I first saw this joke on bash.org twenty or thirty years ago and it's been my go to ever since. I had to fight to resist posting it until at least the week of Halloween.

A fun anecdote about this joke, I once interviewed at NASA. It was a hard choice, but I ended up turning down the job. A few months later, my wife and I went to a birthing class and ended up chatting with the couple in front of us. Turns out the guy worked at NASA and actually knew the person who interviewed me. After getting an understanding of his role, I told him this joke.

He laughed. His wife turned to mine and said "what are they laughing about?" My wife said "I don't know. Math, I think."

I think the proportion of math literate people on Lemmy is higher than it is in many places.

I know this as: There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who know binary and those who don't.

No, I get it. I was trying to be funny but couldn't think of any actually good wordplay to joke about being lowbrow. Here, in apology for the quality of my vocabulary, I'll offer a counter:

An engineer, a physicist and a mathematician are given a challenge: open a can without a can opener.

The engineer throws the can against a hard surface over and over again until it breaks.

The physicist does some calculations, puts pressure on a few points on the can, and finds satisfaction when the can promptly pops open.

The mathematician is later found staring at the can, muttering "assume the can is open ... "

(I looked this up to make sure I remembered the details ... It's surprising how many methods the engineer and physicist are proclaimed to have used, while the punchline is always basically the same.)

Hmm, I might have misremembered.

As a kid I read a story, I think by Bruce Coville, wherein the protagonist discovers the ability to ... Er, I don't quite recall. I think he manages to "slip into the folds of the universe" or something like that. Whatever he manages, it gives him a full understanding of how everything works.

The end result is that he loses all joy because there's no wonder left in the world for him. I think the closing scene in the story is him wandering into carnival machinery, being told by staff that it'll ruin the surprise, and him saying he doesn't care because he already understands the machinations.

My brow has never been more furrowed than after reading this.

https://www.dc.com/characters/scarecrow

Fair enough. Now let's debate the merits of modal and octal WRT adjusting file permissions.

Interesting, this merits further reading, thanks!

From what I recall, quite a few years ago, there was a protest where many people stopped paying them on the basis that you have a right to face your accuser; I don't know what happened with that.

Happy to be of service!

edit: Interestingly, in my notifications it says this post was made by honest_ocelot, but when I open my client it says you're probable_possum. Curious.

I remember reading an Aliens VS Predator book wherein someone described facehuggers as an "ambulatory dick."

In that same book, a character described humanity as "raping the planet" and another character said "I don't remember sticking my dick in the dirt recently."

Neither of those struck me as strange at the time and I haven't thought of the book much since until now, but maybe I shouldn't have been reading that as a kid ...

Make sure to watch the remake as well!

I saw what you put in the credits, Pinky.

They made this joke in HIMYM; showing that scene to my wife is how I convinced her to watch it.

The founder of the company that currently employs me bought some, apparently, crazy espresso machine for the break room (I don't drink coffee or espresso or anything like that, so I don't know what made it so special).

However, when he sold the company, his one requirement (beyond the expected) was that he be permitted to take the machine with him.

I once sponsored the bail for a person of Polish descent I know (via a bondsman). The bondsman left me a voicemail to say, in nicer terms, the person had better show up in court or else.

The voicemail opened with "hi, I'm calling for ... Oh, I'm going to mess this up ... "

His business card titled him "The Butcher" so I'm disappointed he didn't say "oh, I'm going to butcher this."

What even is the joke there?

What happens if you have face blindness?