Math Jokes Explained - Numberphile

Some of your favourite maths jokes are dissected in forensic fashion.
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[namamishanker]

"I'm gonna approximate cat as rectangle".
true physicist

[baijokull]

Jokes are like frogs, if you dissect them you will understand them better. But now they're dead.

[nmarbletoe]

'I'm going to approximate the cat as a rectangle.'

[Project_Kritical]

Did you hear of the mathematician who was afraid of negative numbers?

He would stop at NOTHING to avoid them!!

[CLE]

An engineer, a physicist, and a mathematician are sitting in a bar watching people go in and out of a building. They watch two people walk in and later two people walk out, so they conclude the building is empty. This goes on throughout the day, always ending with the building being empty. Then two people walk in and later three people walk out. Astonished, the engineer says "We must have made an error in our measurement!" The physicist says "There must be something wrong with our theory!" The mathematician thinks a moment and says "If one more person goes in, the building will be empty again."

[BatPhil]

All the functions threw a party. Sin(x), as usual, was a bit up and down; whilst x^2 was slowly getting as high as a kite. |x| was being his usual positive self when he noticed, sat in the corner looking sad, e^x. "Come on e^x", he said, "you need to put yourself out there and integrate!". "What's the point?" replied e^x, "it won't make any difference!".

[sumbloke]

Optimist: Glass is half full.
Pessimist: Glass is half empty.
Engineer: Glass is double the required size.

[fearlessgreyfox]

Answering machine message at a maths department: "The number you have dialled is imaginary, please rotate the keypad 90 degrees and try again."

[SilverWave]

If you've got a pizza with a radius of "z" and a height of "a", the volume can be defined by pi*z*z*a ;)

[raynalramadhan]

I have a root beer and put it in a square glass. Now, it just a beer.

[AbridgedAnime]

A Physicist, an engineer and a mathematician are asked to build a fence with limited supplies, but have to contain the biggest area.
The physicist designs a square fence, showing that a square contains the most area.
The Engineer then designs a circular fence, showing that the area to circumference ratio is better than a square.
The mathematician think for a moment, then starts building a tiny fence around himself. When he's done, he says "I define myself to be the outside

[exonvidz]

Has 2 blackboards in front of him

Draws on a piece of paper with a pen

[frederf]

A terribly corny but genuinely math-based joke I know is such: "What is the difference between a diameter and a radius?" "A radius."

[fuzzballfoxonionring]

3:15 "I'm gonna approximate the cat as a rectangle..."
Okay, you can stop now, joke's over.

[RanDom-bnxm]

Okay, so NORMALLY a joke is not funny if you have to explain it, but seeing someone explain why 6 is afraid of 7 with such a serious tone is just hilarious. XD

[johnfmartin]

A math pun numbs my brain. But, two math puns make it even number

[frostplatypus]

Heisenberg is driving on his way home, when he gets pulled over by the police.
"Sir, you were going exactly 85mph"! said the police officer.
"Oh no, now I'm really lost" he replied

[zuesslayer]

Albert Einstein, Blaise Pascal and Isaac Newton are playing hide & seek. It's Einstein's turn to count, so he closes his eyes. Pascal runs away, but Newton stands right in front of Einstein, takes a piece of chalk from his pocket, and draws a one metre by one metre square on the ground, then stands over it, looking smug.

Finally, Einstein stops counting and opens his eyes. He immediately sees Newton over the square metre, and exclaims "Ha! I found Newton!"

Newton smirks, and replies "Nope, you found Newton over metres squared. You found Pascal!"

[ballefras]

A chemist, a physicist and a mathematician travel by a train in England. They look out a window and the chemist spots a black sheep on a field and conclude. "In England sheep are black". The physicist corrects him and say "no we can't conclude that, what we can conclude is that there is at least one black sheep in England". The mathematician corrects him and say "no we can't conclude that. What we can conclude is that there is at least one sheep in England that is black on at least one side".

[LevatekGaming]

Love how annoyed Matt sounds when there’s another ‘non number’ joke