Generalisations

Broadly speaking, people usually assume that scientists are introverted and distant, but that boring stereotype does not have a point. On the whole, scientific people have an original sense of humor, and it seems to me that it is in order to achieve a balance between such a serious field and an entertaining life.

For instance, if we look at the History of Maths or Physics, we find a lot of funny anecdotes. Some of them might be unintelligible for ‘normal’ people, but in most cases we can get the view. For example, a quick-witted and resourceful mathematician, who was not a big friend of writing letters, sent a telegram to his father-in-law. It was written just “1+1=3”. That was certainly a short way of telling him the good news: he had become grandfather. Of course, there must be always some exceptions, like the unsocial genius Einstein. Not so far in time, we can also take the Ig Nobel Prizes. They reward research projects that “first make people laugh, and then make them think”. Imaginative, isn’t it? Speaking about imagination, picture a party in a faculty, a group of teachers and students dress like wizards and magicians, they are telling mathematical jokes… Yes, that is a tradition in my University.

In general, we find enough examples that prove scientists are not so tedious as they are usually portrayed. People may say that we are weird, but they don’t have a clue.  Don't generalize, you'll be wiser.