The Academic Caste System

The mathematical joke here is absolutely brilliant! In the function f(x)=x, the output equals the input, meaning it grows at a constant rate (linear growth). But non-mathematicians, particularly media outlets, often misinterpret any upward trend as "exponential growth" - which would actually be something like f(x)=2ˣ where the rate of increase itself increases dramatically! This is basically every mathematician's nightmare when watching the news: "COVID cases increased from 100 to 110... EXPONENTIAL GROWTH!!!" Meanwhile, actual mathematicians are screaming into their pillows because that's just... regular growth. It's the mathematical equivalent of calling a hamster a "miniature grizzly bear."

The eternal dialogue between you and your brain during exams! Your panicked self is convinced you've forgotten something crucial on the test, but your brain—that sassy little neurological dictator—basically shrugs and says "if you forgot it, must not have been important!" Then comes the horrifying realization when you see that "(aq)" notation you completely ignored. Aqueous solution? What's that? Just the difference between passing and failing organic chemistry! Your brain wins this round of "Let's Pretend Everything's Fine Until It's Not." That little voice saying "I think I forgot something" wasn't paranoia—it was your last functioning brain cell screaming for help!

The lab becomes your true residence after enough time. Time dilates, sleep schedules collapse, and eventually your bench becomes more familiar than your bed. The outside world? Just a distant memory. Your pipettes are your family now. Your centrifuge, your closest confidant. You've evolved beyond the need for a conventional home—you've become one with the research.

Engineering confidence is the biggest scam of all time! You walk in thinking "Pfft, I've built IKEA furniture without the instructions, how hard can this be?" Then suddenly you're staring at differential equations that might as well be ancient hieroglyphics! 😂 The transition from "I'll understand whatever it is" to "There's nothing about this I understand" happens faster than the speed of light - which, ironically, you'd learn to calculate in the class you're failing!

The mathematical trauma gets passed down like a family heirloom! Each generation inherits a slightly different method to solve the same equation. Grandpa says "subtract first," dad repeats "subtract first," but then plot twist - the kid gets "get rid of the coefficient first." That poor equation (3x + 2 = 7) is just sitting there watching four generations argue about how to find x=5/3. Breaking generational trauma? Not in this algebra household! The real solution is probably just to use a calculator and save everyone the therapy bills.

The mathematical horror on display here is *chef's kiss*. Imagine trying to explain infinite-dimensional vector spaces to people who use math just to make fictional characters unreasonably powerful! The juxtaposition of serious mathematicians encountering "powerscalers" (folks who debate which anime character could beat up which) is peak academic nightmare fuel. That poor textbook on Hilbert spaces—containing some of the most elegant mathematical constructs used in quantum mechanics—reduced to "dummy terms" for people arguing about whether Goku could destroy a universe. The mathematical ancestors are weeping.