GARY C. RAMSEYER'S FIRST INTERNET GALLERY OF STATISTICS JOKES BY TOPIC

Three roommates slept through their midterm statistics exam on Monday morning. Since they had returned together by car from the same hometown late Sunday evening, they decided on a great little falsehood. The three met with the instructor Monday afternoon and told him that an ill-timed flat tire had delayed their arrival until noon.The instructor, while somewhat skeptical, agreed to give them a makeup exam on Tuesday.

When they arrived the instructor issued them the same makeup exam and ushered each to a different classroom. The first student sat down and noticed immediately the instructions indicated that the exam would be divided into Parts I and II weighted 10% and 90% respectively. Thinking nothing of this disparity, he proceeded to answer the questions in Part I. These he found rather easy and moved confidently to Part II on the next page. Suddenly his eyes grew large and his face paled. Part II consisted of one short and pointed question.......

"Which tire was it?"

*This is my own homegrown joke that was motivated by the dramatic increase in grandmother deaths on the day of an examination!

There was this statistics professor who, when driving his car, would always accelerate hard before coming to any Intersection, whip straight through it , then slow down again once he'd got past it. One day, he took a passenger, who was understandably unnerved by his driving style, and asked him why he went so fast over intersections. The statistics professor replied, "Well, statistically speaking, you are far more likely to have an accident at an intersection, so I just make sure that I spend less time there."

*To a colleague of mine who just had his driver's license suspended, thanks for telling me this one.

An undergraduate psychology major was totally hung over for the final exam in abnormal psychology. He was somewhat relieved to find that the exam was a true/false test. He had taken a basic stat course and did remember his professor once performing a coin flipping experiment. Since his brain was pretty mushy he decided to flip a coin he had in his pocket to get the answers for each question. The psychology professor watched the student the entire two hours as he was flipping the coin...writing the answer...flipping the coin ...writing the answer, on and on. At the end of the two hours, everyone else had left the room except for this one student. The professor walks up to his desk and angrily interrupts the student, saying: "Listen, it is obvious that you did not study for this exam since you didn't even open the question booklet. If you are just flipping a coin for your answer, why is it taking you so long?"

The stunned student looks up at the professor and replies bitterly (as he is still flipping the coin): "Shhh! I am checking my answers!"

*This is real cute but unfortunately I don't have an attribution for it. Can anyone claim it?

What does a statistician call it when the heads of 10 rats are cut off and 1 survives?
Nonsignificant.

*Thanks to Chad Hartry a graduate student in my Stat II class.

A man who travels a lot was concerned about the possibility of a bomb on board his plane. He determined the probability of this, found it to be low but not low enough for him. So now he always travels with a bomb in his suitcase. He reasons that the probability of two bombs being on board would be infinitesimal.

*Contributed by Eugene A. Berg -Thanks! Taken from Innumeracy by John Allen Paulos.

Three ladies, formerly roommates at college met monthly for lunch. This month's topic of conversation turned to catching husbands. Sue said she was going to take advantage of the upcoming 3-day weekend to fly to Acapulco and scout the pool at Club Med. Julie said she was going to bite the bullet and sign herself up at one of those video dating services. Kate said she was flying to Chicago for the International Conference of Statisticians. Sue looked puzzled; Julie said, "Huh?" Kate responded by telling them that 86% of Statisticians were single males under the age of 37. Sue said, "Wow! Odds are good!" Julie said, "Yeah, but the goods are odd."

*I love this little joke! Darryl Fiorina sent me this and I really wanted to thank him but he included an invalid email address. If you are out there Darryl please contact me or I may have to conclude that you are odd goods!!

A LOTTERY IS A TAX ON PEOPLE WHO DON'T UNDERSTAND STATISTICS!!

*How True!! How True!! Thanks go out to Alvaro Montenegro Garcia for this contribution.

A patient asked his surgeon what the odds were of him surviving an impending operation. The doctor replied they were 50/50 but he'd be all right because the first fifty had already died!!

*There are a lot of variations of this theme floating around. It reminds me of the coin flipping experiment where a gambler is certain that a tail must appear after ten straight heads. Anyway, thanks to Peter Davies from Oxon in the UK for sending me this little tidbit.

The statistician was asked by his friend why he always used the urinal on the far end.

He replied: "Oh, that is a no brainer. There is half the probablity of being sprayed by someone else."

*Once again this illustrates how repressed statisticians are. They would never be caught in the middle of a group for fear the person on either side would strike up a conversation. Thanks to Graeme Quinlan from Australia for passing this on.

In China, even if you are a one out of a million kind of guy, there are thousands more just like you!!

*Gee this is sad. In the US I would settle for being a one out of a thousand kind of statistician and know there are not thousands more like me. Thanks to Dennis Lankin from the UC at Berkeley for this play upon numbers.

A freshman college student had the misfortune of having several auto accidents while living at home with his parents. One day his statistics professor told his class that 83% of all auto accidents happen within 20 miles of your home. The very next day the student moved 22 miles from home and never had another accident during his entire college career!!!

*This young man found a neat way to beat the odds. I just wonder what would have happened had his parents decided to move in with him? Thanks go out to Jon Holmen, a student at Illinois State University, for passing along this story.

It is 1941 and the Germans are bombing Moscow. Most people in Moscow flee to the underground bomb shelters at night, except for a famous Russian statistician who tells a friend that he is going to sleep in his own bed, saying that "There is only one of me, among five million other people in Moscow. What are the chances I'll get hit?"

He survives the first night, but the next evening he shows up at the shelter. His friend asks why he has changed his mind. "Well," says the statistician, "there are five million people in this city, and one elephant in the Moscow Zoo. Last night, THEY GOT THE ELEPHANT!"

*This should be a staple story for every probability course. It is almost as if the Probability Gods talk to one another after every occurence of an event. The same individual sent me this that related the story about shopping for gourmet brains and insists on remaining anonymous. A big thanks, anyway!