Hacker Perspective: Engineering + Nerd Entertainment

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Engineering Humor

Jokes

Understanding Engineers #1

Two engineering students were biking across a university campus when one said, "Where did you get such a great bike?"

The second engineer replied, "Well, I was walking along yesterday, minding my own business, when a beautiful woman rode up on this bike, threw it to the ground, took off all her clothes and said, "Take what you want."

The first engineer nodded approvingly and said, "Good choice: The clothes probably wouldn't have fit you anyway."

Understanding Engineers #2

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.

Understanding Engineers #3

A priest, a doctor, and an engineer were waiting one morning for a particularly slow group of golfers. The engineer fumed, "What's with those guys? We must have been waiting for fifteen minutes!"

The doctor chimed in, "I don't know, but I've never seen such inept golf!"

The priest said, "Here comes the greens-keeper. Let's have a word with him." He said, "Hello George, What's wrong with that group ahead of us? They're rather slow, aren't they?"

The greens-keeper replied, "Oh, yes. That's a group of blind firemen. They lost their sight saving our clubhouse from a fire last year, so we always let them play for free anytime!"

The group fell silent for a moment. The priest said, "That's so sad. I think I will say a special prayer for them tonight."

The doctor said, "Good idea. I'm going to contact my ophthalmologist colleague and see if there's anything she can do for them."

The engineer said, "Why can't they play at night?"

Understanding Engineers #4

What is the difference between mechanical engineers and civil engineers?

Mechanical engineers build weapons. Civil engineers build targets.

Understanding Engineers #5

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?"

Understanding Engineers #6

Three engineering students were gathered together discussing who must have designed the human body. One said, "It was a mechanical engineer. Just look at all the joints."

Another said, "No, it was an electrical engineer. The nervous system has many thousands of electrical connections."

The last one said, "No, actually it had to have been a civil engineer. Who else would run a toxic waste pipeline through a recreational area?"

Understanding Engineers #7

Normal people 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.

MIT Engineers believe that If it isn't broken, take it apart and fix it!

Understanding Engineers #8

An engineer was crossing a road one day, when a frog called out to him and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess." He bent over, picked up the frog, and put it in his pocket. The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me, I'll turn back into a beautiful princess and stay with you for one week."

The engineer took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it and returned it to the pocket.

The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a princess, I'll stay with you for one week and do anything you want."

Again, the engineer took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket.

Finally, the frog asked, "What is the matter? I've told you I'm a beautiful princess and that I'll stay with you for one week and do anything you want. Why won't you kiss me?"

The engineer said, "Look, I'm an engineer. I don't have time for a girlfriend, but a talking frog - now that's cool."
Understanding Engineers #9
An Engineer dies and goes to Hell. Dissatisfied with the level of comfort, he starts designing and building improvements. After a while, Hell has air conditioning, flush toilets and escalators. The engineer is a pretty popular guy.
 
One day God calls and asks Satan, "So, how's it going down there?" Satan says, "Hey things are going great. We've got air conditioning and flush toilets and escalators, and there's no telling what this engineer is going to come up with next."
 
God is horrified. "What? You've got an engineer? That's a mistake - he should never have gone down there! You know all engineers go to Heaven. Send him up here!"
 
Satan says, "No way. I like having an engineer on the staff. I'm keeping him."
 
God says, "Send him back up here or I'll sue."
 
"Yeah, right," Satan laughs, "and where are you going to get a lawyer?"

Dilbert

Searchable Dilbert.

"Look: Actual Code"
dilbert-1

"Spaghetti Logic"
dilbert-2

"When I Started Programming..."
dilbert-3

Dilbert's "Salary Theorem"

"Engineers and scientists can never earn as much as business executives and sales people."

This theorem can now be supported by mathematics as follows:

steps datum notes
Postulate 1: Knowledge is Power  
Postulate 2: Time is Money  
As every engineer knows: Power = Work / Time  
Since: Knowledge = Power from postulate 1
And: Time = Money from postulate 2
Then: Knowledge = Work / Money  
After multipling both sides by money Money x Knowledge = Work Money cancelled on the right-hand side
After dividing both sides by knowledge Money = Work / Knowledge Knowledge cancelled on the left-hand side

Analysis: As knowledge approaches zero, Money approaches infinity, regardless of the amount of work done.

Conclusion: The less you know, the more money you make. (ask any CEO or MBA)

Women (As Explained by Engineers)

Part I

engineer-part1

Part II

engineer-part2

Part III

engineer-part3

Part IV

engineer-part4

Part V

engineer-part5

The IT Crowd

Art imitates life

Sonny: I just might get to like this place. Let's see if the Braves are on. How do you turn on this here teevee?
Riker: Teevee?
Sonny: Yeah, boob-tube... you know. I'd like to find out how the Braves are doin' after all this time. Probably still finding ways to lose.
Data to Riker: Oh -- I think he means television, sir.
Sonny: Or maybe catch up on the soaps.
Data to Sonny: That particular form of entertainment did not last much beyond the year Two Thousand Forty.
 
Reference: STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - Episode 126 - Titled: "The Neutral Zone"
Reality: The death of television begins before 2000 when the networks decided to replace programs based upon "professional writing and acting" with "so-called Reality TV"
I have always been a life-long fan of the whole Star Trek genre, and own a laminated poster titled "Everything I've Ever Learned in Life, I learned from Star Trek".  However, I always found it absurd that "individual Borg ignored humans walking around the Borg ship". One comic-book level explanation involves Borg drones being preoccupied by the conversations as part of the "Borg hive mind".

Last week (2023-11-17) I noticed a lot of people at the local gym wasting time while exercising their thumbs on smart phones. I needed to get on a machine that was occupied by a thumber, so I asked him if I could do a quick set in between his. This guy was so lost in cyberspace that he didn't hear my request, and didn't respond until I started some hand waving in his field of view. And that's when it hit me: People on social media are part of some sort of human hive mind (incredibly dumbed-down)

Sherlock Holmes

HolmesMany people are not aware of the best reincarnation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's most famous character. Starting in 1984, Granada Television in the UK spent an enormous amount of money to recreate a section of London England (circa 1895-1905) right down to the carriages, gas lanterns, and costumes. They only used stories by Doyle so you won't find Holmes fighting the Nazi's as we have seen in other incarnations from Hollywood. Jeremy Brett plays Holmes and is the most believable of all to date. Granada even goes so far as to end certain scenes with the actors standing in the same positions as the illustrations as originally published in The Strand Magazine. The series is always running on PBS in North America and you can now purchase all 41-episodes as part of a DVD collection.

Music

Spirits In The Material World -  The Police (Ghosts in the Machine)

There is no political solution
To our troubled evolution
Have no faith in constitution
There is no bloody revolution

We are spirits in the material world

Our so-called leaders speak
With words they try to jail you
They subjugate the meek
But it's the rhetoric of failure

We are spirits in the material world

Where does the answer lie?
Living from day to day
If it's something we can't buy
There must be another way

We are spirits in the material world
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Neil Rieck
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.