After several hours of hard work with chainsaw and log-splitter, he has cords of wood stacked all along one wall of the farmhouse. As he is finishing up, he notices an elderly Indian leaning on the fence watching him. He wanders over to say hello, and the Indian takes out a tobacco pipe. The farmer takes out his own pipe and tobacco pouch, the Indian helps himself to a modest pinch but the farmer gestures "fill it up, fill it up!" and the two of them have a pleasant smoke together. At the end of their smoke, the Indian remarks "Winter be cold this year," and wanders off.
Trusting the Indian's native wisdom, the farmer goes out early next day and cuts and splits firewood until the long side of the farmhouse has wood stacked all along its length. He notices that the Indian is there again, so he takes out the tobacco again and they have a good long smoke together, just enjoying the quiet. Once again when his pipeful is done the Indian speaks: "Winter be plenty cold this year," and wanders off.
So the farmer sets to work extra early the next day, and carries on cutting and splitting and stacking until it is almost too dark to see. In the gloom he spots the Indian watching him once again, and they smoke another pipeful together, and the Indian says "Winter be heap damn cold this year."
"How do you know?" asks the farmer.
"Ah," says the old one sagely, "always come cold winter when white man cut much firewood."
Joke Poo: The Algorithm Knows Best
A coder, deeply entrenched in debugging, spends days crafting a complex AI algorithm.
After countless lines of code and countless cups of coffee, the algorithm finally works perfectly. He has several servers and all the lights in his house programmed using it. As he’s celebrating his success, he notices an elderly sysadmin leaning against the server rack, observing him. He offers the sysadmin a celebratory energy drink, and the sysadmin sips it thoughtfully. At the end of the drink, the sysadmin remarks, “System crash coming soon.” and wanders off.
Trusting the sysadmin’s veteran insight, the coder immediately duplicates all his code, backs up all the databases, and tests his fail-over systems. He notices the sysadmin is there again, so he offers another energy drink, and they share a moment of quiet contemplation. Once again, when the drink is finished, the sysadmin speaks, “System crash coming very soon.” and wanders off.
So the coder works even harder, building redundant systems upon redundant systems, adding error-correcting code, and hiring an entire NOC. In the dim glow of the monitors, he spots the sysadmin watching him once again, and they share a final energy drink, and the sysadmin says, “System crash coming imminent.”
“How do you know?” asks the coder, exhausted.
“Ah,” says the old one sagely, “Always comes a system crash when coder add lots of system resources.”
Okay, let’s dissect this joke:
Key Elements:
- Setting: Rural farmland, suggestive of traditional values.
- Characters: A hardworking farmer (representing modern man) and an elderly Native American (representing traditional wisdom/nature).
- Premise: The farmer seeks guidance from the Native American about the severity of the coming winter. The Native American’s predictions increase in intensity.
- Humor/Punchline: The Native American’s “wisdom” is revealed to be observational, not prophetic. The farmer’s actions cause the prediction to come true, undermining the very notion of innate indigenous knowledge. The twist lies in the reversal of expectations – the farmer is not receiving wisdom, but creating the evidence for it.
Humor Analysis:
The joke’s humor comes from the clash between the farmer’s naive belief in ancient wisdom and the practical reality of cause and effect. It subtly pokes fun at romanticized notions of Native American lore and plays on stereotypes (the wise elder, the hardworking farmer). The timing of the punchline is also crucial, delivered after escalating expectations have been built.
Enrichment Time: Let’s build a related joke and a “Did you Know?” observation:
New Joke:
A tech CEO, obsessed with A.I. predictions, kept asking his algorithm about the next stock market crash. The AI kept predicting doom and gloom, advising the CEO to sell everything. The CEO, panic-stricken, followed the AI’s advice each time. Eventually, broke and living in a van, he ran into the programmer who built the AI.
“I don’t understand!” he exclaimed. “Your AI ruined me! It kept predicting market crashes!”
The programmer chuckled. “Yeah, we built it to short sell whenever it predicted a crash. It’s always right because it causes the crash.”
“Did You Know?” Observation:
Did you know that dendrochronology (tree-ring dating) actually can be used to predict weather patterns, but over much longer timescales than the Native American’s “prediction” in the joke? Tree rings show patterns of growth that reflect climate conditions of the past, such as droughts or unusually wet periods. So while a Native American probably couldn’t tell you it would be a “heap damn” cold winter because you were cutting firewood, if that firewood came from a tree that lived through multiple droughts, they might have known a whole lot about the long-term climate.