Several scientists were all posed the following question: “What is 2 X 2 ?”
The engineer whips out his slide rule (so it’s old) and shuffles it back and forth, and finally announces “3.99”.
The physicist consults his technical references, sets up the problem on his computer, and announces “it lies between 3.98 and 4.02”.
The mathematician cogitates for a while, then announces: “I don’t know what the answer is, but I can tell you, an answer exists!”
Philosopher smiles: “But what do you mean by 2 X 2 ?”
The logician replies: “Please define 2 X 2 more precisely.”
The sociologist: “I don’t know, but is was nice talking about it”.
Behavioral Ecologist: “A polygamous mating system”.
Medical Student: “4”
All others looking astonished : “How did you know?”
Medical Student : “I memorized it.”
It is a little sad that the engineer didn’t also have that memorised. As an engineer I find it very useful to have a lot of common facts and formulas in short term memory. I use mathematics daily and it is amazing how much time it saves not having to look things up. It is also amazing how many types of products now have sophisticated mathematical processing in them.
Simple electroncis devices like:
– MP3 player
– toaster
– oven
– watch – ever heard of a Julian Calendar?
And then the much more complex electronics products such as:
– mobile phones
– automobiles
– computers
– motor controls
– anything with a touch interface
A single mobile phone today has more processing power than existed in the whole world during the 1960s.
Ray Keefe
Successful Endeavours Pty Ltd
Casey Business of the Year 2010
Industrial Electronics Future Award Winner 2011
Award Winning Electronics Design and Embedded Software Development