Sunday, April 27, 2008

The difference between a mathematician and an engineer

An old joke I learned at MIT. Told the way that I first learned it, back in the day when all mathematicians and engineers were assumed to be heterosexual men. You can retell it this way, or update it politically correct.

The story:
A mathematician and and engineer were put at the end of a long room. At the opposite end of the room was a beautiful naked woman. [PC version: one or more beautiful naked person of the desired sex and sexual orientation to make achieving the below-stated goal attractive to both the engineer and mathematician . Whatever. They were both hetero males and it was a naked broad. Probably blond in the original telling.]

They were told the rules. "You walk half way across the room. Then stop. Then half the remaining distance. Then stop. And so on."

The mathematician started to cry. "This is terrible," he said. [It was a he.] I'll never get there."

The engineer smiled. "Yes," he said, "but I'll get close enough."

No comments: