Math Is Fun Forum

1. There were two men trying to decide what to do for a living. They went to see a counselor, and he decided that they had good problem solving skills.
He tried a test to narrow the area of specialty. He put each man in a room with a stove, a table, and a pot of water on the table. He said "Boil the water". Both men moved the pot from the table to the stove and turned on the burner to boil the water. Next, he put them into a room with a stove, a table, and a pot of water on the floor. Again, he said "Boil the water". The first man put the pot on the stove and turned on the burner. The counselor told him to be an Engineer, because he could solve each problem individually. The second man moved the pot from the floor to the table, and then moved the pot from the table to the stove and turned on the burner. The counselor told him to be a mathematician because he reduced the problem to a previously solved problem. 
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2. A somewhat advanced society has figured how to package basic knowledge in pill form.
A student, needing some learning, goes to the pharmacy and asks what kind of knowledge pills are available. The pharmacist says "Here's a pill for English literature." The student takes the pill and swallows it and has new knowledge about English literature!

"What else do you have?" asks the student.

"Well, I have pills for art history, biology, and world history," replies the pharmacist.

The student asks for these, and swallows them and has new knowledge about those subjects.

Then the student asks, "Do you have a pill for math?"

The pharmacist says "Wait just a moment", and goes back into the storeroom and brings back a whopper of a pill and plunks it on the counter.

"I have to take that huge pill for math?" inquires the student.

The pharmacist replied "Well, you know math always was a little hard to swallow." 
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3. A Mathemetician (M) and an Engineer (E) attend a lecture by a Physicist. The topic concerns Kulza-Klein theories involving physical processes that occur in spaces with dimensions of 9, 12 and even higher. The M is sitting, clearly enjoying the lecture, while the E is frowning and looking generally confused and puzzled. By the end the E has a terrible headache. At the end, the M comments about the wonderful lecture.
E says "How do you understand this stuff?"
M: "I just visualize the process"
E: "How can you POSSIBLY visualize somrthing that occurs in 9-dimensional space?"
M: "Easy, first visualize it in N-dimensional space, then let N go to 9"
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4. There was once a very smart horse. Anything that was shown it, it mastered easily, until one day, its teachers tried to teach it about rectanguar coordinates and it couldn't understand them. All the horse's aquaintences and friends tried to figure out what was the matter and couldn't. Then a new guy (what the heck, a computer engineer) looked at the problem and said,
"Of course he can't do it. Why, you're putting Descartes before the horse!"