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[JoshuaFH]

Oh man, I think my mind is getting blown, but I just can't feel it!

If only I understood what was going on...

[ein]

Oh man, I think my mind is getting blown, but I just can't feel it!

If only I understood what was going on...

I feel your pain man.

No... Not really, I get these jokes and find them hilarious.

[Vector]

Oh man, I think my mind is getting blown, but I just can't feel it!

If only I understood what was going on...

Then clearly you need a little help... the sad part is that all of these are completely true.

Spoiler: Some helpful definitions (click to show/hide)

Dictionary of Definitions of Terms Commonly Used in Math. lectures.

The following is a guide to terms which are commonly used but rarely defined. In the search for proper definitions for these terms we found no authoritative, nor even recognized, source. Thus, we followed the advice of mathematicians handed down from time immortal: "Wing It."

CLEARLY:
    I don't want to write down all the "in- between" steps.
TRIVIAL:
    If I have to show you how to do this, you're in the wrong class.
OBVIOUSLY:
    I hope you weren't sleeping when we discussed this earlier, because I refuse to repeat it.
RECALL:
    I shouldn't have to tell you this, but for those of you who erase your memory tapes after every test...
WLOG (Without Loss Of Generality):
    I'm not about to do all the possible cases, so I'll do one and let you figure out the rest.
IT CAN EASILY BE SHOWN:
    Even you, in your finite wisdom, should be able to prove this without me holding your hand.
CHECK or CHECK FOR YOURSELF:
    This is the boring part of the proof, so you can do it on your own time.
SKETCH OF A PROOF:
    I couldn't verify all the details, so I'll break it down into the parts I couldn't prove.
HINT:
    The hardest of several possible ways to do a proof.
BRUTE FORCE (AND IGNORANCE):
    Four special cases, three counting arguments, two long inductions, "and a partridge in a pair tree."
SOFT PROOF:
    One third less filling (of the page) than your regular proof, but it requires two extra years of course work just to understand the terms.
ELEGANT PROOF:
    Requires no previous knowledge of the subject matter and is less than ten lines long.
SIMILARLY:
    At least one line of the proof of this case is the same as before.
CANONICAL FORM:
    4 out of 5 mathematicians surveyed recommended this as the final form for their students who choose to finish.
TFAE (The Following Are Equivalent):
    If I say this it means that, and if I say that it means the other thing, and if I say the other thing...
BY A PREVIOUS THEOREM:
    I don't remember how it goes (come to think of it I'm not really sure we did this at all), but if I stated it right (or at all), then the rest of this follows.
TWO LINE PROOF:
    I'll leave out everything but the conclusion, you can't question 'em if you can't see 'em.
BRIEFLY:
    I'm running out of time, so I'll just write and talk faster.
LET'S TALK THROUGH IT:
    I don't want to write it on the board lest I make a mistake.
PROCEED FORMALLY:
    Manipulate symbols by the rules without any hint of their true meaning (popular in pure math courses).
QUANTIFY:
    I can't find anything wrong with your proof except that it won't work if x is a moon of Jupiter (Popular in applied math courses).
PROOF OMITTED:
    Trust me, It's true.

Spoiler: Some celebrated styles of proof (click to show/hide)

How to prove it. Guide for lecturers.
 

Proof by vigorous handwaving:
    Works well in a classroom or seminar setting.


Proof by forward reference:
    Reference is usually to a forthcoming paper of the author, which is often not as forthcoming as at first.


Proof by funding:
    How could three different government agencies be wrong?


Proof by example:
    The author gives only the case n = 2 and suggests that it contains most of the ideas of the general proof.


Proof by omission:
    "The reader may easily supply the details" or "The other 253 cases are analogous"

Proof by deferral:
    "We'll prove this later in the course".


Proof by picture:
    A more convincing form of proof by example. Combines well with proof by omission.


Proof by intimidation:
    "Trivial."


Proof by adverb:
    "As is quite clear, the elementary aforementioned statement is obviously valid."


Proof by seduction:
    "Convince yourself that this is true! "


Proof by cumbersome notation:
    Best done with access to at least four alphabets and special symbols.


Proof by exhaustion:
    An issue or two of a journal devoted to your proof is useful.


Proof by obfuscation:
    A long plotless sequence of true and/or meaningless syntactically related statements.


Proof by wishful citation:
    The author cites the negation, converse, or generalization of a theorem from the literature to support his claims.


Proof by eminent authority:
    "I saw Karp in the elevator and he said it was probably NP- complete."


Proof by personal communication:
    "Eight-dimensional colored cycle stripping is NP-complete [Karp, personal communication]."


Proof by reduction to the wrong problem:
    "To see that infinite-dimensional colored cycle stripping is decidable, we reduce it to the halting problem."


Proof by reference to inaccessible literature:
    The author cites a simple corollary of a theorem to be found in a privately circulated memoir of the Slovenian Philological Society, 1883.


Proof by importance:
    A large body of useful consequences all follow from the proposition in question.


Proof by accumulated evidence:
    Long and diligent search has not revealed a counterexample.


Proof by cosmology:
    The negation of the proposition is unimaginable or meaningless. Popular for proofs of the existence of God.


Proof by mutual reference:
    In reference A, Theorem 5 is said to follow from Theorem 3 in reference B, which is shown to follow from Corollary 6.2 in reference C, which is an easy consequence of Theorem 5 in reference A.


Proof by metaproof:
    A method is given to construct the desired proof. The correctness of the method is proved by any of these techniques.


Proof by vehement assertion:
    It is useful to have some kind of authority relation to the audience.


Proof by ghost reference:
    Nothing even remotely resembling the cited theorem appears in the reference given.


Proof by semantic shift:
    Some of the standard but inconvenient definitions are changed for the statement of the result.


Proof by appeal to intuition:
    Cloud-shaped drawings frequently help here.

And, something to think on:

The reason that every major university maintains a department of mathematics is that it is cheaper to do this than to institutionalize all those people.

[ein]

Those are awesome.

Also, major profile overhaul.
New sig, new text, mehtal mahreen instead of TGL.
what is the world coming to?

[JoshuaFH]

But what of Conway's Game of Life? Is it now... Conway's Game of Death!?

[ein]

TGL has always had more death than life.
Most patterns will die out within a couple of generations.

[Cheeetar]

A distant friend of my brothers committed suicide, and now every single member of my family is inconsolably sad but me.

[Realmfighter]

Would you feel better to know that the social expectation that is saddening you is also making everyone else fake sadness?

[cganya]

A distant friend of my brothers committed suicide, and now every single member of my family is inconsolably sad but me.

not everyone shows grief through sadness, just a majority. Sometimes people react in different ways, sometimes they don't react at all. If the person was distant than it's not strange for you to be less effected by it. If I found out that a relative of mine out west died tonight. I wouldn't really be affected. I've seen them maybe 3 times in my life?

that being said, i sure do hope one of them does not die suddenly as I would hate to feel some measure of responsibility. *knocks on wood*

[Lord Dakoth]

I have been spending way too much time working the past month or two. I'm working almost 40 hour weeks, plus 15-20 at my internship, and I have absolutely no time for the people I love. As a result, my most treasured relationship is slowly falling to pieces.

EDIT: Wow, that really sounds like a sob story now that I'm rereading it.

[RAM]

every single member of my family is inconsolably sad but me.

Yes, I am sure that the tree doesn't hold a grudge while you are bashing it...

But yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if they were upset about the thought of suicide, it tends to make humans uneasy. Also they may be worried that it could be contagious... And of course people don't want to seem insensitive...

[Cheeetar]

every single member of my family is inconsolably sad but me.

Yes, I am sure that the tree doesn't hold a grudge while you are bashing it...

I have no idea what this means.

[ein]

Ye gods, the cramps.
They are in the most uncomfortable places.
How the hell does this happen...

[Tack]

Well, had a really rough day. Got pressganged into taking six people in my car, even though five friends of mine died about half a year ago because of overloading a car, then managed to run a red light. Got a parking ticket, which I've never had before so I'm freaking out about how the fuck I pay the things. Etc. Etc. It's been hell. Got home, had two Double Blacks back to back, and I'm on my third. Let's hope this night gets batter.

[Jackrabbit]

every single member of my family is inconsolably sad but me.

Yes, I am sure that the tree doesn't hold a grudge while you are bashing it...

I have no idea what this means.

He means your family tree. Which is silly because I don't think anyone assumed you meant everyone in your family ever.