Geek Stars From Atkinson to Zappa

Ian Lamont writes "You probably remember reading about Brian May getting a PhD in Astrophysics, but may not know about the many other celebrities from the music, TV, and film worlds who have studied science and technology in college and grad school, or are simply serious gearheads who like gadgets, games, and other geek pastimes. Computerworld has identified about 50 celebrities who fit the bill, including Dan Grimaldi (Patsy Parisi, The Sopranos) who has a Bachelor of Arts degree in math, a master's in operations research and a Ph.D. in data processing; Rowan Atkinson, who has a master's in electrical engineering from Queen's College, Oxford; and Todd Rundgren, who developed an early paint program called Utopia. Other folks on the list: Dr. Demento, Montel Williams, Natalie Portman, Curt Schilling, and Huey Lewis."

Portman

[Mr. Capris]

From the article:

Likewise, Natalie Portman -- beloved of geek fanboys worldwide since long before her Star Wars turns -- is an accomplished psychology student with two published papers under her belt, but psych isn't strictly a science or tech pursuit. (Waaahbulances will please park in the designated Comments section.)

Hot grits, etc.

Psychology

[Dr. Cody]

I think we've all got to recognize that the psychology department is where people go if they're not geeky enough to go into engineering or compsci, but have too much self-respect to wake up one day with a Bachelor's of microeconomics on their wall.

Natalie Portman isn't a geek, she's just a girl who was smart enough not to spend four years with a bunch of Star Wars fans.

Re:

[MicktheMech]

There is real science being practiced under the heading of Psychology. There is also pseudo-science people call psychology. What we really need is for a particular geeky slashdotter to track down her papers and have a look at the analysis.

Re:Portman

[Monsieur Canard]

That's Hedley.

Re:

[utopianfiat]

I seem to remember something about Vin Diesel and D&D- and Asia Carrera playing Counterstrike.

Yawn

[evilviper]

This isn't so much "geek stars" as it is an exhaustive list of "Everyone in Hollywood that isn't mechanically inept."

Many actors majored in some field of science rather than art, and didn't flunk. Robin Williams plays video games and likes gadgets. Real big geek cred...

Quite a waste of time.

Re:

[TapeCutter]

"Many actors majored in some field of science rather than art..."

Comic Guy voice: "I like to refer to these people as "closet geeks", their many faux friends call them "interesting"...pffft!"

Re:Yawn

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually what is interesting is that very few of the people on this list ever publicly talk about their education or interests. We live in an age when kids are losing interest in science in technology and chasing the celebrity dream of fame and fortune. Many of these people could be good roll models to encourage kids back into science, technology and engineering.

Also, Masi Oka has a double in Math and CS, and worked at ILM. I don't care what you say: Hiro Nakamura is a real geek. He still consults for ILM for Petes sake!

Re:

[JamesRose]

Shut Up! I'm sixteen years old, and the more of these guys getting sucked into chasing fame the greater my chances are of getting into a top university. Quit Ruining The Plan!

Re:

[NeilTheStupidHead]

Chances are, if they're gettign 'sucked in', they're probably weren't much of a threat to you anyway.
Now get off my lawn, etc. :P

Re:

[NeilTheStupidHead]

And my spelling means neither do I.

encouraging kids back into science ...

[ja]

You mean they could be good role models like in: "I couldn't get a proper job despite my academic education(s) but hey, who can complain when you get millions for jumping up and down like a monkey?"

Re:

[Hijacked Public]

No, he wrote roll models......as in 16 sided dice.

Re:

[Nullav]

couldn't get a proper job...get millions for jumping up and down like a monkey

Pardon, but that not only sounds like a 'proper' job, but a very desirable one at that. If you mean betterment of society, rather than of oneself, then think about all of the people out there with flat nothing to do between work and sleep.

Re:

[dido]

Apparently he's also a huge fan of Neon Genesis Evangelion, and managed to get an Evangelion toy to appear in his movie One Hour Photo [imdb.com] .

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[Chibi Merrow]

Well I hate to use Wikipedia as a source, but there's lots of news articles that quote that she was named after Princess Zelda. Haven't found the actual quote from Robin, though...

Also in a movie of his, a toy used as a prop is a Production Model Evangelion toy from Robin Williams' personal collection. He's a geek.

Wait, so Bill Nye is actually an engineer?

[talkingc]

Bill Nye the Engineering Guy doesn't seem to ring as well... I don't know why, but a part of my childhood feels like it was deceived. :P

Re:

[jotok]

Because back in high school you and I stood up for ourselves, then went on to make ridiculous amounts of money. Now the football player/cheerleader couple's spawn would be proud to be "geeky like us."

We're victims of our own success. Cue Dershowitz!

Re:

[FranTaylor]

Bill Nye was an engineer at Boeing when he decided to go for comedy. He was hilarious on the short lived Seattle comedy show "Almost Live".

I'm a person

[ObiWanStevobi]

I'm a person that just happens to blog, code for a living, and play video games, too. I also have an addiction to Lucas, Adams, and Tolkien. When something bad happens, I say that "Someone set me up the bomb!". I've skipped school to play a chess game against a master. I've waited in line for video game releases. Being a person that just happens to do all these things makes me a nerd. I used to not like the term nerd. But once you get into the professional world, the term nerd is no longer a bad thin

Hey Editor!

[pato101]

Is mentioning Natalie Portman in a Slashdot story a good idea?

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

127.0.0.1

Psychology == Geek?

[DTemp]

I was considering karma whoring and making a Natalie Portman joke early on in a discussion, almost guaranteeing a +5 Funny...

But I decided to actually read the story. According to the article, and also Wikipedia, shes a Psyc student, published a couple papers. Seriously, thats enough to make the geek list? Am I in a dillusioned world that of the thousands of "stars" out there, there aren't many with more geek cred than this?

Oh and I will karma whore... here's the link to the full article print link:

http://computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=printArticleBasic&articleId=9043739 [computerworld.com]

Re:

[amRadioHed]

The fact that she knows 6+ languages qualifies as geeky in my book. That's an impressive intellectual accomplishment, no two ways about it.

Re:Psychology == Geek?

[somersault]

Understanding R2-D2 and Wookiees doesn't count. So basically we're saying that any smart/accomplished person is now a 'geek'? Hmm :P

Re:

[LinuxGrrl]

As I recall, that's how it was at school.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[elrous0]

No, her publicist CLAIMS she knows 6+ languages. A lot of publicists have adopted this "multilingual" shtick for any actor who can speak even a few words of a foreign language. It makes the actress/actor look intelligent and the publicist knows that they will never be called on it (since they usually don't even specify WHICH languages).

Re:

[pimpimpim]

Ah yes, so what couple of papers did you publish in the mean time? I think it's quite respectable. Furthermore, I am afraid that being able to perform logical thought is indeed already geeky at the moment, partly due to the big lobbies of people who want to press 'the word of god' as superior than 'reason'. Yes they do, look at the photos of the creationist museum in texas, you can find them on flickr.

Re:

[elrous0]

"Publishing Papers" is laughably easy in academia. "Publishing articles in well-known, reputable journals" is where you separate the dipshit students from the real academics.

Actually, geekier than it sounds.

[porcupine8]

After discovering that she published her papers under her birth name of Hershlag (urg, no wonder she took a stage name), I found one of them on Google Scholar:

Frontal Lobe Activation during Object Permanence: Data from Near-Infrared Spectroscopy [66.102.1.104]

Definitely geekier than your average psych paper.

And it appears that her other paper, on which she was first author while in high school, was actually in chemistry:

A Simple Method To Demonstrate the Enzymatic Production of Hydrogen from Sugar [wisc.edu]

Though it's actually in a chemistry education journal, and appears to maybe have something to do with doing demonstrations in chemistry classrooms.

Re:

[olddotter]

Damn. Now I am going to stay awake at night thinking of Portman. Sexy, Cute, and smart. Oh why why couldn't she be stupid...... :-(

innocuous rant == journalist?

[weighn]

...shes a Psyc student, published a couple papers. Seriously, thats enough to make the geek list?

I've had a couple of letters published in the newspaper - does that make me a journalist?

Re:

[Stooshie]

I always thought it should be the Vogelstein-Steiger number anyway as Bert Vogelstein is the most cited [evalu8.org] scientist and Rod Steiger is the most highly connected [oracleofbacon.org] actor in hollywood.

Re:

[schon]

That said... you misread the article. Portman isn't on their list. She's on their list of almosts

Neither did the submitter, as evidenced by the fact that he listed both Portman and Dr. Demento, when Demento is mentioned in the article as a fan of one of the people who *is* on the list.

What the hell ever happened to reading comprehension?

Re:

[elrous0]

She's was a fucking undergrad in a field that can charitably be called "pseudoscience." Christ, are Holloywood standards so low that THIS is considered an intellectual?!?!

Wait. This is Hollywood. Of course they are.

Don't forget Britney Spears!

[CortoMaltese]

Britney Spears' Guide to Semiconductor Physics [britneyspears.ac] :-)

Re:

[lordofthechia]

Thank you, I had forgotten about this gem though I could have used this last semester!

Re:Don't forget Britney Spears!

[locokamil]

That site saved me over and over and over again sophomore year in college. Knock Britney all you want for her alcoholism and poor parenting skills, but damn, she knows her semiconductor physics!

...and what about George Clinton?

[tpholland]

He apparently has a BA in Mathematics [xkcd.com].

Mensa

[Propaganda13]

What no mention of Asia Carrera? Mensa, gamer, pornstar

Re:

[porcupine8]

Mensa is not an organization for smart people. It's an organization for people who feel the need to prove how smart they are. The vast majority of people who qualify for mensa are not members.

From Asia's Bio...

[ConanG]

This comes directly from her bio: http://www.asiacarrera.com/bio.html [asiacarrera.com]

Geeky Academic Stuff - NJ spelling champ, National Mathematics League, Spanish National Honor Society, placed in National Geography, Language Arts, and Mathematics Olympiads.

Geeky Other Stuff - Played classical piano at Carnegie Hall at 13 & 14 (Ernesto Lecuona's 'Malaguena' and Bach's 13th Invention), taught Colloquial English at Tsuruga College in Japan at 16

Education - Attended performing arts high school (emphasis on instrumental music and visual arts), National Merit Scholarship Winner (for 1440 on SAT's), and Garden State Scholar (for nerdly grades). Attended Rutgers University on full academic scholarship, with a double-major in Business and Japanese.

Zappa on music

[ThirdPrize]

In his book "The Real Frank Zappa" [amazon.com] released in 1989 Zappa explains his plan for the future of music distribution. He says that consumers arn't that interested in CDs or vinyl and explains how you could use the cable tv or telephone system to digitally transmit music (and cover art, etc) into peoples homes on a subscription basis. This was back in 1989, long before your interweb thing took off.

Prior Art in any patent cases?

[T-Kir]

Although I don't know at hand if there are any patent trolls or music companies claiming this idea as IP. But wouldn't it being written down in that book count as prior art?

Just food for thought people.

Re:

[Hal_Porter]

In his book "The Real Frank Zappa" [amazon.com] released in 1989 Zappa explains his plan for the future of music distribution. He says that consumers arn't that interested in CDs or vinyl and explains how you could use the cable tv or telephone system to digitally transmit music (and cover art, etc) into peoples homes on a subscription basis. This was back in 1989, long before your interweb thing took off.

But 1989 is not before Modems. And he could probably figure out that the time to send a song would drop dramatically in the future to the point where it was possible to send songs.

I mean it's not rocket science to work out the Shannon limit for a phone line with the filters in the exchange tweaked would give DSL like speeds, or to notice that a frequency domain compression algorithm should be feasable for music and should compress raw PCM data from a CD by around 10:1. So would clearly be possible to send

Re:

[fafne]

Yeah, Zappa was a true genious. Another thing he said back in the seventies IIRC, was something in the lines of "sometime in the future, the bulk of new music will consist of recycled ideas". And look, we got sampling a number of years later. Today, the number of true musical innovation creations topping the charts steadily dwindle.

Um, Dr. Demento *not* on the list

[drphil]

Do the submitters actually RTFA? Dr. Demento's name was dropped in trying to put context around Prof. Tom Lehrer (not sure why you need to see Dr. D's name to understand who Lehrer is). BTW I think Dr. Demento has only a masters degree and was an A&R guy at one time - one of the least geeky jobs ever.

Re:Um, Dr. Demento *not* on the list

[puto]

You are correct sir. I have an three original Lehrer records on vinyl that my dad gave me in 78, i was 8 years old. Harvard professor, political satirist, pianist.

http://members.aol.com/quentncree/lehrer/

Check the above for his lyrics.

puto

Thomas Dolby spoke at the Be Developer's Conf.

[MichaelCrawford]

He and I were both BeOS developers back in the day.

His real last name isn't Dolby, it's Robertson [wikipedia.org].

When he spoke at the BDC, it was about his high-tech startup [wikipedia.org], which developed a new audio format.

He got sued by the Dolby corporation; according to Wikipedia, the settlement allows him to use their trademark only when in the context of "Thomas ".

Dr. Demento's Thesis

[vertigoCiel]

Here at Reed College (Dr. Demento's alma mater), finding Dr. Demento's senior thesis in the Thesis Tower is a common scavenger hunt item. While the topic (the operas Wozzeck and Pelleas et Melisande) isn't traditionally nerdy, no one can get through Reed without being a little bit geeky.

Erdos-Bacon number

[Michael Woodhams]

I can't let this go past without bringing up Erdos-Bacon numbers. [wikipedia.org]

Natalie Portman has one of the better scores (Erdos 5 + Bacon 2 = 7). She did not (so far as I know) use her fame in her primary field (acting) to get preferential treatment in the other (science/maths.) There are scientists with a lower total, but I think they've all got an acting part on strength of their science fame (e.g. Stephen Hawking.)

According to Wikipedia, a few people have lower Erdos-Bacon numbers which appear to be 'clean', but I haven't heard of them before: Kiralee Hayashi (3+3), Danica McKellar (4+2), Barney Pell (3+2), John Platt (3+3), Karl Schaffer (3+2), Brian Wandell (3+2), Wendelin Werner (3+3).

Re:

[saforrest]

She did not (so far as I know) use her fame in her primary field (acting) to get preferential treatment in the other (science/maths.)

Well, I'm sure she did not, because how would that even work! "Umm, look, I'm a famous celebrity! Please add me as a co-author on numerous academic papers so that I can be a famous academic as well!"

Academia has its flaws, but obsession with celebrity culture is thankfully not one of them!

Not to be a bore, but..

[Ztream]

isn't this just a list of famous people who also have an academic degree? That's hardly synonymous with "geek" for me..

A Bachelor of *arts* in Mathematics?

[Fross]

How does that work?

"e^i*pi = -1. How does that make you feel?"

"Pythagoras' Theorem is a^2 + b^2 = c^2. What do you think he was trying to convey by that?"

Re:A Bachelor of *arts* in Mathematics?

[itsdapead]

How does that work?

Quoth Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:

Traditionally the term art was used to refer to any skill or mastery, a concept which altered during the Romantic period, when art came to be seen as "a special faculty of the human mind to be classified with religion and science".

The "Bachelor of Science" (BSc) is a relatively recent invention by modern universities. "Modern" in this context means "Not already 600 years old when those Romantic trendies re-wrote the dictionary". Certainly the University of Oxford (est. 1069 give or take a few decades) doesn't have any truck with this sort of newspeak and awards BA for everything.

Re:

[bigstrat2003]

If you go to a liberal arts school, perhaps. The school I went to, Lawrence University, offers only BA degrees (well, also a B. Music for those who are in the conservatory), no matter what you study. I assure you that the math curriculum involves no asking how it makes you feel, and is good, solid, old-fashioned math. ;)

But then that removes the distinction

[Fross]

Surely the difference between a BA and BSc is in the approach of study - and some subjects are approachable from many angles. While I'd not expect a BA in Engineering, other cutting-edge science could be - I'd expect a BSc in genetics or nanotech to be versed in the technical application thereof, while a BA could be more on the ethics, real-world scenarios and so forth. Both would be strongly versed in theory, of course.

But yeah, I would expect a BA in Maths to be about as useful as a BSc in art - while a

Re:

[IBBoard]

Some Universities just like to crap up perfectly good degrees. It wasn't quite going to end up as a BA, because we'd already started it, but when the University of Manchester 'took over' UMIST (they said it was a merger) then the UMIST Computation department became Informatics in the Faculty of Humanities.

Quite how you could be taken seriously with a BSc Computing Science from the Faculty of Humanities I don't know - luckily I got an old-style certificate as well.

So, in summary, Universities do stupid thing

I have a BA in Physics from UC Santa Cruz

[MichaelCrawford]

at the time that's the only option the physics department offered undergrads. I'm rather proud of it actually - I think I got a better education at "Uncle Charlie's Summer Camp" than I did during my first two years at Caltech; for example I took classes in painting and drawing.

At the time, they didn't give grades. Instead, instructors wrote a short "narrative evaluation" about their students' performance.

However, I understand that they've given into economic pressures, so that now both grades and BS d

Re:

[hansamurai]

I have a BA in Computer Science (and East Asian Studies). The difference between a BA and a BS at UW-Madison is a three credit online nutrition course. I just took a lot of foreign language when I was there and the BA came easily.

Re:A Bachelor of *arts* in Mathematics?

[lahvak]

Perhaps is a similar way as "Doctor of Philosophy in Mathematics"?

Re:

[Jedi Alec]

Error: insufficient data. Please provide destinations for both trains.

Re:A Bachelor of *arts* in Mathematics?

[xaxa]

The trains are on the same track. An insect is flying back-and-forth between the two trains. When the trains collide, how will the insect feel? How will the train drivers feel? What about their families? Write an extended television news article ignoring the relative safety of rail travel. Give suitably twisted statistics where appropriate. Extra credit will be gained for interviewing survivors and asking them inappropriate questions live on national television.

Part 2, law: outline a case for suing
a) The driver of the first train,
b) The manager of the railway company,
c) A contractor working on the signalling system,
d) A passer by,
e) Your grandmother,
f) The insect.
Show how you would win each case.

Gary Numan

[clickclickdrone]

Wrote his own website and flies aerobatic stunts at airshows - does that count?

Re:

[clickclickdrone]

Damn, rumbled, better get back to my car then and go down the park.

Obvious Missing Entries

[Mister Transistor]

There's Elvis Costello - former computer programmer who chucked it all for Rock 'N Roll...
(He kept the geek look but lost the career!)

Peter Gabriel is quite the computer nerd...

Joe Walsh of the Eagles - he's got a Ham Radio license...

And Jeff Foxworthy used to work for IBM, but I'm not sure how nerdy he was.

Re:

[3waygeek]

More missing entries:

Gary Shandling -- was an EE before going into comedy
Cindy Crawford -- valedictorian of her high school class, received ChemE scholarship to Northwestern
Teri Hatcher -- math major

Re:

[DannyO152]

Big fan of Elvis Costello, I respect the hell out of him, but I understand that the job was as basic operator, meaning he was mounting and unmountng data reels.

Reverse music/tech link: Schildt (no, really)

[scottsk]

Don't forget Herb Schildt was in the progressive rock band Starcastle before turning to the word processor and churning out an almost infinite stream of books on MS-DOS and C, and later C++. I think he may still be around today, but he was big in the 90s as sort of the paragon/punching-bag of bad technical writing.

Brian May

[BigBadBus]

Brian May *doesn't* have a PhD. He has submitted his thesis, but hasn't been awarded it yet. Get your facts right.

Re:

[BigBadBus]

Get your own facts right! The slashdot article talks about May getting a specific doctorate - "Astrophysics". The honorary one just talks about a generic science PhD. Also, the article linked to mentions May submitting his PhD, NOT the honorary doctorate.
I don't mind people getting accredited PhDs and calling themselves "Dr", but I have never heard of anyone doing so. I had to work bloody hard for my own doctorate, so I can call myself Dr!
FFS!

Kris Kristofferson

[puto]

Although he doesn't have the best voice. He did write a slew of hits, Bobby Mcgee and Help me Make it through the night. Was one of the highway men.

1. Rhodes Scholar.
2. Military Helicopter Pilot.
3. Assigned as a professor at West Point but resigned his commission.
4. Golden Gloves boxer.

A true geek in the Heinlein sense. Smart and tough.

Physics of Baseball

[mdsolar]

The summary metions Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling. Jeff Francis, pitcher for the Rockies is a Physics Major: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/columnist/bodley/2007-10-23-bodley-column_N.htm [usatoday.com].

Don't forget

[UnHolier than ever]

Paul Verhoeven, physicist, who directed Total Recall, Basic Instinct and Starship Troopers.

Re:

[tb3]

And don't forget "Basic Instinct" and 'Showgirls".
Oh, wait...

Dexter Holland, lead singer of The Offspring

[bajan_on_ice]

Dexter Holland, lead singer of the the band "The Offspring" has a Bachelor's degree in Biology and a Master's degree in Molecular Biology, both from the University of Southern California. He is also a PhD candidate in Molecular Biology.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_Holland [wikipedia.org]

PhD !=geek

[sm62704]

Having a PhD does not, of course, preclude nerdiness, but it doesn't guarantee it, either. My old boss Charlie (now retired in Florida) had a PhD and was, in fact, a true geek. OTOH, the fellow now in the next office from mine has a PhD but is dumb as a box of rocks, and has no geek qualifications whatever aside from being a fat dork who wears glasses. It doesn't take a high IQ to obtain a PhD, just stubbornness and a good work ethic. It does require a three digit IQ to be a nerd.

The #1 all time famous nerd was Niel Armstrong, who was an engineer who famously said "I am and always will be a pocket protector wearing nerd". He accomplished the ultimate in nerdiness, being the first man to step foot on another world. That was a nerd's wet dream come true!

-mcgrew [kuro5hin.org]
(Linked text is titled "Growing Up With Computers" from 2005, in it is mention of Niel's most famous act of nerdiness. Another of my useless but on-topic scribblings is a two year old blagh titled What is a nerd? [mcgrew.info])

Re:

[xPsi]

It does require a three digit IQ to be a nerd.

In a base greater than nine.

As long as Winnie Cooper made the list ...

[louzerr]

I had to make sure Danica McKellar made the list ... sure enough.

She was recently on NPR talking about what she was doing with her degree in mathmatics ...

Poor Kevin Arnold! How'd he let her slip away?

Todd Rundgren is the biggest geek on the list

[K8Fan]

Todd Rundgren only gets a single line:

Our honor roll is in tune with three remarkable nerds. Todd Rundgren ("Hello It's Me") is legendary for developing the Utopia Graphics System, one of the very first paint programs, and has remained profoundly engaged with technology throughout his recording and producing career.

...but his involvement with technology has been greater than any other person in that list.

• He animated his own 3D music video "Change Myself" [youtube.com] in Lightwave on a big pile of Amiga 2000s.
• He wrote a massively popular screen saver, Flowfazer.
• He created the first completely interactive album "No World Order", allowing the listener to control the tempo, mood and vocal mix from a capella to instrumental for the Philips CDi platform.
• He may have been the first artist to sell music electronically, via downloads on Compu$erve.
• Wrote a very early OO operating system called HyperCode [google.com]

Pretty damn geeky.

Also expert driver

[threaded]

Rowan Atkinson also holds higher levels of British Driving license allowing him to drive HGVs aka articulated trucks on the highways. I'm told he performs many of the car stunts in the shows himself.

Re:

[Instine]

Not that expert: he made quite a mess of a very nice car [bbc.co.uk]

Re:Also expert driver

[hey!]

Danny Kaye once said that in order to do something funny you have to be able to do it well.

If you think about it, anybody who is bad at something might do something funny by accident, but a pro has to get up on stage or on camera and be funny on cue. Kaye taught himself to sing, dance and fence tolerably well. Maybe not well enough to be a singing and dancing star or that you'd put your money on him in a duel, but well enough to be able to execute his idea of what might be funny accurately enough to make people laugh on purpose.

There are lots of people in the world who can be funny opportunistically, but there is an incredible amount of craft even in something as deceptively simple as stand up comedy. What could be more natural than telling a funny story? Practically anything, if that means you have to tell that story five or more days a week, several times a night, to a paying audience that really wants your act to be over so they can see the guy they came to see. Sometimes if you see a comedian on TV who is funny, then look up his website, he'll have posted an earlier version of the exact same routine. Frank Caliendo's Bush impression comes to mind. If you look at the early videos of his routine, they are undeniably funny, but not as funny as the version he did on Letterman. That's unnatural. Most people who tell the same joke over and over again get less and less funny, but a skilled comedian is funny even if you've seen his routine a dozen times.

I think that a mania for craft is an often overlooked element of geekdom. It certainly isn't your schooling that makes you a geek; it isn't an interest in science or math. You've got to be obsessed with doing things that other people can't. Lots of guys work on cars; quite a few are good at it. But the one who spends years trying to redesign his car is a geek, no matter what other trappings his intellectual life sports. Likewise being able to work a math problem that most people can't is not necessarily geeky. Having strongly held opinions about the best way to approach certain kinds of math problems is quintessentially geeky.

Re:

[timeOday]

We're supposed to be surprised that Mr. Bean's an EE? Sheesh, I would have assumed that all along :)

Re:

[IBBoard]

That's probably because Mr Bean is one of Rowan Atkinson's worst characters ever and well below his normal level of quality with Edmund Blackadder.

Having seen the comedy he does in things like Blackadder then it doesn't surprise me that he's a bright guy. Interesting that it was Electrical Engineering, though.

Re:

[clickclickdrone]

Blackadder was good but I prefer his Not The Nine O'Clock News stuff. His sketch with 'Gerald the Gorilla' was insane.

Re:

[IBBoard]

I think I was too young for that. Blackadder has been repeated more on British TV since then, but I don't remember Not The Nine O'Clock News being repeated.

Re:

[clickclickdrone]

NTNOCN gets semi-regular repeats on the Paramount channel of all places I believe plus there's a best of DVD. It's good stuff - lots of well known UK comedians cut there teeth on it.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it is only a Bachelors. The University of Oxford "upgrades" all B.A.s to M.A.'s a year after graduation.
In Engineering (or actually, Engineering Science as they call it here), there is the M.Eng for undergraduate masters and for the few postgraduate masters courses, they are normally called M.Sc or M.Phil.
So don't be fooled when you hear of Oxford or Cambridge graduates with Masters, it is a big con!

P.S. How fitting that the captcha is ensnared...

Most EE's with a soldering iron make me cringe....

[Ellis D. Tripp]

, probably because a shockingly large percentage of them don't seem to know which end to pick the thing up by. :)

Over ~30 years in electronics, I have met many engineers who are whizzes with SPICE simulations or Fourier transforms, but put them on a bench with a screwdriver and a soldering iron, and you have created a weapon of mass destruction targeted at the most expensive piece of silicon in the vicinity. Some of them know this, and leave the hands-on development/prototyping work to engineering techs, or

Re:

[MyGirlFriendsBroken]

You should have got your university priorities right, everyone know that Newcastle is one of the best places to go to uni from an overall view, i.e. education, beer and girls. I got a good degree, drank a lot of beer, and am 5 weeks awaz from getting married to a girl I meet in my first semester there.

Re:

[IBBoard]

Pah, Manchester (specifically UMIST when it was around) was the place to be. Much more student-oriented and not so cold! You get a better degree from a bigger/more recognised Uni, lots of beer, good rock/metal clubs and I got married to the girl I met in the first semester nearly six weeks ago now ;)

Linkage?

[threaded]

Where's the link? You can't make a statement like that and not give us a link: it leaves us all frozen and petrified.

Re:

[splutty]

Uhm... Not to be a total bitch. But is there any actual reason why we would *not* want to totally forget about Keanu 'Rigor Mortis Is Acting, Really!' Reeves?

I mean, in my admittedly not so humble opinion, he's about the most overrated semi-actor I know. His only good 'performance' was as Johnny Mnemonic, and that pretty much only because he had to play himself.

Re:

[$RANDOMLUSER]

He does, however, know Kung Fu.

Re:

[rbochan]

whoa

Re:

[SpeedyDX]

Um ... you DO realize they're called stars for a reason, right? Maybe YOU don't care about them, but clearly SOMEBODY does.

Re:

[superwiz]

Please show me the ones with PhD's. The rest are just BLOGGERS.

Why would one choose to complete a thesis in some esoteric point of some esoteric field when one has so many chances to contribute to fields in which people need help so direly that they are willing to pay for it? Alas, I am currently completing a thesis. So there might be some buyer's remorse here.