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Home | Switchboard | Unix Administration | Red Hat | TCP/IP Networks | Neoliberalism | Toxic Managers |
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| "Until recently, I thought that there would never again be an opportunity to be involved with an industry as socially destructive and morally bankrupt as the subprime mortgage industry. I was wrong," Eisman said. "The for-profit education industry has proven equal to the task." |
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In 2004, a housecat named Colby Nolan was awarded an "Executive MBA" by Texas-based Trinity Southern University. The cat belonged to a deputy attorney general looking into allegations of fraud by the school.
The cat's application was originally for a Bachelor of Business Administration, but due to the cat's "qualifications" (including work experience in fast-food and as a paperboy) the school offered to upgrade the degree to an Executive MBA for an additional $100. As a result of this incident, the Pennsylvania attorney general has filed suit against the school.
This highly original answer so incensed the examiner that the student was failed immediately. He appealed on the grounds that his answer was indisputably correct, and the university appointed an independent arbiter to decide the case. The arbiter judged that the answer was indeed correct, but did not display any noticeable knowledge of physics. To resolve the problem it was decided to call the student in and allow him six minutes in which to provide a verbal answer which showed at least a minimal familiarity with the basic principles of physics.
For five minutes the student sat in silence, forehead creased in thought. The arbiter reminded him that time was running out, to which the student replied that he had several extremely relevant answers, but couldn't make up his mind which to use. On being advised to hurry up the student replied as follows:
Firstly, you could take the barometer up to the roof of the skyscraper, drop it over the edge, and measure the time it takes to reach the ground. The height of the building can then be worked out from the formula H = 0.5g x t squared. But bad luck on the barometer.
Alternatively, if the sun is shining you could measure the height of the barometer, then set it on end and measure the length of its shadow. Then you measure the length of the skyscraper's shadow, and thereafter it is a simple matter of proportional arithmetic to work out the height of the skyscraper.
If you wanted to be highly scientific about it, you could tie a short piece of string to the barometer and swing it like a pendulum, first at ground level and then on the roof of the skyscraper. The height is worked out by the difference in the gravitational restoring force T = 2 pi sqr-root (l/g).
If the skyscraper had an outside emergency staircase, it would be easier to walk up it and mark off the height of the skyscraper in barometer lengths, then add them up.
However, if you merely wanted to be boring and orthodox about it, of course, you could use the barometer to measure the air pressure on the roof of the skyscraper and on the ground, and convert the difference in millibars into feet to give the height of the building.
But since we are constantly being exhorted to exercise independence of mind and apply scientific methods, undoubtedly the best way would be to knock on the janitor's door and say to him 'If you would like a nice new barometer, I will give you this one if you tell me the height of this skyscraper'."
The student was Niels Bohr, the only Dane to win the Nobel prize for Physics.
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gordon:
Maybe it's an urban myth, but wasn't there a famous, screaming newspaper headline back in the 1950s or thereabouts in response to a report about intelligence: "Half The Population Is Below Average!"
More seriously, realisation of the scale of human variation should put the kybosh on the often-repeated theme that social mobility is the answer to inequality. Only a monster or an economist could possibly believe that.
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Bob's Basement Humor
I was sent this list of how several things have changed in our educational system and lives over the past 50 years, and it's a sad but true observation of how "Trying to Make Things Better™" ultimately makes things worse...
SCENARIO 1: Jeffrey will not be still in class, he disrupts other students.
- 1959 - Jeffrey sent to the Principal's office and given a good paddling by the Principal. He then returns to class, sits still and does not disrupt class again.
- 2009 - Jeffrey is given huge doses of Ritalin. He becomes a zombie. He is then tested for A.D.D. The school gets extra money from the state because Jeffrey has a disability.
SCENARIO 2: Johnny and Mark get into a fist fight after school.
- 1959 - Crowd gathers. Mark wins. Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up buddies.
- 2009 - Police called and SWAT team arrives -- they arrest both Johnny and Mark. They are both charged with assault and both expelled, even though Johnny started it.
SCENARIO 3: Mark gets a headache and takes some aspirin to school.
- 1959 - Mark shares his aspirin with the Principal out on the smoking dock.
- 2009 - The police are called and Mark is expelled from school for drug violations. His car is then searched for drugs and weapons.
SCENARIO 4: Jack goes quail hunting before school and then pulls into the school parking lot with his shotgun in his truck's gun rack.
- 1959 - Vice Principal comes over, looks at Jack's shotgun, goes to his car and gets his shotgun to show Jack.
- 2009 - School goes into lock down, FBI called, Jack hauled off to jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for traumatized students and teachers.
SCENARIO 5: Billy breaks a window at his school and his Dad gives him a whipping with his belt.
- 1959 - Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college and becomes a successful businessman.
- 2009 - Billy's dad is arrested for child abuse. Billy is removed to foster care and joins a gang. The state psychologist is told by Billy's sister that she remembers being abused herself and their dad goes to prison. Billy's mom has an affair with the psychologist.
SCENARIO 6: Pedro fails high school English.
- 1959 - Pedro goes to summer school, passes English and goes to college.
- 2009 - Pedro's cause is taken up by state. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against the state school system and Pedro's English teacher. English is then banned from core curriculum. Pedro is given his diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he cannot speak English.
SCENARIO 7: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from the Fourth of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle and blows up a red ant bed.
- 1959 - Ants die.
- 2009 - ATF, Homeland Security and the FBI are all called. Johnny is charged with domestic terrorism. The FBI investigates his parents -- and all siblings are removed from their home and all computers are confiscated. Johnny's dad is placed on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.
SCENARIO 8: Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary. Mary hugs him to comfort him.
- 1959 - In a short time, Johnny feels better and goes on playing.
- 2009 - Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces 3 years in State Prison. Johnny undergoes 5 years of therapy.
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December 5, 2010 | The Chronicle of Higher Education
My mother recounts a story whose narrative confection never ceases to delight me. It goes like this:
About 40 years ago, at a New Year's party for a group of doctors and residents, my father and his colleagues became so preposterously irrigated that they decided it would be a great idea to burn down their own hospital.
One detail from this episode that I find especially intriguing concerns the extremely multicultural composition of the would-be arsonists. The medical staff was quite a mix, comprised of Pakistanis, Indians, Iranians, Israelis, Palestinians, Syrians, Egyptians, Turks, and many others.
"More diversity than any of them was bargaining for," as my ever-perceptive mother likes to quip. And perhaps, I would add conspiratorially, more diversity than the surrounding and conspicuously less heterogeneous hospitals in the 1970s were bargaining for as well. But I am divagating.
Whenever the story is told, which is astonishingly often, my father has assiduously contested its accuracy. His denials reflexively lead my mother to exclaim: "What are you talking about? I was the one who had to hide the matches. You were all headed for the Children's Wing." To which my father ripostes that, at the very worst, the mob had set its sights on the cancer ward.
The lesson learned from this story is transparent enough: Health-care professionals should not set their workplace ablaze. Yet it does leave professors, a cohort not unacquainted with bacchanalia, in the dark as to what the guidelines are for academic inebriation. In that spirit, I submit the following clear and concise ground rules governing our alcoholic intake in academic settings:
Don't ever, under any circumstances, load up in the presence of your undergraduates: I say this not merely because it violates university policy. Not merely because it may encourage underage drinking. And not merely out of any fear for the safety of the undergraduates. I say this because students are better at this game than you are. Getting Professor X to do vodka shots will be an awesome, transformative, even educational, experience for them. For you, it will be the single most humiliating experience of your career. And if you disregard my advice, rest assured that picture of you holding a red plastic cup in one hand and a copy of Kingsley Amis' Lucky Jim (upside down) will be posted to YouTube. Or this. Wine and cheese after the poetry recital is, however, acceptable.
Do think carefully about throwing a few back with your graduate students: The data here is somewhat difficult to interpret. Graduate students are kind of like us. The problem is that you, Professor, are in possession of a good that they desperately covet. I refer not to your capacious fount of wisdom, but an actual paying job in academe. "Massive status differentials within the context of one professional environment provide ample opportunity for misunderstandings and subsequent litigation" is my motto on this issue. Stray graduate students who you meet at other universities, zoos, or in public parks? Bottoms up.
Don't underestimate how unpleasant drinking with your departmental colleagues can be: Decades back a colleague became frightfully wasted at a loud, raucous affair held at the chair's demesne and passed out in the bathtub. Our fallen comrade was a bit of an oddball-a journeyman Chaucerist who many suspected had been involved with paramilitary organizations in South America.* Two immediate problems presented themselves. The first was that none of us left standing liked the fellow enough to want to take him home. The second was that the chair didn't like him much either. What emerged as people were reacquainting themselves with their coats and heading out the door was something we all knew well: the tensile, subtextually ridden play of power that embodied every sober moment in our dysfunctional department. After all, wasn't the task best suited for the associate professor with the student evaluations hovering in the negatives? Or maybe, the new guy we just hired? In other words, our "party" mode began to replicate our non-party mode. Drinking with colleagues at your own institution, I wish to say, is fraught with peril.
Do drink with other people's colleagues!: Invited to lecture at another university? This is a most excellent time to sauce up. It is here where you can play the role of anthropologist, participant-observation being your preferred mode of field research. That's because so many there will have ignored my advice in the previous paragraph. Be prepared to hear things like this: "David just admit it, you, you EXPLETIVE! little EXPLETIVE!-you never read my paragraph, my monograph, you never even read my course descriptions, so why don't you . . . you do INCOMPREHENSIBLE EXPLETIVE."
Do drink at conferences! Drinking at an annual conference is good, clean fun. Although it might not be widely known, biblical scholars-of which I am one-are extraordinary skilled in the arts of public intoxication. One of my fondest professional memories occurred in Nashville some years back. An immense cohort of exegetes had somehow ended up drinking en masse. We found ourselves all together, far from our rooms, in the wee hours of the morning. There too we may all have found more diversity than we were bargaining for. I recall, with sovereign reverence, how scholars who had previously assaulted one another in print drank together amiably, as did scholars who had previously assaulted one another. When the evening was over the whole group engaged on a Drunken Fool's March through that odd Biosphere called Opryland. Arm in arm we staggered; Evangelicals and atheists, Catholics and Lutherans, Postmodernists and source critics, Biblical archaeologists and . . . (actually they staggered alone), Postcolonialists and defenders of Empire. If alcohol may offer any redemption it is this-the leveling of distinctions, the possibility of reconciliation, the reminder that we are all creatures of folly.
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Computing Center [n] In a University, that organization whose functions are 1) To impede wherever possible the development and usefulness of computing on the campus, 2) To gain the lion's share of funding, spend it largely on obsolete and otherwise inappropriate Solutions, and convince the campuse(s) wherever possible to expend their meager funds on the same, and 3) to oppose vigorously any new, useful and popular technology for ten years or more until nearly everyone on the campus(es) and elsewhere in the world is using it, then to adopt that technology and immediately attempt to gain complete and sole control of it [see MS-DOS, UNIX, ETHERNET, INTERNET].
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My name is Kevin Saltkill. I got this off of my (college) advisor's door. I
think she got it from the University of Kentucky.
My e-mail address is [email protected]. I would appreciate any additions that
can be thought up. Thanks, and enjoy!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
All undergraduate students must take note of new required classes.
Course number Title Days Time
MUS147 HOW TO HUM: LECTURE AND LAB MW 10:00-10:50
HIS024 U.S. HISTORY SINCE ABOUT AN HOUR AGO TR 12:00-1:15
GEO222 COUNTRIES THAT ARE ORANGE ON MAPS MWF 2:00-2:50
ENG537 SURVEY IN ENG LIT: SIR FRANCIS BACON MWF 9:00-11:15
AND LORD HENRY SAUSAGE
POLS834 U.S. DOMESTIC POLICY: IF FROGS COULD TR 1:30-2:45
VOTE
ANT248 AMISH PARTY GAMES W 6:00-8:15
FR106 ELEMENTARY FRENCH TOAST MW 8:00-8:50
COM193 TOPICS FROM "GREEN ACRES": LIFE AND T 7:00-9:15
TIMES OF MR. HANEY
HIS456 THE HISTORY OF SOUP TR 9:30-10:45
CHE546 THE SCIENCE OF PLAY-DO MWF 10:00-10:50
PHI101 THE RAMBLINGS OF DEAD, DRUNKEN MWF 9:00-9:50
PHILOSOPHERS
ARC555 ARCHITECTURE OF THE BRADY BUNCH HOME WTBS 4:35-5:05
MOO108 THE BOVINE ERA, PART IV: COW HISTORY R 5:30-7:15
SINCE 1784
ENG327 SHAKESPEAREAN MEMOS, MENUS, AND GROCERY TR 11:00-12:15
LISTS
ANT764 NOMADIC TRIBES OF SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA MW 3:00-3:50
THAT ARE REALLY JUST LOST
MATH001 COMPREHENSIVE STUDY OF THE NUMBER SEVEN TR 9:30-10:45
POLS497 REPUBLICAN PARTY ETHICS M 1:00-1:05
ARC123 DESIGNING MODERN CITIES USING LEGOS MWF 2:00-2:50
MATH19875 MATHEMATICS SO HARD THAT NO ONE CAN W 6:00-8:30
DO IT
COM253 UNDERSTANDING THE PLOT TWISTS IN "TWIN MTWRFSS 9:00-4:15
PEAKS"
A-S546 TOPICS IN MODERN ART: USING A LIVE TR 3:00-4:15
AS A PAINT BRUSH
HPR314 BEGINNING YAHTZEE MWF 1:00-1:50
ENG893 THE ROMANTIC PROSE OF ALAN CUTLER MWF 9:00-9:50
PHY276 HYPNOTIZING YOUR PETS TR 2:00-3:15
TEL115 MUNSTERS/ADDAMS FAMILY: A COMPARISON M 7:00-9:15
STUDY
BIO654 STUDENT CENTER SOUPS MWF 10:00-10:50
???267 POTPOURRI TR 12:30-1:45
ENG690 STOOGE CRITICISM: THE SHEMP YEARS MWF 10:00-10:50
MUS532 THE BAGPIPES GO DISCO MWF 3:00-4:15
MATH476 LEARNING POSSIBLE LOTTERY NUMBERS TR 11:00-12:15
BUS109 NEIL BUSH INVESTMENT SEMINAR MWF 4:00-4:50
ZGH786 INTRO AM OP ED ACK OOP TR 11:00-11:50
HRP192 TAKING DOWN THE VOLLEYBALL NET MW 12:00-12:50
(NOTE:prereq:HPR191: PUT UP VBALL NET)
SCH465 UNDERSTANDING THE SCHEDULE BOOK M 2:00-2:50
If you think of any other classes that should be required, add them at your
leisure.
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Todd's Humor Archive
What The Professor Really Means
By J. Timothy Petersik
from the Chronicle of Higher Education
You'll be using one of the leading I used it as a grad student.
textbooks in the field.
If you follow these few simple rules, If you don't need any sleep, you'll
you'll do fine in the course. do fine in the course.
The gist of what the author is saying I don't understand the details
is what's most important. either.
Various authorities agree that... My hunch is that...
The answer to your question is beyond I don't know.
the scope of this class.
You'll have to see me during my office I don't know.
hours for a thorough answer to your
question.
In answer to your question, you must I really don't know.
recognize that there are several
disparate points of view.
Today we are going to discuss a most Today we are going to discuss my
important topic. dissertation.
Unfortunately, we haven't the time to I disagree with what roughly half
consider all of the people who made of the people in this field have
contributions to this field. said.
We can continue this discussion outside 1. I'm tired of this - let's quit.
of class. 2. You're winning the arguement -
let's quit
Today we'll let a member of the class I stayed out to late last night and
lead the discussion. It will be a good didn't have time to prepare a
educational experience. lecture
Any questions? I'm ready to let you go.
The implications of this study are I don't know what it means either,
clear. but there'll be a question about it
on the test.
The test will be 50-questions The test will be 60-questions
multiple choice. multiple guess, plus three short-
answer questions (1000 words or more)
and no one will score above 55%
The test scores were generally good. Some of you managed a C+.
The test scores were a little below Where was the party last night?
my expectations.
Some of you could have done better. Everyone flunked.
Before we begin the lecture for Has anyone opened the book yet?
today, are there any questions about
previous material?
According to my sources... According to the guy who taught this
class last year...
It's been very rewarding to teach I hope they find someone else to
this class. teach it next year.
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master
ARE YOU A MASTER TEACHER?
1. A girl is misbehaving in your class. You should:
(a) join in the misbehavior so that she will think it's "uncool."
(b) warn her that further misbehavior will result in subsequent warnings.
(c) write her name on the board. Then draw a funny picture of her below it.
(d) send the student to the office and let the principal deal with her.
2. You catch a boy cheating on a test. You should:
(a) hire him to do your taxes for you.
(b) move him near a smarter student so he can get better answers to copy.
(c) advise the other students to copyright their answers.
(d) send the student to the office and let the principal deal with him.
3. It is Monday morning. You were sick all weekend and have nothing planned to teach today. You should:
(a) be sick just one more day so that you can get some planning done.
(b) teach Friday's lesson again. Half the class didn't get it and the other half already forgot it.
(c) show a video about a topic that can be somehow connected to your curriculum.
(d) have a work day. If any students say that they don't have any work to do, send them to the office and let the principal deal with them.
4. A boy asks a question to which you do not know the answer. You should:
(a) make up an answer.
(b) eliminate further opportunities for students to ask questions.
(c) explain that all knowledge flows through you and that since you don't know the answer, you also forbid him to know it.
(d) send the student to the office and let the principal deal with him.
5. A mother requests a progress report on a student who has made none. You should:
(a) send home a note that says, simply, "None."
(b) deny having the student in your class.
(c) write a glowing report praising the child's motivation, effort, and perseverance in avoiding work altogether.
(d) refer the parent to the office and let the principal deal with her.
6. A student complains that your class is not challenging her enough. You should:
(a) try to make your assignment directions more confusing.
(b) give her a special assignment that is so hard she'll never bother you with this again.
(c) offer her a real challenge. Put her in charge of classroom behavior management.
(d) send the student to the office and let the principal deal with her.
7. Students working in a group get little done and are constantly bickering. You should:
(a) tell them how much they remind you of the faculty.
(b) tell them how much they remind you of your family.
(c) spread the problems out over a greater area by reassigning the students to different groups.
(d) send the students to the office and let the principal deal with them.
8. Your class is empty because you've sent everyone to the principal's office. You should:
(a) teach a new lesson. They'll just have to get caught up when they return.
(b) go to the teacher's lounge and inform everyone of your good fortune.
(c) take a field trip.
(d) send yourself to the office and let the principal deal with you.
Scoring: Hey, if you're a master teacher, you already know the answers.
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These are the winners of the "worst analogies ever written in a high school essay" contestHis thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
Her hair glistened in the rain like nose hair after a sneeze.
He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes…
The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.
From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and "Jeopardy" comes on at 7 p.m. instead of 7:30.
Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.
Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:\flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake.
Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.
Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like "Second Tall Man."
Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.
John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon.
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A man in the library: "I borrowed a book last week, but it was the most boring I've ever read. There was no story whatsoever, and there were far too many characters!"
Librarian: "Oh, you must be the person who took our phone book."
Stressing the importance of a good vocabulary, the teacher told her young charges, "Use a word ten times, and it shall be yours for life."
From the back of the room a small male voice said, "Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina, Kristina."
A student taking a philosophy class had a single question on his final: "What is courage?".
The student wrote "This.", signed it, and turned it in.
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."
One professor at school (an econ prof) had a strict policy that the hourly examinations were done at the bell and anyone who kept writing on their exam after the bell would take a zero on the exam. Well, one guy kept writing on his exam for a while after the bell and then confidently strode up to turn it in.
The prof looked at him and said "don't bother to hand that paper in...you get a zero for continuing after the bell."
The guy looked at him and said, "Professor, do you know who I am!!"
The professor replied, "No, and I don't care if your dad is president of the United States...you get a zero on this exam"
The guy, with a enraged look on his face, shouted, "You mean you have no idea who I am???"
The professor responded, "No, I've no idea who you think you are."
With that, the guy said "good," plunged his exam into the middle of the stack of other students exams, and did a hasty retreat from the examination room!!!
What is this?
__ __ __ / \/ \/ \ \__/\__/\__/ / \/ \/ \ \__/\__/\__/ / \/ \/ \ \__/\__/\__/ / \/ \/ \ \__/\__/\__/ \ NO 3Answer: Chicken-wire nitrate.
A high school teacher was giving a true/false test. He was strolling up and down the aisles surveying the students at work. He came upon one student who was flipping a coin, then writing.
Teacher: What are you doing?
Student: Getting the answers to the test.
The teacher shook his head and walked on. A little while later, when everyone was finished with the test, the teacher noticed the student was again flipping the coin.
Teacher: Now what are you doing?
Student: I'm checking the answers.
Teacher (warning her students against catching cold):
"I had a little brother seven years old and one day he took his sled out when it was too cold. He caught pneumonia and three days later he died."Silence for ten seconds
Voice from rear: "Where's his sled?"
[child later went on to become an engineer]
Some funny excuse notes written to teachers:
LEESVILLE, La. - "My son is under the doctor's care and should not take P.E. today," one parent wrote. "Please execute him."
That death sentence was inadvertently recommended in a note which a parent who was in a hurry or possessed of an uncertain vocabulary wrote to excuse a child's absence from school in Vernon Parish.
Duplicated copies of some of the parish's more astonishing excuse notes were given out at a School Board meeting this month. "Some of them were obviously made up by students," Richard Carter, assistant principal of Leesville High School, said Wednesday. But most, he said, were probably legitimate excuses written by parents in the rural northwest Louisiana parish.
In these samples, names were replaced with either Fred or Mary to protect innocent and guilty alike.
One parent appeared to have taken drastic action: "Please excuse Mary for being absent. She was sick and I had her shot."
Another had a more comprehensive request: "Please excuse Fred for being. It was his father's fault."
"Please excuse Fred being absent on Jan. 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 and 33," wrote a parent who lives by an unusual calendar.
"Mary was absent from school yesterday as she was having a gangover, wrote one who apparently expected the school to be tolerant of social follies
"Mary could not come to school today because she was bother by very close veins," wrote one parent.
"Fred has an acre in his side," said another.
And in an extreme case of people losing things, "Please excuse Fred fro P.E. for a few days. He fell yesterday out of a tree and misplaced his hip."
In a confusion of office work and medical terms, one parent wrote: "Please excuse Mary from Jim yesterday. She is administrating."
And several had a racier tone:
"Please excuse Fred for being absent. He had a cold and could not breed well."
"Please excuse Mary. She has been sick and under the doctor."
How to tell the difference between a University, Polytechnic and a College?
When the lecturer walks in and says "Good Morning" in a University all the students ignore him.
When the lecturer walks in and says "Good Morning" in a College all the students say "Good Morning" back.
When the lecturer walks in and says "Good Morning" in a Polytechnic half the students fall asleep, half the students write it down and one at the back asks "Why?".
Recently saw in a commentary on this thread that the author asked why - if all the Nobel prize winners were foreign - they were in the US?
You make it so easy for us, you see: your educational system is so bad, and your TV is so juvenile, that most of your population is suspended in a perpetual moronic adolescence. So we foreigners come in and run things for you....
A teacher was teaching the colors and their flavors using lollies. She distributed purple lollies to her class and asked, "What flavor is purple?" The class responded, "Grape." She continued this with yellow, green, orange and red. The last lollies distributed were a light yellow-brown (honey flavored). The children were unable to identify the flavor. Teacher suggested, as a clue to its name, "It's what your mother calls your father when he leaves for work in the morning." Little Mary shouted, "Spit it out quick! It's a b*tthead!"
Q: Why don't art students play hide and seek?
A: Because nobody wants to look for them.
Here is a list of the ways professors here at the American University grade their final exams:
DEPT OF STATISTICS:
- All grades are plotted along the normal bell curve.DEPT OF PSYCHOLOGY:
- Students are asked to blot ink in their exam books, close them and turn them in. The professor opens the books and assigns the first grade that comes to mind.DEPT OF HISTORY:
- All students get the same grade they got last year.DEPT OF RELEGION:
- Grade is determined by God.DEPT OF PHILOSOPHY:
- What is a grade?LAW SCHOOL:
- Students are asked to defend their position of why they should receive an A.DEPT OF MATHEMATICS:
- Grades are variable.DEPT OF LOGIC:
- If and only if the student is present for the final and the student has accumulated a passing grade then the student will receive an A else the student will not receive an A.DEPT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE:
- Random number generator determines grade.MUSIC DEPARTMENT:
- Each student must figure out his grade by listening to the instructor play the corresponding note (+ and
- would be sharp and flat respectively).DEPT OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION:
- Everybody gets an A.DEPT OF POLITICAL SCIENCES:
- Stand at the top of the stairs and toss all final papers out, the ones closest to the top will get A, and furthest down will get F.DEPT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING:
- Final papers can be blown away will get F.DEPT OF PHYSICS:
- Final papers cannot block out sunlight completely will get F.DEPT OF CHEMISTRY:
- Final papers completely burn to ash first will get F.DEPT OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING:
- Students can have any one of these grades:
A (Amper) if they can resist high current.
C (Coulomb) if they get high all the time.
F (Farad) if they eat too much and have too much energy.
W (Watt) if they have power to work.
MATH AND ALCOHOL DON'T MIX
Please, don't drink and derive.
Mathematicians
Against
Drunk
Deriving
There's an anti-abortion group on this campus called
STUDENTS FOR LIFE
Hmm, so when are they gonna graduate?
A teacher was working with a group of children, trying to broaden their horizons through sensory perception. She brought in a variety of lifesavers and said, "Children, I'd like you to close your eyes and taste these."
The kids easily identified the taste of cherries, lemons and mint, but when the teacher gave them honey-flavored lifesavers, all of the kids were stumped.
"I'll give you a hint," said the teacher. "It's something your daddy and mommy probably call each other all the time."
Instantly, one of the kids coughed his onto the floor and shouted, "Spit 'em out, guys, they're as*holes!"
Prof. Somebody once taught a class from 2:30pm to 5:30pm. Every time the class met, all the students would have a lot of food on their desks when the class started. During the 5 minutes break, all of them would line a queue at the nearby vending machine. He couldn't understand why these students were hungry all the time, anyway, his class was just after the lunch time and long before dinner time. Prof. Somebody was not happy about this because when they ate, they make a lot of noise. So he announced one day "No food in the class". Next class he found the classroom extremely quiet. Guess what, everybody was dozing because nothing was keeping them awake.
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I've been asked to compile some Dilbert advice for new graduates who have no idea what's awaiting them in the business world. I'm talking about practical advice. Here are some of the ones that come to mind.
- The person who sits nearest the boss's office gets the most assignments.
- Your potential for senior management will be determined by the three H's: Hair, Height, and Harvard degree. You need at least two out of three. (Non-Harvard schools will be acceptable if it's clear that you "could have gone" to Harvard.)
- Your hard work will be rewarded. Specifically, your boss's boss will reward your boss for making you work so hard.
- There's no such thing as good ideas and bad ideas. There are only your own ideas and other people's. If you want someone to like your idea, tell him he said it last week and you just remembered.
- Teamwork is what you call it when you trick other people into ignoring their priorities in favor of yours.
- Leadership is a form of evil. No one needs to lead you to do something that is obviously good for you.
- You can estimate the time for any project by multiplying the number of idiots involved by one month and adding the number of capable co-workers times two weeks. (The competent ones are busier.)
- In any group of three coworkers, at least one of them will be a sadistic loser intent on grabbing your ankle as he circles the drain.
- Non-monetary incentives are every bit as valuable as they sound.
- Business success is mostly about waiting for something lucky to happen and then taking credit.
- Preparing a Powerpoint presentation will give you the sweet, sweet illusion of productivity.
- It is better to be an "expert" than it is to do actual work.
- The first month on any new job should be spent talking smack about the "idiot who had the job before you."
Do you have any advice you'd like to add? (It might end up in a book.)
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In case you've ever wondered why ignorance rises to the executive level, here is a simple explanation that is also a mathematical proof:
Knowledge is Power.
Time is Money.
And, as every actuary (with some physics training) knows:
Work
---------- = Power
TimeSo, if
Knowledge = Powerand
Time = Money
then through simple substitutions,
Work
---------- = Knowledge
MoneySolving for Money, we get:
Work
-------------- = Money
KnowledgeThus, If Work is held constant as a positive number (no matter how small!) Money approaches infinity as Knowledge approaches zero.
What this means is:
All else being equal, the less you know, the more you make
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Last week I walked into a local "home style cookin' restaurant/watering hole" to pick up a take out order. I spoke briefly to the waitress behind the counter, who told me my order would be done in a few minutes.
So, while I was busy gazing at the farm implements hanging on the walls, I was approached by two, uh, um... well, let's call them "natives".
These guys might just be the original Texas rednecks -- complete with ten-gallon hats, snakeskin boots and the pervasive odor of cheap beer and whiskey.
"Pardon us, ma'am. Mind of we ask you a question?"
Well, people keep telling me that Texans are real friendly, so I nodded.
"Are you a Satanist?"
Well, at least they didn't ask me if I liked to party.
"Uh, no, I can't say that I am."
"Gee ma'am. Are you sure about that?" they asked.
I put on my biggest, brightest Dallas Cowboys cheerleader smile and said, "No, I'm positive. The closest I've ever come to Satanism is watching Geraldo."
"Hmm. Interesting. See, we was just wondering why it is you have the lord of darkness on your chest there."
I was *this close* to slapping one of them and causing a scene -- then I stopped and noticed the T-shirt I happened to be wearing that day.
Sure enough, it had a picture of a small, devilish looking creature that has for quite some time now been associated with a certain operating system. In this particular representation, the creature was wearing sneakers.
They continued: "See, ma'am, we don't exactly appreciate it when people show off pictures of the devil. Especially when he's lookin' so friendly."
These idiots sounded terrifyingly serious.
Me: "Oh, well, see, this isn't really the devil, it's just, well, it's sort of a mascot."
Native: "And what kind of football team has the devil as a mascot?"
Me: "Oh, it's not a team. It's an operating-- uh, a kind of computer."
I figured that an ATM machine was about as much technology as these guys could handle, and I knew that if I so much as uttered the word "unix" I would only make things worse.
Native: "Where does this satanical computer come from?"
Me: "California. And there's nothing satanical about it really."
Somewhere along the line here, the waitress has noticed my predicament -- but these guys probably outweighed her by 600 pounds, so all she did was look at me sympathetically and run off into the kitchen.
Native: "Ma'am, I think you're lying. And we'd appreciate it if you'd leave the premises now."
Fortunately, the waitress returned that very instant with my order, and they agreed that it would be okay for me to actually pay for my food before I left.
While I was at the cash register, they amused themselves by talking to each other.
Native #1: "Do you think the police know about these devil computers?"
Native #2: "If they come from California, then the FBI oughta know about 'em."
They escorted me to the door. I tried one last time: "You're really blowing this all out of proportion. A lot of people use this "kind of computers". Universities, researchers, businesses. They're actually very useful."
Big, big, BIG mistake. I should have guessed at what came next.
Native: "Does the government use these devil computers?"
Me: "Yes."
Another BIG boo-boo.
Native: "And does the government pay for 'em? With our tax dollars?"
I decided that it was time to jump ship.
Me: "No. Nope. Not at all. You're tax dollars never entered the picture at all. I promise. No sir, not a penny. Our good Christian congressmen would never let something like that happen. Nope. Never. Bye."
Texas. What a country.
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Computing Center [n], is an organization whose functions are
- To impede wherever possible the development and usefulness of computing in the company or University.
- To gain the lion's share of funding, spend it largely on obsolete, bloated and otherwise inappropriate IT Solutions, and convince the businesses/campuses wherever possible to spend funds on the same.
- To oppose vigorously any new, useful and popular technology for three years or more until nearly everyone on the business/campuses and elsewhere in the world is using it, then to adopt that technology and immediately attempt to centralize and gain complete and sole control of it [for example, Web hosting, Webmail, ssh, etc].
Society
Groupthink : Two Party System as Polyarchy : Corruption of Regulators : Bureaucracies : Understanding Micromanagers and Control Freaks : Toxic Managers : Harvard Mafia : Diplomatic Communication : Surviving a Bad Performance Review : Insufficient Retirement Funds as Immanent Problem of Neoliberal Regime : PseudoScience : Who Rules America : Neoliberalism : The Iron Law of Oligarchy : Libertarian Philosophy
Quotes
War and Peace : Skeptical Finance : John Kenneth Galbraith :Talleyrand : Oscar Wilde : Otto Von Bismarck : Keynes : George Carlin : Skeptics : Propaganda : SE quotes : Language Design and Programming Quotes : Random IT-related quotes : Somerset Maugham : Marcus Aurelius : Kurt Vonnegut : Eric Hoffer : Winston Churchill : Napoleon Bonaparte : Ambrose Bierce : Bernard Shaw : Mark Twain Quotes
Bulletin:
Vol 25, No.12 (December, 2013) Rational Fools vs. Efficient Crooks The efficient markets hypothesis : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2013 : Unemployment Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 23, No.10 (October, 2011) An observation about corporate security departments : Slightly Skeptical Euromaydan Chronicles, June 2014 : Greenspan legacy bulletin, 2008 : Vol 25, No.10 (October, 2013) Cryptolocker Trojan (Win32/Crilock.A) : Vol 25, No.08 (August, 2013) Cloud providers as intelligence collection hubs : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : Inequality Bulletin, 2009 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Copyleft Problems Bulletin, 2004 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Energy Bulletin, 2010 : Malware Protection Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 26, No.1 (January, 2013) Object-Oriented Cult : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2011 : Vol 23, No.11 (November, 2011) Softpanorama classification of sysadmin horror stories : Vol 25, No.05 (May, 2013) Corporate bullshit as a communication method : Vol 25, No.06 (June, 2013) A Note on the Relationship of Brooks Law and Conway Law
History:
Fifty glorious years (1950-2000): the triumph of the US computer engineering : Donald Knuth : TAoCP and its Influence of Computer Science : Richard Stallman : Linus Torvalds : Larry Wall : John K. Ousterhout : CTSS : Multix OS Unix History : Unix shell history : VI editor : History of pipes concept : Solaris : MS DOS : Programming Languages History : PL/1 : Simula 67 : C : History of GCC development : Scripting Languages : Perl history : OS History : Mail : DNS : SSH : CPU Instruction Sets : SPARC systems 1987-2006 : Norton Commander : Norton Utilities : Norton Ghost : Frontpage history : Malware Defense History : GNU Screen : OSS early history
Classic books:
The Peter Principle : Parkinson Law : 1984 : The Mythical Man-Month : How to Solve It by George Polya : The Art of Computer Programming : The Elements of Programming Style : The Unix Hater’s Handbook : The Jargon file : The True Believer : Programming Pearls : The Good Soldier Svejk : The Power Elite
Most popular humor pages:
Manifest of the Softpanorama IT Slacker Society : Ten Commandments of the IT Slackers Society : Computer Humor Collection : BSD Logo Story : The Cuckoo's Egg : IT Slang : C++ Humor : ARE YOU A BBS ADDICT? : The Perl Purity Test : Object oriented programmers of all nations : Financial Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : The Most Comprehensive Collection of Editor-related Humor : Programming Language Humor : Goldman Sachs related humor : Greenspan humor : C Humor : Scripting Humor : Real Programmers Humor : Web Humor : GPL-related Humor : OFM Humor : Politically Incorrect Humor : IDS Humor : "Linux Sucks" Humor : Russian Musical Humor : Best Russian Programmer Humor : Microsoft plans to buy Catholic Church : Richard Stallman Related Humor : Admin Humor : Perl-related Humor : Linus Torvalds Related humor : PseudoScience Related Humor : Networking Humor : Shell Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2012 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2013 : Java Humor : Software Engineering Humor : Sun Solaris Related Humor : Education Humor : IBM Humor : Assembler-related Humor : VIM Humor : Computer Viruses Humor : Bright tomorrow is rescheduled to a day after tomorrow : Classic Computer Humor
The Last but not Least Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt. Ph.D
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Last modified: March 12, 2019
