Science Jokes to Brighten Your Monday Morning

Fair warning: These jokes are total groaners. Like science-based vaudeville. Frankly, that's what makes them so awesome. I've only had this video since Saturday, and my husband is already sick of me trying to make people laugh at the Schrödinger's Cat joke. But hey, now we all have something to fill the awkward silent moments at Thanksgiving...or create awkward silent moments, depending on your family.

Science comedian Brian Malow.
Watch his full 15-minute set from 2009 Wonderfest science festival

(Thanks, Nemski!)

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

Maggie goes places and talks to people. Find out where she'll be speaking next.

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jokel

Oh good Lord.
gATO

Oh my… so, so corny, but I’m still laughing my ass off. Must be some by-product of Heisenberg’s principle. Or not.
- gATO
  
  augh, crap… that should’ve been SchrÃ¶dinger’s, not Heisenberg’s, you stupid stupid clone
manhackman

My fathers best joke!
A photon checks into a hotel. The bell hop asks him ” Can I help you with your luggage?” To which the photon replies, “I don’t have any. I’m traveling light.”
Anonymous

A man walks into a pub and asks for a pint of Adenosine Triphosphate. Barman says – That’ll be ATP. (80p – works in the UK ;) )
squidfood

Humor’s an odd thing… I personally thought S’s Cat was the unfunniest one (really you can see those coming a mile away) but the staph and the host jokes were pretty darn (awful) and good.
Ian70

a) these jokes are awesome
b) I totally spoke the punchline for the neutrino joke out loud just as the guy was saying it. GMTA. Evidently I could also be a groaner-generating professor.. and may yet become one.. (cue Theremin music)
rain_globule

The whole thing was build up to the SchrÃ¶dinger joke, that one was the best.
Anonymous

but everyone knows that math puns are the first SINE OF MADNESS!
Anonymous

Interesting use of the word ‘walks’ for all these limbless entities…

I like the concept of a whole raft of ‘walked into a bar’ jokes with different scales of matter. Nice stuff.

For a longer comic riff on Schroedinger’s Cat, you can view http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khINi_5uuaI
Anonymous

A very short ballerina walks into a barre . . . .
sheepdawg666

This made my morning MUCH better. This is akin to the dead monkey jokes for the science set. You know:

Why did the monkey fall out of the tree?
Because it was dead.

Why did the second monkey fall out of the tree?
Because it was stapled to the first monkey.

Why did the third monkey fall out of the tree?
Peer pressure…

I’ll be annoying my fellow grad students all day with these! Thanks, Maggie.
ZippySpincycle

A neutron goes into a bar and orders a beer. As the neutron is reaching for its wallet, the bartender looks at it and says, “Oh, for you–no charge.”
rrh

The hydrogen atom says to the oxygen atom, “Hey buddy, have you seen an electron around here? I seem to have lost mine.”

“Are you sure you lost it?” the oxygen atom asks.

And the hydrogen atom says, “I’m positive!”
jeepsblues

Not strictly science but…

Decartes walks into a bar. The bartender says: Rene! Great to see you! How about a beer?

Decartes says: I think not. And promptly disappears.
mypalmike

I’m adding the staph joke to my personal collection of bad jokes to tell to other geeks.
Anonymous

A virus is spotted China, President of Madagascar shuts. Down. EVERYTHING.
Anonymous

@#28
No, it’s the sum of (1/2^n), n=1 to infinity.

Adding that up, you get 2, so it is infinite mathematicians.

First few terms = 1 + 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8…

(1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8…) as the terms keep going add up to 1, so 1 + 1 = 2, so 2 beers.
rAMPANTiDIOCY

I’m with you, Maggie. The staph infection really got me too.
Anonymous

So an infinite number of mathematicians walk into a bar.

The first one orders a beer. The second orders half a beer. The third, a quarter of a beer. The bartender says â€œI hate you guysâ€ and pours two beers.
Anonymous

fantastic, loved it:-) thank you:-) X M
pantalones

I’m almost certain that’s a laugh track. My students never laugh out loud at my jokes, which are much better ;). They do audibly groan, though.
gothicgeek

very funny, the cat joke will be added to my list of cringers :)
Anonymous

I saw him on his last trip to Houston, and I was in geek heaven. He’s got a bunch more stuff online – http://www.sciencecomedian.com
greyhound4334

Some very funny science videos here: http://www.biocompare.com/Funny-Science-Videos.html
Anonymous

A Large Hadron Collider walks into a bar. The bartender says “Hey, we don’t serve large hadron colliders in here.”

The Large Hadron Collider says, “That’s OK. I’m broke, anyway.”
efergus3

My favorite bumper sticker: “Werner Heisenberg MAY have slept here.”
Anonymous

a bar of gold walks into a barr, the barman turns and yells “A, u” …
Anonymous

A neutron walks into a bar after a long day of work. He orders his beer and after about an hour he gets up to leave. He asks the bartender, “so how much do I owe ya barkeep?” The bartender replies, “for you, no charge.”
Anonymous

These are terrific. Every kid who thinks science is boring should see this. But they probably wouldn’t understand it. That’s why the geeks will inherit the earth.
Anonymous

What is the difference betweeen an enzyme and a hormone?

You can’t make an enzyme…
InsertFingerHere

In an alternate reality, this is considered funny stuff.
Anonymous

One physics student asks another if he’s getting a lot of work done on his paper.

He replies, “No.”
gollux

Thanks!
Pip_R_Lagenta

A Lichen walks into a bar. The bartender says “we don’t serve your Kind in here.” The Lichen says “that’s O.K., we don’t drink.”
Cornan

These all made me laugh. Thanks so much for starting my morning off right.
Anonymous

@Maggie – the problem with the staph joke is it only works in the US (and maybe parts of Canada). Whereas the rest of them are equally bad everywhere. (Captcha = “1:45 zingers”, very nice)
Jonathan Badger

A bacterium is trying to enter New Zealand — the customs officer is giving him grief about not having a good reason to enter the country. The bacterium responds “But I heard that New Zealand was a nuclear free zone!”
- Maggie Koerth-Baker
  
  Ba DUM ching!
  
  Ouch, Jonathan. That’s one’s a doozy.
Anonymous

A Higgs Boson walks into a church, and the priest says, “Hey, you can’t come in here! Get out!” The Higgs Boson says, “But how can you have mass without me?”
Anonymous

He missed one, though:

The bartender says, “We don’t serve tachyons in here.”
A tachyon walks into a bar.
Anonymous

Ok, they are not the best jokes ever but… that guy made me laugh!

Thanks for sharing!
Anonymous

@#10:

It has to be a countable number of mathematicians, not just any old infinite number, if I understand correctly. (?)
Anonymous

lol’d at the neutrino, but it’s true, the only one ACTUALLY funny is the one with SchrÃ¶dinger’s cat :P
Anonymous

Heisenberg gets stopped on the motorway by the police.

Cop: Do you know how fast you were going sir?

Heisenberg: No, but I know exactly where I am.
TheGibson

Love the concept but…yikes. The SchrÃ¶dinger’s Cat one is the only funny. :(
- Maggie Koerth-Baker
  
  I’m sorry. I feel bad for anyone who can’t laugh at the staph joke. ;)
Day Vexx

My wife’s favorite joke:

“A baby seal walks into a club…”