University Memes

Engineering department rivalry distilled into its purest form. Mechanical engineers and industrial engineers pretending not to know each other at parties is practically a scientific constant. One designs the machines, the other optimizes the processes, yet they act like distant relatives at Thanksgiving. The stoic "No" from mechanical engineers speaks volumes about their relationship with equations and physical constraints, while the cheerful "Yes" from industrial engineers reflects their optimistic approach to efficiency problems. It's the academic equivalent of oil and water—except both insist they have the superior method for separating the two.

Engineers proudly declaring they don't know basic math while simultaneously denying it has anything to do with their profession is peak engineering culture. The beautiful contradiction of someone presenting a slide that says "Just because we are engineers doesn't mean we know basic math" followed by the panicked clarification "I mean, we don't, but not because we're engineers!" is exactly why calculators were invented. Engineers will design a nuclear reactor but panic when asked to divide by hand. They're not bad at math because they're engineers—they're engineers because they're clever enough to find ways around doing math!

The eternal engineering student dilemma! When universities announced hybrid options post-pandemic, it created the ultimate Sophie's choice for engineering students: actual human interaction or the sweet, sweet freedom of using WolframAlpha during exams without suspicious proctors watching your every move. For those who spent four years calculating integrals by hand while WolframAlpha could do it in 0.3 seconds, this is the mathematical equivalent of "do I want friends or do I want an A+?" The pandemic taught us many things, but perhaps the most valuable lesson was that pants are optional and computational engines are forever.