# It Never Worked Before: Nine Intellectual Jokes

I curated a collection of 9 of my favorite intellectual jokes. I will repost five of them here. In the final section, I offer a small treatise on when I like them, and why I consider many other “smart people jokes” to not reach this bar.

**Philosophy**
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In xenosociology class we learned about a planet full of people who believe in anti-induction: if the sun has risen every day in the past, then they think it’s very unlikely that it’d rise again.

As a result, these people are all starving and living in poverty. An Earth xenosociologist visits the planet and studies them assiduously for 6 months. At the end of her stay, she asked to be brought to their greatest scientists and philosophers, and poses the question: “Hey, why are you still using this anti-induction philosophy? You’re living in horrible poverty!” The lead philosopher of science looks at her in pity as if she’s a child, and replies:

“Well, it never worked before…”

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A mob drags a man into a police station for running over 13 people, while shouting "Murderer!" "Killer!" The policeman disperses the crowd and begins to interrogate the suspect.

The policeman: "Tell me what happened."

The suspect: " Sir I was driving home within the speed limit when my brakes failed. I had no choice but to crash the car into a group of 12 people or to swerve into a single person. Am I a monster for deciding to swerve into the single person?"

Policeman: “No, that sounds like a difficult yet reasonable decision. But tell me how did you end up killing 13 people?"

Suspect :" Well that selfish bastard ran towards the other 12.”

**Mathematics**
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A physicist, a mathematician and an engineer were attending a conference. That night, they're sleeping on different floors of the same hotel.

The engineer wakes up to see that his room is on fire. He quickly activates all the emergency fire hydrant systems in his room, completely putting out the fire but drenching his room in the process. He gets back to bed and uncomfortably goes to sleep.

The physicist wakes up to see that her room is on fire. She takes a pitcher, walks to the bathroom, and carefully estimates how much water is needed to put out the fire. She puts out the fire with precisely the right amount of water, gets back to bed and goes to sleep.

The mathematician wakes up to see that his room is on fire. He takes out a pencil and notepad, walks to his desk, and starts madly scribbling. The fire gets bigger and bigger and he scribbles faster and faster. Finally, he writes QED down, and slams his notepad on his desk. "A ha! I have proven that it's possible to solve the fire problem!" He gets back to bed and goes to sleep.

**Psychology**
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Two behaviorists were having sex. One turns to the other and asks: “That was good for you. Was it good for me?”

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Q: How many psychologists does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: Only one, but the lightbulb has to really *want* to change.

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Check out the other 4 jokes, and why I think intellectual humor is different from mere "smart people jokes" here:  [https://linch.substack.com/p/intellectual-jokes](https://linch.substack.com/p/intellectual-jokes)