A curated collection of intellectual jokes that actually teach interesting ideas and make you think, not just rely on insider-jargon and smart-people stereotypes
The one about the mathematician's always been one of my favorites.
Reminds me of:
Three logicians walk into a bar.
The bartender asks: "Do you all want a drink?"
The first logician says: "I don't know."
The second logician says: "I don't know."
The third logician says: "Yes."
---
Also there's another variety type of boolean logic humor that I have _really_ enjoyed recently, though it's a bit less intellectual - laughing at ChatGPT's failure to answer boolean statements correctly.
The key is that the bartender is asking if ALL the logicians want a drink, so each logician considers what the others want as well as themselves.
If the first logician did NOT want a drink, then he could just answer no. But he does want a drink, and he doesn't know if the other two, so he says "I don't know."
Ditto for the second logician.
The third, having seen that the first two did not say "no", reasons that they must want drinks, and he too wants a drink, so he finally and he alone can say "yes".
Yeah this was in my shortlist of ~15 that I decided to not include in the top 9 list! (I originally wanted to make it a top 10 but couldn't decide between so many good ones!)
Another self-deprecating one I like, which I might be misremembering but whatever:
An experimental physicist, an engineer, a mathematician, and a philosopher sit at a bar. "Your job must be so hard", says the engineer to the experimental physicist, "you need to wait on results from an entire particle accelerator or whatever it is you use. I just need some good CAD software, a pen and paper, and a trash can for my mistakes."
"I can do you one better", says the mathematician, "all I need to do my job is a pen and paper, and a trash can."
"Are you kidding me?" says the philosopher, "all *I* need is a pen and paper!"
Undoubtedly, but it’s quite good with Sartre. Sartre writes about the illusion of choice, claiming that choice is inescapable. The waiter chooses to adhere to his philosophy, even though he does not need to
Okay, if my last one had too much wordplay, how about this one:
Three engineers—a structural engineer, an electrical engineer, and a civic engineer—are discussing theology. God, as the creator of the universe, is of course the original engineer, but the engineers are debating: what kind of engineer is he?
The structural engineer says, “Looking at the remarkable construction of the body’s bones and joints, it’s clear God is a structural engineer.”
The electrical engineer says, “But you’re neglecting our intricate system of nerves and synapses. That could only have been made by an electrical engineer.”
“God was definitely a civic engineer,” says the third, “because only a civic engineer would think to run a waste disposal pipeline right through a major recreational area.”
Here are some other "smart people jokes" I quite like because I find them very funny! But I didn't include in my post because they didn't fulfill the definition of "intellectual humor" I gave above:
Two chemists walked into a bar. The first chemist said "I'd like some H2O, please!". So the bartender got him some water.
The second chemist said "I'd like some H2O as well."
The first chemist cried. His assassination attempt had failed.
__
Q: What do you get when you cross a mountain climber with a mosquito?
A: Nothing! You can't cross a vector with a scalar!
II.) Plato and Diogenes sit at a bar, having a heated philosophical debate. Although they disagreed on much, they both found value in the virtues. Diogenes tells a story in medias res:
“A man and his tribe were captured by a group of foreigners. They were loaded into a wagon in small cages being transported far away from their home for execution. No one had committed any crimes.
The man used his mouth to pick the lock. Once freed from his cage, he lept from the moving vehicle to safety. The wagon moved too quickly for him to help his friends. After being rescued by strangers, he lived out the rest of his days in the countryside.”
“Wow! This man sounds like quite the courageous fellow, we should honor his virtue.”
Not strictly an intellectual joke by Linch's definition, but I thought I would throw it out there:
A bunch of aeronautical engineering professors are attending a flight show and are invited to take a ride in a new type of a plane. Before the takeoff, they are told that their very own students had designed the airplane. A mad scramble for the exits ensues as the faculty assume a jet designed by their students is bound to crash. One professor, however, remains calmly seated. He is asked why he is not abandoning this airplane before the takeoff. He replies: "Because it won't fly."
A man goes to bertrand russell. He says he hates his beard but will not shave it. Russell says "The treatment is simple. The great barber pagliacci is in town. He will shave all men (and only those men) who will not shave themselves." The man bursts into tears, “But Bertrand…”
At its most fundamental level, particularly the "radical behaviorism" championed by B.F. Skinner, the behaviorism school of psychology posits that psychology should be a science of observable behavior. It rejects the internal and posits that interiority either doesn't exist or is fundamentally unknowable. They focus on the external: a behaviorist can study the stimulus (what goes into the organism) and the response (the observable behavior that comes out), but they cannot scientifically comment on what happens inside the black box.
The joke comes from taking the scientific school very literally.
_
Hmm I think your joke rests on wordplay so I won't call it "intellectual" in the demarcation of the post above. But I enjoyed it anyway!
Walking by a butcher shop Edna notices that brains are on special. Liking brains she goes in and asks "how much are the brains?" "Well, the engineer brains are $5/lb."
"How much are the physicist brains?"
"$10/lb"
"And how much are the philosopher brains?"
"$200/lb"
"$200/lb! That's incredible, why so much?"
"Do you how philosophers it takes to make a pound of brains."
NB: Etiquette requires that one tailor this joke to poke on one's own profession.
The one about the mathematician's always been one of my favorites.
Reminds me of:
Three logicians walk into a bar.
The bartender asks: "Do you all want a drink?"
The first logician says: "I don't know."
The second logician says: "I don't know."
The third logician says: "Yes."
---
Also there's another variety type of boolean logic humor that I have _really_ enjoyed recently, though it's a bit less intellectual - laughing at ChatGPT's failure to answer boolean statements correctly.
For instance:
https://open.substack.com/pub/ramblingafter/p/why-does-chatgpt-think-mammoths-were?r=1ml1p0&selection=e20ae6f3-3a23-4a3a-8e1e-5ac8aa9e5d9c
I enjoyed it! I think it definitely fulfills both of my criteria of
a) being funny
and
b) being about ideas
I decided not to include it in my top 9 list above, but it was a difficult decision.
Ninotchka!
!!! Of course. Thank you. I’m old and forgetful. Tomorrow morning when I wake up I’ll try it again and see if I get it. 😎
I’m not ashamed to admit I’m a dummy. Can u explain this one.
The key is that the bartender is asking if ALL the logicians want a drink, so each logician considers what the others want as well as themselves.
If the first logician did NOT want a drink, then he could just answer no. But he does want a drink, and he doesn't know if the other two, so he says "I don't know."
Ditto for the second logician.
The third, having seen that the first two did not say "no", reasons that they must want drinks, and he too wants a drink, so he finally and he alone can say "yes".
Jean-Paul Sartre sits at a café, and a waiter approaches him: "can I get you something to drink, monsieur?"
"Yes, a cup of coffee, no cream".
The waiter returns a few minutes later: "I'm terribly sorry, we are all out of cream — how about with no milk?"
Yeah this was in my shortlist of ~15 that I decided to not include in the top 9 list! (I originally wanted to make it a top 10 but couldn't decide between so many good ones!)
Another self-deprecating one I like, which I might be misremembering but whatever:
An experimental physicist, an engineer, a mathematician, and a philosopher sit at a bar. "Your job must be so hard", says the engineer to the experimental physicist, "you need to wait on results from an entire particle accelerator or whatever it is you use. I just need some good CAD software, a pen and paper, and a trash can for my mistakes."
"I can do you one better", says the mathematician, "all I need to do my job is a pen and paper, and a trash can."
"Are you kidding me?" says the philosopher, "all *I* need is a pen and paper!"
I kind of understand this one but why does it apply to Jean Paul Sartre?
This one has been around for millennia... and it has never been about Jean-Paul Sartre.
Undoubtedly, but it’s quite good with Sartre. Sartre writes about the illusion of choice, claiming that choice is inescapable. The waiter chooses to adhere to his philosophy, even though he does not need to
Here's my favorite quote from Steven Brust:
Everyone generalizes from one example. At least, I do.
I love that joke! I even referenced it in my anthropics intro post: https://linch.substack.com/i/169429562/does-anthropics-matter
Okay, if my last one had too much wordplay, how about this one:
Three engineers—a structural engineer, an electrical engineer, and a civic engineer—are discussing theology. God, as the creator of the universe, is of course the original engineer, but the engineers are debating: what kind of engineer is he?
The structural engineer says, “Looking at the remarkable construction of the body’s bones and joints, it’s clear God is a structural engineer.”
The electrical engineer says, “But you’re neglecting our intricate system of nerves and synapses. That could only have been made by an electrical engineer.”
“God was definitely a civic engineer,” says the third, “because only a civic engineer would think to run a waste disposal pipeline right through a major recreational area.”
Here are some other "smart people jokes" I quite like because I find them very funny! But I didn't include in my post because they didn't fulfill the definition of "intellectual humor" I gave above:
Two chemists walked into a bar. The first chemist said "I'd like some H2O, please!". So the bartender got him some water.
The second chemist said "I'd like some H2O as well."
The first chemist cried. His assassination attempt had failed.
__
Q: What do you get when you cross a mountain climber with a mosquito?
A: Nothing! You can't cross a vector with a scalar!
_
Cogito ergo sum, said Rene,
Who then began to fear,
If I watched Man V. Food today,
Will I just disappear?
a few jokes of my own:
I.) What’s the most poetic dinosaur?
A ptero-dactyl!
II.) Plato and Diogenes sit at a bar, having a heated philosophical debate. Although they disagreed on much, they both found value in the virtues. Diogenes tells a story in medias res:
“A man and his tribe were captured by a group of foreigners. They were loaded into a wagon in small cages being transported far away from their home for execution. No one had committed any crimes.
The man used his mouth to pick the lock. Once freed from his cage, he lept from the moving vehicle to safety. The wagon moved too quickly for him to help his friends. After being rescued by strangers, he lived out the rest of his days in the countryside.”
“Wow! This man sounds like quite the courageous fellow, we should honor his virtue.”
“Actually, he was a chicken.”
Plato wrestles Diogenes to the ground.
(edit: fixed a typo)
Did you make up the second joke? I've never heard it before!
I made up both! Well, maybe someone else has made the pterodactyl joke before, but I haven’t heard anyone else say it.
Joke II. is my play on Diogenes presenting a plucked chicken to refute Plato’s definition of a man as a “featherless biped” :)
Yeah I got the joke and the references! Second one was a bit dark but I liked it.
My favorite physics joke:
I’ll have a rum and coke.
The bartender asks, “what will you have?”
A tachyon walks into a bar.
Heisenberg, Goedel, and Chomsky walk into a bar.
H: Our appearance together in this bar is highly improbable. I suspect we are in a joke.
G: From outside the joke it would be obvious, but from inside the joke there's no way to tell.
C: Of course we're in a joke, you're just telling it wrong.
A topologist doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground. But he DOES know his ass from two holes in the ground.
Not strictly an intellectual joke by Linch's definition, but I thought I would throw it out there:
A bunch of aeronautical engineering professors are attending a flight show and are invited to take a ride in a new type of a plane. Before the takeoff, they are told that their very own students had designed the airplane. A mad scramble for the exits ensues as the faculty assume a jet designed by their students is bound to crash. One professor, however, remains calmly seated. He is asked why he is not abandoning this airplane before the takeoff. He replies: "Because it won't fly."
I don’t know if this qualifies as an intellectual joke but a lot of people don’t get it. Maybe it’s just a crappy joke or my awful delivery:
A grasshopper walks into a tavern and sits at the bar.
The bartender comes over and says “We’ve got a drink named after you.”
The grasshopper looks puzzled and says “What….Eric?”
A man goes to bertrand russell. He says he hates his beard but will not shave it. Russell says "The treatment is simple. The great barber pagliacci is in town. He will shave all men (and only those men) who will not shave themselves." The man bursts into tears, “But Bertrand…”
Can you explain the behaviorist one?
Here’s my favorite, I think this could be called intellectual:
A woman arrives at Logan Airport in Boston, gets in a cab, and asks the driver, “Can you take me somewhere I can get scrod?”
The driver replies, “Huh, that’s the first time I’ve heard it in the pluperfect subjunctive.”
At its most fundamental level, particularly the "radical behaviorism" championed by B.F. Skinner, the behaviorism school of psychology posits that psychology should be a science of observable behavior. It rejects the internal and posits that interiority either doesn't exist or is fundamentally unknowable. They focus on the external: a behaviorist can study the stimulus (what goes into the organism) and the response (the observable behavior that comes out), but they cannot scientifically comment on what happens inside the black box.
The joke comes from taking the scientific school very literally.
_
Hmm I think your joke rests on wordplay so I won't call it "intellectual" in the demarcation of the post above. But I enjoyed it anyway!
Walking by a butcher shop Edna notices that brains are on special. Liking brains she goes in and asks "how much are the brains?" "Well, the engineer brains are $5/lb."
"How much are the physicist brains?"
"$10/lb"
"And how much are the philosopher brains?"
"$200/lb"
"$200/lb! That's incredible, why so much?"
"Do you how philosophers it takes to make a pound of brains."
NB: Etiquette requires that one tailor this joke to poke on one's own profession.
This one might be just on the line of only a jargon-joke, I'm not sure:
The thing about tautological humor is: it always works.
The first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club!
A mathematician, a statistician, and a lawyer were each presented with the inquiry: “What is two plus two?”
The mathematician, pulls on his beard and with Euclidean certainty, answered: “By the immutable axioms of number, it is four.”
The statistician, with a nod to probability, opines: “In the overwhelming majority of cases, it resolves to four.”
The lawyer, with certainty and legal crispness, replies: “What would you like it to be?”