yes and is easily found on google.

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12 ? The least integer that symbolizes all integers just by itself. Successors: 123, 1234...

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