Question

Looking through the Android apis I found a method call isUserAMonkey(),
says it returns true if the phone is being messed with by a monkey.

Is this a joke, or what is it used for?

Answer 1

Look at monkeyrunner, it will give you the answer.

Quote from the document:

The monkeyrunner tool provides an API for writing programs that
control an Android device or emulator from outside of Android code.
With monkeyrunner, you can write a Python program that installs an
Android application or test package, runs it, sends keystrokes to it,
takes screenshots of its user interface, and stores screenshots on the
workstation. The monkeyrunner tool is primarily designed to test
applications and devices at the functional/framework level and for
running unit test suites, but you are free to use it for other
purposes.

So if you are running a package using Monkeyrunner, then this function will return true.