Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Salvador Mirzo Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: education Date: Fri, 14 Mar 2025 11:17:53 -0300 Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Lines: 71 Message-ID: <87ikobu25q.fsf@example.com> References: <67b21894$14$17$882e4bbb@reader.netnews.com> <67b4fc88@news.ausics.net> <67b659f8@news.ausics.net> <87mseggwo1.fsf@example.com> <87frk8gwji.fsf@example.com> <05f9e6d7-ae71-d73e-9244-2638790780ef@example.net> <87tt8odsb7.fsf@example.com> <1b411147-a833-8c73-2d85-e5c749fc23b9@example.net> <87ikp03y4r.fsf@example.com> <874j04fia3.fsf@example.com> <83pEKU9qRrJ2uBIl@violet.siamics.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Injection-Date: Fri, 14 Mar 2025 15:18:00 +0100 (CET) Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="e27d3930ac1ea8ac8b29e9183fdd47e4"; logging-data="1543582"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX182Fa4B4hWC1XDtCT/pQGFRPU+aYEqe7FQ=" Cancel-Lock: sha1:D4zRf2fH+Nb110a+Bp5gknsVH+Q= sha1:xjPW3qLuwTkGLLi9k+Blye3CDpc= Xref: csiph.com comp.misc:26900 Ivan Shmakov writes: >>>>>> On 2025-03-08, Rich wrote: >>>>>> Salvador Mirzo wrote: >>>>>> Ivan Shmakov writes: > > >>> http://web.archive.org/web/20190622112330/ > >>> http://www.math.ttu.edu/~pearce/jokes1/joke-086.html > > >> Lol. I don’t get the joke. What’s up with the joke? I’m slow. The > >> waitress has a hard-science college degree but can’t get a job in her > >> field? That’s not a joke. I don’t get the joke. Please explain? :) > > The joke didn’t seem obscure to any degree to me, TBH, not > requiring much context aside basic calculus knowledge, which > is something I think anyone interested in CS should posess. > > Quite unlike, say, “For the umpteenth time, Sam! It’s not > Palantír, it’s Pentium!” Or “Lysenko’s own arrogance was his > undoing: he climbed a pine tree to gather apples, and was killed > when ripe coconuts fell from it.” > > > The joke is that the second mathematician, who should know better, > > gave the waitress the wrong answer to repeat. > > > The waitress pretends to be dumb when he gives her what will be the > > wrong answer to his question. > > > Then, when he asks the question, she repeats his incorrect answer > > flawlessly, and adds in the correction he should have known himself. > > The way I read it, the waitress doesn’t know the question at > first, so cannot decide whether the answer she’s asked to give > is correct or not. Once she does, she adds the correction. > > > I. e., the joke is that the mathematicians were not quite as “smart” > > as they thought they were. > > There’s an added irony that even though the second mathematician > insisted that “most people can cope with a reasonable amount of > math,” he evidently didn’t quite believe it himself. > > A while ago, I’ve been told that a story like that happened at > the university I’ve graduated from. The students were spending > a break between classes outside, and so was one of the professors. > Hearing them complain of how hard their (fairly basic) math was, the > professor commented something along the lines of “that’s everyone’s > knowledge.” So, he called a guy loitering nearby who looked like > a common tramp and asked him to solve a simple algebra or calculus > problem; thinking for a bit, the guy gave the correct answer. > > (Or something like that; my recollection of it is rather vague.) > > What I take from the joke is: do not underestimate average Joe. > (Or Jane, as the case might be.) A sentiment that is also at > the core of G. K. Chesterton’s “The Trees of Pride”, > http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Trees_of_Pride . Thanks---I think that's the more sane interpretation of the joke. Don't underestimate people. Even though one of the mathematicians tacitly considered people more intellectually prepared than the other mathematician claimed, it seems both would be surprised with the answer. But, finally, I think the joke is pretty bad---unless we make the waitress into a joker herself. If she knows the antiderivative of x^2, she surely wouldn't have any trouble understanding the expression 1/3 x^3, violating the facts narrated in the joke. But if she's well-educated in the topic, she could easily come up with a joke herself on the spot. (And there's a statistician joke in here as well about sample size; and another about how fraud and corruption and so on. So, yeah, I think the joke is pretty bad.)