Collage 292               H u m o u r N e t                4 SEP 96

On a mailing list this size, not every Collage is going to appeal to
every subscriber. But the ones that seem to appeal to the fewest
people are my "geek humor" Collages. (Even political humor probably
enjoys a broader appeal.) Nevertheless, they are so thoroughly loved
by the geeks in the audience that they've become a mainstay of
HumourNet. Alas, the moderator has no choice but to accommodate the
vocal minority ...

("And your moderator, being such a happy geek, is a piece of cake.")

And when I say "minority," I mean *MINORITY*. There are painfully
few people out there who really understand geekdom -- especially
geek employment. It's so bad that smart geeks know better than to
even *discuss* their jobs, for fear of having to perform emergency
resuscitation on anyone within earshot.

Not a problem, though -- the *creative* ones simply make up other,
more interesting lines of work. Ideally, these lines of work are
tailored to the audience. For example, there's no sense in trying to
explain the fundamentals of foliage-penetrating radar to members of
the college field-hockey team. No, it's much better, in that
particular case, to be a gynecologist for the FBI.

(You're probably starting to see how I get myself into trouble....)

Well, I'm not the only one who gets creative when the field hockey
team (or gymnastics team or what have you) shows up at the local bar.
And, to illustrate this, Jon in Rockford, Illinois, sent me the
following excerpt from a thread that surfaced on a graphic-design
list to which he subscribes; since the conversation evolves in a
nice, simple fashion, I'll just label the speakers A, B, and C:

A: When in conversation with a stranger, how do you explain what you
A: do in a single sentence?

B: It takes so long for me to really describe all the aspects of my
B: work [that] I can even bore myself sometimes.
B: I usually reply, "I sing in a band."
B: The conversation gets much funnier that way.

C: ...I've built up a repertoire of such answers:
C:
C: I'm an Elvis impersonator.
C: I'm an otter trainer.
C: I rob gas stations, liquor stores, that sort of thing.
C: I'm between jobs.
C: Well right now, I'm the dictator of a small South American
C: country, but soon I'll control all of Latin America and then the
C: Western hemisphere and then -- I'LL RULE THE WORLD! [maniacal
C: laughter]
C:
C: (Just the ones I use most often.)

Note how it's easier to develop a more-or-less normal conversation
as the maniacal dictator of a small South American (or Latin
American) country than it is to explain that you're a graphic
designer (or engineer or, for that gymnastics team, really anything
that requires at least a two-year degree) (not that I'm not being
critical, mind you -- they still look awfully cute as they bounce
across the floor). In other words, Manuel Noriega probably has an
easier time meeting members of the field-hockey team than, say, the
average mechanical-engineering major. And Noriega's serving 40 years
for drug trafficking. (Come to think of it, he probably has a *much*
easier time of it.)

OTOH, it's a well-established fact that MEs have very underdeveloped
conversational skills ... ;-)

BTW, my own personal favorite out of that list is "otter trainer";
not because it's the one I use most often, but because I think it's
the only one I *haven't* used [yet].

There are very good reasons why we need to do this -- probably the
single most convincing is that, quite simply, no one is interested
in geek employment. As "B" noted, above, it's so boring, even *we're*
not interested.

But that's not the worst of it. No, the worst is *geek humor*.
Boring jobs aside, your standard geek (yes, that'd be ANSI standard)
can't resist an opportunity to make a comment that only another geek
would understand -- much less find *amusing*.

Among geeks, it's more than just sport; it's religion.

And, hence, the geek-humor Collages. And the follow-up comments
that they [unfortunately ;-)] generate ...

Collage 279 (the most recent "Geeks!" Collage) contained the
following piece:

     ... Engineers like to solve problems. If there are no
     problems handily available, they will create their own
     problems. Normal people don't understand this concept;
     they believe that if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
     Engineers believe that if it ain't broke, it doesn't have
     enough features yet.

Marc (in Maryland) felt compelled to clarify this a little:

     Actually, if it ain't broke, we need to take it apart to
     find out why.

Which, of course, also applies to things that *are* broken -- hence,
the engineer's proclivity for disassembling virtually everything in
sight. It's genetic -- that is, *geek* genetics.

And so, we come to probably the single geekiest of all the geek-humor
Collages I've ever produced -- and all with thanks to:

Richard in Phoenix, Arizona, for "Math Riots Prove Fun Incalculable";

Jerry in Bellevue, Washington, for "A Modest Proposal";

and Umid in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, for "Career Choices,"
"Engineers, Scientists, and Mathematicians, Take One," and
"... Take Two."

Huge thanks to all the guilty parties. Here's one for the geek
history books ...

Enjoy! (But if you do, don't admit it to anyone. ;-)

- Vince Sabio
  HumourNet Moderator
  HumourNet@telephonet.com
____________________________________________________________________
          Opener (above) Copyright 1996 by Vincent Sabio
  Permission is hereby granted to forward or post this "Collage";
  please observe the guidelines stated at the end of the message.
____________________________________________________________________

SUBJ: Math Riots Prove Fun Incalculable
By Eric Zorn
(The following column appeared in the Chicago Tribune/DuPage County
edition, Tuesday June 29 1993 page 2-1)

News Item (June 23) -- Mathematicians worldwide were excited and
pleased today by the announcement that Princeton University
professor Andrew Wiles had finally proved Fermat's Last Theorem, a
365-year-old problem said to be the most famous in the field.

Admittedly, there was rioting and vandalism last week during the
celebration. A few bookstores had windows smashed and shelves
stripped, and vacant lots glowed with burning piles of old
dissertations. But overall we can feel relief that it was nothing
-- nothing -- compared to the outbreak of exuberant thuggery that
occurred in 1984 after Louis DeBranges finally proved the Bieberbach
Conjecture.

"Math hooligans are the worst," said a Chicago Police Department
spokesman. "But the city learned from the Bieberbach riots. We
were ready for them this time."

When word hit Wednesday that Fermat's Last Theorem had fallen, a
massive show of force from law enforcement at universities all
around the country headed off a repeat of the festive looting sprees
that have become the traditional accompaniment to triumphant
breakthroughs in higher mathematics.

Mounted police throughout Hyde Park kept crowds of delirious wizards
at the University of Chicago from tipping over cars on the midway as
they first did in 1976 when Wolfgang Haken and Kenneth Appel cracked
the long-vexing Four-Color Problem. Incidents of textbook-throwing
and citizens being pulled from their cars and humiliated with
difficult story problems last week were described by the
university's math department chairman Bob Zimmer as "isolated."

Zimmer said, "Most of the celebrations were orderly and peaceful.
But there will always be a few -- usually graduate students -- who
use any excuse to cause trouble and steal. These are not true fans
of Andrew Wiles."

Wiles himself pleaded for calm even as he offered up the proof that
there is no solution to the equation x^n + y^n = z^n when n is a
whole number greater than two, as Pierre de Fermat first proposed in
the 17th Century. "Party hard but party safe," he said, echoing the
phrase he had repeated often in interviews with scholarly journals
as he came closer and closer to completing his proof.

Some authorities tried to blame the disorder on the provocative
taunting of Japanese mathematician Yoichi Miyaoka. Miyaoka thought
he had proved Fermat's Last Theorem in 1988, but his claims did not
bear up under the scrutiny of professional referees, leading some to
suspect that the fix was in. And ever since, as Wiles chipped away
steadily at the Fermat problem, Miyaoka scoffed that there would be
no reason to board up windows near universities any time soon; that
God wanted Miyaoka to prove it.

In a peculiar sidelight, Miyaoka recently took the trouble to secure
a U.S. trademark on the equation "x^n + y^n = z^n " as well as the
now-ubiquitous expression "Take that, Fermat!" Ironically, in
defeat, he stands to make a good deal of money on cap and T-shirt
sales.

This was no walk-in-the-park proof for Wiles. He was dogged, in the
early going, by sniping publicity that claimed he was seen puttering
late one night doing set theory in a New Jersey library when he
either should have been sleeping, critics said, or focusing on
arithmetic algebraic geometry for the proving work ahead.

"Set theory is my hobby, it helps me relax," was his angry
explanation. The next night, he channeled his fury and came up with
five critical steps in his proof. Not a record, but close.

There was talk that he thought he could do it all by himself,
especially when he candidly referred to University of California
mathematician Kenneth Ribet as part of his "supporting cast," when
most people in the field knew that without Ribet's 1986 proof
definitively linking the Taniyama Conjecture to Fermat's Last
Theorem, Wiles would be just another frustrated guy in a tweed
jacket teaching calculus to freshmen.

His travails made the ultimate victory that much more explosive for
math buffs. When the news arrived, many were already wired from
caffeine consumed at daily colloquial teas, and the took to the
streets en masse shouting, "Obvious! Yessss! It was obvious!"

The law cannot hope to stop such enthusiasm, only to control it.
Still, one has to wonder what the connection is between wanton
pillaging and a mathematical proof, no matter how long-awaited and
subtle.

The Victory Over Fermat rally, held on a cloudless day in front of a
crowd of 30,000 (police estimate: 150,000) was pleasantly peaceful.
Signs unfurled in the audience proclaimed Wiles the greatest
mathematician of all time, though partisans of Euclid, Descartes,
Newton, and C.F. Gauss and others argued the point vehemently.

A warm-up act, The Supertheorists, delighted the crowd with a ragged
song, "It Was Never Less Than Probable, My Friend," which included
such gloating, barbed verses as --- "I had a proof all ready / But
then I did a choke-a / Made liberal assumptions / Hi! I'm Yoichi
Miyaoka."

In the speeches from the stage, there was talk of a dynasty,
specifically that next year Wiles will crack the great unproven
Riemann Hypothesis ("Rie-peat! Rie-peat!" the crowd cried), and
that after the Prime-Pair Problem, the Goldbach Conjecture ("Minimum
Goldbach," said one T-shirt) and so on.

They couldn't just let him enjoy his proof. Not even for one day.
Math people. Go figure 'em.

[Editor's Note: I shudder to think of the day that the Unified Field
Theory finally coalesces ... </vs>]

========================[ H U M O U R N E T ]=======================

SUBJ: A Modest Proposal
By Shannon Weston, University of Washington
(Reprinted on HumourNet with [indirect] permission)

[Editor's Note: According to Jerry, who is a faculty member at UW,
Shannon is a real student, and actually submitted this letter to
his teaching assistant. Jerry and the TA agreed that Shannon should
probably be in the marketing program. Heh. And my professors said
that I should be in the English Department. Of course, it was only
the *engineering* professors who were saying that.... ;-) </vs>]

Dear Sir,

I am presently enrolled in three math courses, one of which is your
linear algebra class. Naturally, the generous helpings of weighty
concepts presented thrice weekly occupy much of my thoughts -- a
fact which, owing to several recent close calls at pedestrian
crossings, seemed to be something of a mixed blessing. That is,
until last weekend. At about 10 o'clock Sunday evening, as I was
struggling to smear a facade of rigor over my EE235 homework, it
suddenly occurred to me how many names are attached to the familiar
methods, functions, etc. of college mathematics.

By "names" of course I do not mean technical designations in
general, but actual human names. Consider for a moment the fact
that mundane mathematical methods of the sort that are ladled out
daily in high school are rarely, if ever, named. The common man, it
seems, would not tolerate the obstruction incurred by lugging around
five-syllable German family names for simple functions -- thus we
have the "sine" and not the "Hohenhelmwohler function". However,
once that unsuspecting citizen enters the halls of academe, shielded
from the prying eyes and tender sensibilities of the public, a
continuous acclimating process works on him with every math course
he takes until, only two years later, he is regularly exposed to and
blandly accepts from mathematicians brazen self-promotion of a
degree unheard of outside the rap music industry.

It is NOT my purpose to pronounce ethical judgments on my betters,
particularly when they are intellectuals of Gauss' or Dirac's
standing. Even geniuses are bound by the constraints of the flesh
-- they must eat, and in order to do so they must be able to market
their product. Therefore Gauss' name appears in my text for much
the same reason that Kalvin Klein's appears on the rumps of anorexic
models. It IS my purpose to call your attention to a significant
difference between the two gentlemen: Klein is alive and Gauss is
dead. He is dead and, to the best of my knowledge, neither he nor
his estate hold any legal claim to his functions, processes, proofs,
etc. Moreover, not only is Gauss dead, but so is Dirac, Fourier and
the rest -- all of the mathematical geniuses of our race have been
culled by the brutal hand of natural selection at traffic crossings
and the like, and all them before they had the chance to secure a
solid legal claim to so much as a hyperbolic trig function.

Sir, I submit to you that we are sitting on a gold mine. The
commercial opportunities at hand beggar the imagination. At any
given time tens of thousands of our nation's youth are obliged to
study mathematics. These are generally well financed, perhaps a
touch naive, and, to put it gently, more study math than want to.
We know their demographics and what they are inclined to buy. A
captive audience, more ripe for exploitation would be hard to
imagine. Picture the typical student, bent over his text for hours
at a time. Imagine the results if, instead of the old math, he was
staring at (your product here):

      BEFORE                     AFTER
  Gassian elimination        Guiness Stout Elimination(tm)
  eigenvalues                Fritovalues(tm)
  Wronskian determinants     Shaquillian Determinants(tm)
  L'Hopital's rule           Honda Rules(tm)
  improper integrals         Victoria's Secret Integrals(tm)
  Laplace transform          Lifestyles transform(tm)
  Nortan equivalent          No-Doz Equivalent(tm)

... and so on. Of course this is just the tip of the iceberg. How
much do you think McDonald's would pony up to get theta replaced
with the golden arches? If we make too much money, we can always
plow some of the math back as a tax shelter:

    Y = sin (official function of the '96 Olympics) X

I'm sure you are every bit as intrigued as I am. Think it over ...

[Editor's Note: Unconfirmed, unsubstantiated, and unreliable (and,
nevertheless, quoted here) rumor has it that this student failed the
math course, but passed the business course -- and later went on to
found a large software corporation somewhere in the northwestern
U.S.... ;-) </vs>]

========================[ H U M O U R N E T ]=======================

SUBJ: Career Choices

The graduate with a physics 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 a liberal arts degree asks, "Do you want fries
with that?"

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

SUBJ: Engineers, Scientists, and Mathematicians, Take One

Engineers think that equations approximate the real world.
Physicists think that the real world approximates equations.
Mathematicians are unable to make the connection ...

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

SUBJ: Engineers, Scientists, and Mathematicians, Take Two

An engineer, a physicist, and a mathematician are shown a pasture
with a herd of sheep, and told to put them inside the smallest
possible amount of fence.

The engineer is first. He herds the sheep into a circle and then
puts the fence around them, declaring, "A circle will use the least
fence for a given area, so this is the best solution."

The physicist is next. He creates a circular fence of infinite
radius around the sheep, and then draws the fence tight around the
herd, declaring, "This will give the smallest circular fence around
the herd."

The mathematician is last. After giving the problem a little
thought, he puts a small fence around himself and then declares, "I
define myself to be on the outside."

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