C
Chankovsky
Should I be ashamed to get a 9 on ps when I'm an engineer. I hear that this is the section that we are supposed to do really well. Any engineers out there who performed similarly?
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You are a disgrace to all engineers.
j/k 😛
C'mon, not everyone fits stereotypes, and in this case, there's a good reason. Engineers don't need to memorize everything. Usually, they're encouraged to look up stuff in books if they forgot, at least where I'm from. Engineers need to be able to use what they have and to be creative.
The MCAT is heavy on testing your memory of these concepts, so I wouldn't be surprised if an engineer didn't score well on the ps. A 9 isn't horribly bad either.
j/k 😛
C'mon, not everyone fits stereotypes, and in this case, there's a good reason. Engineers don't need to memorize everything. Usually, they're encouraged to look up stuff in books if they forgot, at least where I'm from. Engineers need to be able to use what they have and to be creative.
The MCAT is heavy on testing your memory of these concepts, so I wouldn't be surprised if an engineer didn't score well on the ps. A 9 isn't horribly bad either.
8
8744
I got an 8 on the physical science part and I was a Registered Professional Civil Engineer.
But in my defense let me say that as a Civil Engineer I didn't do a whole lot of work with circuit analysis, optics, or any of the other arcana tested by the MCAT
But I did get a decent MCAT score (29) by virtue of a good Verbal score and was accepted to my two state medical schools.
And no, I did not study for the MCAT but took it "cold." I bought the "Gold Standard" review book with the idea of studying but every time I opened it up I got major EGO.*
*Eyes Glazed Over
But in my defense let me say that as a Civil Engineer I didn't do a whole lot of work with circuit analysis, optics, or any of the other arcana tested by the MCAT
But I did get a decent MCAT score (29) by virtue of a good Verbal score and was accepted to my two state medical schools.
And no, I did not study for the MCAT but took it "cold." I bought the "Gold Standard" review book with the idea of studying but every time I opened it up I got major EGO.*
*Eyes Glazed Over
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I thought my wife was gonna slap me when she was so excited about my 32 and I was moping about a 9 on the PS. My one really weak spot was aq. solutions chem and my test form was loaded with it (4-5 psg's and some free standing Q's). I was getting 12's and 13's on practice tests. It still chaps me a little (I wanted to get closer to my brother's score), but I'm glad to be done with the MCAT.
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Don't ignore the fact that PS is 1/2 gen chem. Physics might be the domain of engineers (well, engineering is basically 4 years of reviewing physics over and over and over...) but don't get down about a 9 in PS. It's a decent score to begin with, but the chem section might have brought you down a little.
And you have a ton of other stuff to support you(GPA, LOR, EC, PS, etc) But hey, you're done with the test. Go on with your life 😉
Cheers
Capt
And you have a ton of other stuff to support you(GPA, LOR, EC, PS, etc) But hey, you're done with the test. Go on with your life 😉
Cheers
Capt
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That all depends on what kind of engineer you are. For mechanical, electrical, civil, and aeronautical engineers this may be true. This is way off for other types of engineers however (Chemical, Computer, Software...). As for me, I'm a chemical engineer and I had to study the physics much more than chemistry for the PS section. Turns out I did well on it though.
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I am an Electrical Engineer and I scored a 11 on the PS. I am not complaining, however I wasn't expecting less than a 13, since that's what I was getting on my practice tests. And to my luck, somehow pulled a 11 on BS too. But I will tell you this............verbal is probably the worst section for most engineers (not all though) since we barely have to read and comprehend any dense material throughout our 4 years in college. And proof?? My 7 on VR.
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hey im repping engineers (Cornell Elec Eng Program) and lemme tell yall, any non enginerd who tried to post somehwat of a reply on this subject has no idea whats going on
an unfortunate secret amongst us engineers, which we cant even disclose to others if we tried, is that engineering is a discipline beyond any other field. What is expected of us through four years is incomprehensible to any other discipline. "problem sets? yea we had em too? projects? sure!'. Its not just like that. Have yo uever stayed up 96 hours, STRAIGHT, trying to design a parellel pipelined CPU (in addition to handling normal courseloads for other classes), and then failed the entire project just because one part of it didnt work?
THe difference between engineering and other disciplines - at least in college - is that in nonengineering areas, if you put in the time, you will succeed. tests might be a struggle, but that factor exists in all majors. Hoewever, in engineering, you can put in all the time and effort you want, but if some computer geek asian (excuse the stereotype, its been intentionally added for emphasis) figured out a better way, you fail. doesnt matter if you put in 300 manhours into your project. Engineering is a comprehensive area of study that incorporates not only those components characterisitc of massive workloads, but also your own discipline, creativity, intellect, stamina, and determination.
I speak for Cornell engineers and I can attest that you will not succeed if you are missing even one of the aforementioned attributes.
So nonengineers, please save yourself the trouble. Responses like 'engineering is just physics learned over and over and over for four years' are ludicrous and make you sound more ignorant than our president. All you stubborn non-engineers out there who might be thinking to yourself "this guy is just sour over picking the wrong major"...snap out of it. Its a reality...majoring in psychology or econ is far easier than engineering. I'm sure my fellow enginerds will back me up. However, as I mentioned before, its a sad catch-22 for us. No one will truly understand engineering unless theyve endured it themselves.
As far as the MCAT goes, physics material should be easier for engineers to understand compared to the average pre-med, and thus they may be inclined to do better on that section. However, it is my firm belief that anyone who puts in the time to understand the concepts and their applications will most likely succeed regardless of their background. (After all, premed is pretty much non-engineering. Hence my theory from before applies.)Also, whoever made the comment about it being half chem is absolutely correct - we cannnot overlook that.
i have ranted much more than i anticipated, but i felt this point needed to be addressed. Just my two cents (ok, actually its like 50 cents!)
holla
an unfortunate secret amongst us engineers, which we cant even disclose to others if we tried, is that engineering is a discipline beyond any other field. What is expected of us through four years is incomprehensible to any other discipline. "problem sets? yea we had em too? projects? sure!'. Its not just like that. Have yo uever stayed up 96 hours, STRAIGHT, trying to design a parellel pipelined CPU (in addition to handling normal courseloads for other classes), and then failed the entire project just because one part of it didnt work?
THe difference between engineering and other disciplines - at least in college - is that in nonengineering areas, if you put in the time, you will succeed. tests might be a struggle, but that factor exists in all majors. Hoewever, in engineering, you can put in all the time and effort you want, but if some computer geek asian (excuse the stereotype, its been intentionally added for emphasis) figured out a better way, you fail. doesnt matter if you put in 300 manhours into your project. Engineering is a comprehensive area of study that incorporates not only those components characterisitc of massive workloads, but also your own discipline, creativity, intellect, stamina, and determination.
I speak for Cornell engineers and I can attest that you will not succeed if you are missing even one of the aforementioned attributes.
So nonengineers, please save yourself the trouble. Responses like 'engineering is just physics learned over and over and over for four years' are ludicrous and make you sound more ignorant than our president. All you stubborn non-engineers out there who might be thinking to yourself "this guy is just sour over picking the wrong major"...snap out of it. Its a reality...majoring in psychology or econ is far easier than engineering. I'm sure my fellow enginerds will back me up. However, as I mentioned before, its a sad catch-22 for us. No one will truly understand engineering unless theyve endured it themselves.
As far as the MCAT goes, physics material should be easier for engineers to understand compared to the average pre-med, and thus they may be inclined to do better on that section. However, it is my firm belief that anyone who puts in the time to understand the concepts and their applications will most likely succeed regardless of their background. (After all, premed is pretty much non-engineering. Hence my theory from before applies.)Also, whoever made the comment about it being half chem is absolutely correct - we cannnot overlook that.
i have ranted much more than i anticipated, but i felt this point needed to be addressed. Just my two cents (ok, actually its like 50 cents!)
holla
Oh my gosh, I couldn't have said it any better myself! - Joined
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Amen fellow enginerd.
Throw in overanalysis of the simplest but poorly stated problems in the mix too!
Engineers are a breed onto themselves. Right when you want to throw that uP board with the chips under the wheels of a loaded 18 wheeler (this after putting in 6 mos work) is when you realize: Oh MY Gosh I have become an engineer!
Screw it! I am glad to see that board flatten though!
Took the test cold PS14
Studied for 4 mos to improve my VR/BS and scored a PS9 WTF???
Throw in overanalysis of the simplest but poorly stated problems in the mix too!
Engineers are a breed onto themselves. Right when you want to throw that uP board with the chips under the wheels of a loaded 18 wheeler (this after putting in 6 mos work) is when you realize: Oh MY Gosh I have become an engineer!
Screw it! I am glad to see that board flatten though!
Took the test cold PS14
Studied for 4 mos to improve my VR/BS and scored a PS9 WTF???
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Don't bother explaining it to the pre-meds. There are very few of 'em that understand engineering. Like you said, one has to go through the pain of actually doing all the projects from CPU pipelining to designing a high-gain amplifier to programming the UP1 bot to DSP image processing........the list goes on. Tests and quizzes are only one component of engineering courses. Doing good in those doesn't mean much if you can't come up with an optimum design (not just a working design) for your projects.
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Hiic--
You call yourself an electrical engineer and tell me that physics ISN'T beaten into your head in ur 3 or 4 years? E-Mags, microelectronic circuits, circuit theory, fluids/thermo, statics/dynamics(ME classes), ...hmm, sound pretty physics heavy to me...
My point was that engineers have such strong backgrounds in physics that the chem was likely what got to the OP.
I can understand Chem E's or BME's not having a strong physics background, but good EE's have no excuse for not excelling at physics.
Cheers,
Captjack
You call yourself an electrical engineer and tell me that physics ISN'T beaten into your head in ur 3 or 4 years? E-Mags, microelectronic circuits, circuit theory, fluids/thermo, statics/dynamics(ME classes), ...hmm, sound pretty physics heavy to me...
My point was that engineers have such strong backgrounds in physics that the chem was likely what got to the OP.
I can understand Chem E's or BME's not having a strong physics background, but good EE's have no excuse for not excelling at physics.
Cheers,
Captjack
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BWT I am a EE. So I'm not some random economics major pre-med talking crap.
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🙂
I'm an industrial engineer, and before anyone rips on that, I'll inform you that I set the curve on the ME (thermo), CE (statics/dynamics), and EE (digital signal processing) classes I had to take at a decent engineering school. So don't diss on IE's.
I did do well on the PS (14), and I think that the section shouldn't be easy because you studied physics for so long (I never saw emag after my freshman year), but rather the idea of reading and solving physics type problems is sort of innate in all of us. You didn't decide to major in engineering when you failed physics (or rather most don't). If there is something an engineer is good at, it is probably conceptuallizing physics based concepts. No one is inherently good at biology, but chemistry and physics are conceptual enough that having that skill is an advantage.
As for the guy who ranted and raved about how engineering is hard as hell. Yeah, its true. Yeah, even though I'm in medical school, I still consider my engineering brethren a step above the rest.....HOWEVER.....med school makes engineering look slack.....yes, you heard me.....SLACK. While engineering has a finite amount of knowledge that requires manipulation, which means the smarter you are the quicker you can complete projects, medicine is an infinite amount of info, and you just hope you understand and remember enough to get by.
So before you go off badmouthing premeds.....be careful, because if they start whooping up on you when you get into med school, you'll be left with your foot in your mouth. No one cares if you worked harder in undergrad engineering if you're suckin' it up in med school. Keep your pro-engineering thoughts in your heart and not on your sleeve.
-A ramblin' gamblin' helluva engineer
I'm an industrial engineer, and before anyone rips on that, I'll inform you that I set the curve on the ME (thermo), CE (statics/dynamics), and EE (digital signal processing) classes I had to take at a decent engineering school. So don't diss on IE's.
I did do well on the PS (14), and I think that the section shouldn't be easy because you studied physics for so long (I never saw emag after my freshman year), but rather the idea of reading and solving physics type problems is sort of innate in all of us. You didn't decide to major in engineering when you failed physics (or rather most don't). If there is something an engineer is good at, it is probably conceptuallizing physics based concepts. No one is inherently good at biology, but chemistry and physics are conceptual enough that having that skill is an advantage.
As for the guy who ranted and raved about how engineering is hard as hell. Yeah, its true. Yeah, even though I'm in medical school, I still consider my engineering brethren a step above the rest.....HOWEVER.....med school makes engineering look slack.....yes, you heard me.....SLACK. While engineering has a finite amount of knowledge that requires manipulation, which means the smarter you are the quicker you can complete projects, medicine is an infinite amount of info, and you just hope you understand and remember enough to get by.
So before you go off badmouthing premeds.....be careful, because if they start whooping up on you when you get into med school, you'll be left with your foot in your mouth. No one cares if you worked harder in undergrad engineering if you're suckin' it up in med school. Keep your pro-engineering thoughts in your heart and not on your sleeve.
-A ramblin' gamblin' helluva engineer
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Sorry to break this to you amigo but the physics engineers study is VERY BASIC. I know this because I was an EE major before I switched to math and computer science. EE students usually take a 3 semester sequence in calculus-based physics. This is similar in content to the physics that most premeds take except that it is stretched out into 3 semesters and there is more mathematical rigor. In reality, it is not much more different or difficult than premed physics. Just because a problem involves elementary calculus does not make it more difficult. The difficulty of basic undergraduate physics never lies in the mathematical solution of the problems, but in the conceptual formulation of them.
Also, much of the circuit analysis done in EE is NOT physics. It is clever mathematical manipulations. Nodal and Mesh analyses, and the Thevenin and Norton theorem is nothing more than the application of basic topology to Kirchoff's laws. The heavy physics in electronic circuits concern solid-state components and how they affect circuit behavior in certain conditions. That work, however, is done mostly by applied physicists. What does State-Space and Fourier analysis have to do with physics?
Ahhhh dissing economics majors huh? As Kolmogorov aptly put it, "Terrible mathematicians become physicists and terrible physicists become engineers." Why don't you try reading Wittgenstein's work on philosophy and language or Cohen's great work on the Continuum Hypothesis to put things in perspective.
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I'm a Chem E and I've always assumed I'll do well on the PS because of that. Now you guys have me a little worried. Are there Any Chem E's out there that want to share their PS scores?
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And terrible doctors kill people.
The thing that sets engineers apart from the very talented physicists and arrogant and useless mathematicians out there is that engineers work hard and become part of a profession. Although I love physics, without my undergraduate engineering degree, I could not have become a working professional and learned how to put my knowledge to use. Doctors (especially surgeons) are alot like engineers. They dont have time to philosophize on every patient; they have to get the job done. They follow strict rules and realize that a breakdown in the system has serious consequences. No book can teach you that.
So anyways, i'm a BME (and yes, there is work out there for BMEs) and I got a 12 on PS.
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And to agree with the industrial engineer from the University of Michigan or wherever, you are right. Engineers don't get to make fun of traditional pre-meds; all that matters is who can learn the stuff in med school.
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Man, some of you guys are terrible. The engineers I know do a lot of work, but they dont sit around and whine about how hard they have it or how much better they are than everyone else and the other majors. I guess the 90s dot-com boom (and consequent bust) drove up a lot of egos in the field. Its quite sad that such a well-respected field that obviously requires a lot of intelligence has lost the very humility that made engineers as/more respected than typically (or at least perceived to be) more arrogant scientists, doctors, lawyers, businessmen.
Oh well, at least there are still teachers to look up to as a profession.
PS... My dad and some of my friends are EE and have noticed how the younger crop of engineers are no different than the businessmen that engineers make fun of (if you co-oped for an engineering firm, you know exactly what I am talking about). They want instant gratification, dont care about technical challenges, are not fundamentally sound, and are getting harder to work with in groups because of their arrogance. I find this sad, because I always had associated engineering as "applied science for the bookish hardworker with an interest in math and technology."
Oh well, at least there are still teachers to look up to as a profession.
PS... My dad and some of my friends are EE and have noticed how the younger crop of engineers are no different than the businessmen that engineers make fun of (if you co-oped for an engineering firm, you know exactly what I am talking about). They want instant gratification, dont care about technical challenges, are not fundamentally sound, and are getting harder to work with in groups because of their arrogance. I find this sad, because I always had associated engineering as "applied science for the bookish hardworker with an interest in math and technology."
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Pleeaaaaaaaaaaaasssssssssseeeeeeeeeeeeee. 99.999% of undergraduate EE majors do not understand quantum mechanics enough to make sense of chip technology. They simply memorize its main properties and how to use it in VLSI. In fact the majority of Ph.Ds in EE do not sufficiently understand solid-state physics at the basic level. Who do you think tech companies hire to do R&D on circuit components? Hint: IT IS NOT ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS. It is mostly applied physicists and physical chemists. Please spare me the drama. Electrical engineers as a group lack the mathematical maturity requisite to deal with high level physics. Name the schools that require EE majors to take Tensor Calculus, Partial Differential Equations, Complex Analysis, Calculus of Variations or Functional analysis? These are the upper-level math courses required to sufficiently handle the high-level physics underlying the quantum mechanical behavior of solid-state devices.
The simple and unadulterated truth is that most EE majors do not learn significantly more physics than most premeds do. The most complicated physics an EE major would ever do would be analyzing the solutions of Maxwell's equations in various media. Most EE programs do not require students to be able to solve Maxwell's equations from first principles, but to simply understand at a practical level what the properties of the solutions mean for EM wave propagation in various media. Premeds learn pretty much the same thing in physics 2 but with less mathematical rigor, and are not required to study non-ideal behavior.
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So let me get this straight. Engineers and surgeons are hard working and know how to put their knowledge to use; whereas, physicists and mathematicians are lazy and waste time philosophizing? Who do you think was behind the major technological revolutions of the 20th century? You guessed it, it was the "lazy and philosophical" mathematicians and physicists. The most important electronic component invented in the 20th century was the transistor. It was invented by physicists Brattain, Bardeen and Shockley.
Mass electronic communication was ushered in by Claude Shannon's(mathematician) work in information theory. The computer revolution was started and led by mathematicians like Von Neumann, Alan Turing, Kleene, Alonzo Church, John Kemeny etc. Physicists and mathematicians continue to lead the charge in areas like optical communications, network security, solid state electronics, signal analysis, operations research etc. If you look through the list of the greatest minds ever to pass through Bell Labs, they are/were almost all mathematicians and physicists. The only major exceptions were the great engineers George Stibitz and Barney Oliver.
It is amazing how much these "lazy and philosophical" physicists and mathematicians who do not apply their knowledge have been able to achieve🙄 .
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I was originally referring to mathematicians as being useless, NOT physicists. And i'm only referring to present day. The invent of computers has made the work of a computer scientist much more powerful than that of the mathematician of yester-year.
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Shannon was amazimg and made great contributions to information theory. Had to give him props.. but i thought he was an engineer.
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Shannon was a double major in EE and math in undergrad but got his doctorate in mathematics. Shannon is not revered because of great engineering designs, he is loved because of his mathematical insights into the nature of information. The main reason why Shannon switched from EE to math in graduate school was that he thought mathematical maturity would be key to the advancement of engineering, especially computational and communications engineering. He was right.
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This just shows how little you know of both computer science and mathematics. Why do you think a significant portion of the faculty of most CS departments hold doctorates in mathematics? CS is a branch of applied mathematics. In fact theoretical computer science is nothing more than applied combinatorics and computational number theory. Before the '90s, most CS programs were either part of the EE or math departments at most schools. Which department the CS programs were part of depended on their orientation. The theoretical programs tended to reside in the Math departments and applied programs tended to reside in the EE departments. EVERY major theory in theoretical computer science was proposed and proved by a mathematician. Have you been exposed to formal language theory, coding theory or automata and computability? If you have, you would know what I am talking about.
Why am I even debating you on this issue, you obviously don't know what you are talking about. It is apparent that much of your resentment of mathematicians is due to an inferiority complex.
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to mochafreak
I am a chemE as well and I got an eleven on the PS section. I didn't think the section was that bad especially since I didn't really study for this section at all. You'll do great in chemistry just don't forget to refresh on the electrochemistry stuff too. For physics, just review optics and magnetism and you'll do fine on this section.
I am a chemE as well and I got an eleven on the PS section. I didn't think the section was that bad especially since I didn't really study for this section at all. You'll do great in chemistry just don't forget to refresh on the electrochemistry stuff too. For physics, just review optics and magnetism and you'll do fine on this section.
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8744
Sorry folks, real engineering is building things which will kill hundreds of people if they collapse.
Any other former or current Civil Engineers out there?
And yes, I did go into Civil Engineering because it seemed to be the easiest of the engineering sub-specialties.
And am I the only friggin' eduma****incated engineer who got mediocre scores on the Physical and Biological sciences but aced the Verbal section?
Any other former or current Civil Engineers out there?
And yes, I did go into Civil Engineering because it seemed to be the easiest of the engineering sub-specialties.
And am I the only friggin' eduma****incated engineer who got mediocre scores on the Physical and Biological sciences but aced the Verbal section?
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haha, I did better on verbal and BS than PS, but my PS wasn't too shabby.
I went civil just because I liked that kind the best. I didn't even know it was supposed to be the easiest till later. I just thought civil = legos. 😀
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I've been thinking about this comment and exactly how to respond. I know you're deep into research, but not an engineer with a dad as an engineer? I don't know what exactly it is, but something just struck me as off about your comment. I'm not disagreeing, I just think it isn't really an insiders view maybe. I've worked in engineering. Maybe no one else agrees with me since no one responded to your comment.
I don't think these people are being cocky and would carry that over to the real world profession any more so than another profession. You always have the nerds and the arrogant ones. I don't know anyone from my school who is how you describe the people above. All hard working and not any whinier than anyone else. And I wouldn't really say engineers are more respected than doctors and lawyers.
I will say this, old docs are having the same issues with the new incoming docs as the engineers. Probably just has a lot to do with our generation as a whole.
For some reason, the words aren't really flowing, but maybe you will catch what I mean.
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That's a really good point, I guess I am biased based on some of what my friends and parents say, and a bit by reading some of the really arrogant posts on slashdot.
Then again, if we were to judge people based on anonymous message boards, 90% of premeds have a 4.0 and 43T MCAT coming out of high school while having the maturity level of a middle schooler.
Though perhaps it is me, but I do respect engineers as much as doctors and lawyers, quite honestly the only professions I respect more are professors and teacher. But I guess its like any other field.
I dont know if anyone else has interned or has parents in the field, but I would be interested to know if my friends and parents experiences with some of the younger engineers is similar to what I have described, or whether its the exception.
Anyway, I was just curious what others thought, thanks for responding. I guess my point is nonunique, and applies to many professions and our generation.
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I both agree and disagree with Gleevac's comment.
I'm an engineer, have interned as one, and my dad is one.
There are 4 times more engineers in the US today than in 1980. This unregulated growth pretty much has to compromise quality of the graduates. Are the graduates today as in 1980, I would bet not. There are a lot of people who went into engineering (especially CS) with the Tech boom in the 90's and they are the new crop that Gleevac probably cites. As for people who went into engineering in the 70's and early 80's (as our parents generation would be ), they would be more technically minded and went into it because they are both good at it and like it.
On the other hand, it is a good thing that the new crop of engineers have this attitude because the companies that hire them have this attitude. When designing a product, you can either spend an infinite amount of making sure it is technically correct and not make money selling the product, or you can get it close (use heuristics instead of precise algorithms) and get the item to the shelves quicker. Companies are investing less and less in R&D, which reflects this attitude. In most companies, R&D is the first department that gets hit when budget cuts are needed. In essense, companies want a quick rollout of the product, while engineers would want a slower release. Ultimately, management pays engineers, so the engineers have to conform.
Just my $.02.
I'm an engineer, have interned as one, and my dad is one.
There are 4 times more engineers in the US today than in 1980. This unregulated growth pretty much has to compromise quality of the graduates. Are the graduates today as in 1980, I would bet not. There are a lot of people who went into engineering (especially CS) with the Tech boom in the 90's and they are the new crop that Gleevac probably cites. As for people who went into engineering in the 70's and early 80's (as our parents generation would be ), they would be more technically minded and went into it because they are both good at it and like it.
On the other hand, it is a good thing that the new crop of engineers have this attitude because the companies that hire them have this attitude. When designing a product, you can either spend an infinite amount of making sure it is technically correct and not make money selling the product, or you can get it close (use heuristics instead of precise algorithms) and get the item to the shelves quicker. Companies are investing less and less in R&D, which reflects this attitude. In most companies, R&D is the first department that gets hit when budget cuts are needed. In essense, companies want a quick rollout of the product, while engineers would want a slower release. Ultimately, management pays engineers, so the engineers have to conform.
Just my $.02.
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No, I know plenty about finite cellular automata, turing machines, and enough about information coding from reading countless books on information theory as it deals with auditory signals (my scpeific research). I'd go into more, but I need to be at Boeing by 12pm sharp on Tuesday to do an installation and I am running out of time. I picked up a cool book about chaos the other day by this dude dude so maybe now the dumb young engineer could takt the mathematician before he sleeps with his wife. (actually his name was Gleick and the book, Chaos, was read by myself over 4 times).
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I'm a chem e who got a 9 PS and it was my lowest section. I could speculate on the factors that led to my MCAT breakdown, but really I think it proves that I'll be a better doctor than engineer. 🙂
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To mochafreak: I'm a ChemE, and PS was my highest score at 14. I would maintain that ChemE's are at an advantage over other engineering majors for PS, due to the high concentration of both chem and phys in the curriculum. I'm not trying to flame the other enginerds (great term!), this is just curriculum--just as I'd imagine BioE's or BME's have the engineering curricula most relevant to BS.
To Gbemi24: Let's be serious for a moment. This thread is talking about undergrad majors. Those great mathematicians and physiscists you talk about have advanced degrees. The simple fact remains that the engineering BS is the only vocational undergraduate degree. The point made by kingcer0x still holds that engineers and doctors alike have to get things done. You can't give credit to all physics majors for the accomplishments of the most talented and brilliant minority od PhD's.
All of the last 8 recipients of the Nobel Prize recipients for medicine were PhD's rather than MD's. (The Nobel site only shows the education of the last 8, but I would speculate that the trend persist well back in the history of the award). But innovations in healthcare aside, the bulk of the work in diagnosis and treatment falls to the MD's. All practicing doctors have to do their job, while most physicists do not make astounding accomplishments like those that you mention. Engineers with a BS will not invent the transistor, but they go out there and apply their knowledge to the job at hand. That is why engineers make more with an undergrad degree than do physicts and math majors.
Your point about mathematicians who founded the field of computer science is completely irrelevant. Information theorists couldn't major in computer science before it was a field, and so of course they came from other fields. If, 100 years from now, the newest innovations in CS came from people outside the field of CS, then that would be something. But you don't seem to care much that James Watt and Sadi Carnot--both engineers--laid the foundations of the field of thermodynamics.
As for the premed vs engineer physics conundrum, I have to wonder what school's curriculum you use as a basis for these claims. Premeds at my school take to semesters of baby physics and two semesters of calculus. All engineers take the same four lower division math courses that physics majors take, and they take the same three-semester sequence of lower division physics that physics majors take. This includes special relativity, vector calculus and partial differential calculus-based E & M, and an intro to quantum mechanics. ChemE's go on to take two semesters of physical chemistry comparable to the QM sequence taken by phsics majors, and can opt to take the physics majors QM series. Every upper division class I've taken as a ChemE has been mathematically intense, including partial differential equations and tensor calculus. I doubt that the other engineering majors have things that much easier.
To Gbemi24: Let's be serious for a moment. This thread is talking about undergrad majors. Those great mathematicians and physiscists you talk about have advanced degrees. The simple fact remains that the engineering BS is the only vocational undergraduate degree. The point made by kingcer0x still holds that engineers and doctors alike have to get things done. You can't give credit to all physics majors for the accomplishments of the most talented and brilliant minority od PhD's.
All of the last 8 recipients of the Nobel Prize recipients for medicine were PhD's rather than MD's. (The Nobel site only shows the education of the last 8, but I would speculate that the trend persist well back in the history of the award). But innovations in healthcare aside, the bulk of the work in diagnosis and treatment falls to the MD's. All practicing doctors have to do their job, while most physicists do not make astounding accomplishments like those that you mention. Engineers with a BS will not invent the transistor, but they go out there and apply their knowledge to the job at hand. That is why engineers make more with an undergrad degree than do physicts and math majors.
Your point about mathematicians who founded the field of computer science is completely irrelevant. Information theorists couldn't major in computer science before it was a field, and so of course they came from other fields. If, 100 years from now, the newest innovations in CS came from people outside the field of CS, then that would be something. But you don't seem to care much that James Watt and Sadi Carnot--both engineers--laid the foundations of the field of thermodynamics.
As for the premed vs engineer physics conundrum, I have to wonder what school's curriculum you use as a basis for these claims. Premeds at my school take to semesters of baby physics and two semesters of calculus. All engineers take the same four lower division math courses that physics majors take, and they take the same three-semester sequence of lower division physics that physics majors take. This includes special relativity, vector calculus and partial differential calculus-based E & M, and an intro to quantum mechanics. ChemE's go on to take two semesters of physical chemistry comparable to the QM sequence taken by phsics majors, and can opt to take the physics majors QM series. Every upper division class I've taken as a ChemE has been mathematically intense, including partial differential equations and tensor calculus. I doubt that the other engineering majors have things that much easier.
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*shameless bump*
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how did you ever make it as an engineer and not know this! 😛
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I just don't get this line of thinking. You are insinuating that physicists just loiter around whiles engineers work. That is abject nonsense. Just because you are designing machines or manufacturing products does not make your work anymore meaningful or valuable than someone sitting behind a desk with a pencil and paper. What engineers do in industry is made possible by the hard work of physicists and mathematicians in academia. You think physical optics and differential equations just popped out of nowhere? People behind desks with pencils and papers had to sweat to come up with the theorems and ideas underlying these areas. Without mathematicians, physicists and other physical scientists engineering would be sterile. Even if we leave aside the Ph.Ds for a moment, most undergraduate physics majors get into industry. I did a summer internship at Bausch & Lomb at the end of my sophomore year (when I was still EE) and there were just as many physics students as engineering students.
Undergraduate engineers make more with their degrees than physics and math students? Where are you getting this from? What do you think most physics undergrads do after graduation? THEY WORK IN INDUSTRY AS ENGINEERS OR APPLIED PHYSICISTS. Mathematicians also work in industries or areas such as software engineering (particularly in algorithm analysis), finance, actuary, systems analysis, operations research, military logistics, code breaking and network security, aeronautics etc. A significant number of math majors also become high school teachers. Why do you think there were/are so many mathematicians at Bell Labs or Los Alamos? Why are there so many mathematicians at NASA? Why were there so many mathematicians involved in the Manhattan project? I guess these industries and research labs just like paying mathematicians to play chess 🙄.
The point I was making is that mathematicians do important work such as inventing many valuable and applied fields like computer science. If mathematicians were as useless as kingcer0x intimated they were, we wouldn't have modern computing systems and the benefits that they come with. The other point I was making is that theoretical computer science is really just a branch of applied mathematics just as optical engineering is a branch of applied physics. Just because you give it a new name does not mean it becomes something else. To this day a significant number of students who wish to work in areas like graph theory, coding theory, algorithm analysis, computational geometry and computability choose to get doctoral degrees in mathematics.
As regards premed vs engineering physics, you did not rebutt any of my points. In fact you were mostly agreeing with me. I explicitly said that engineers take a 3 semester sequence in physics that is more mathematically rigorous than premed physics. However, just because a course is mathematically rigorous does not mean you learn more. Einstein was a mediocre (relatively speaking) mathematician but a superior physicist. In fact much of the mathematical work in General Relativity was done by David Hilbert(mathematician) but Einstein got the credit for General Relativity and rightfully so. The difficulty of physics is in intuitionally understanding things NOT the mathematics involved. Mathematics often gives deeper insight into physics problems but this does not really happen at the introductory level where engineers mostly learn physics. How will Calculus 1 & 2, elementary differential equations and Vector calculus give you deeper insights into introductory physics? EVERYTHING that can be explained with vector calculus in E & M can be explained intuitionally in premed physics. The mathematics is just needed for completeness.
Also if you read my posts carefully you would notice that I always use the word "MOST" rather than "ALL" when discussing the engineering curricula of schools. A few elite programs will require their students to take some upper-level physics or math but not most. Besides, I don't consider differential equations and vector calculus at the somophore level to be upper-level math niether do I consider being able to solve the heat equation as having
"real" knowledge of partial differential equations. The only traditional engineering field that requires a fair degree of mathematical sophistication is MechE. They take atleast 3 to 4 upper level math courses beyond the sophomore year.
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I'm not insinuating that math and physics majors don't do anything. I am stating that the engineer has a more challenging task because the engineer must make the process feasible, both physically and economically. It is true that a great many physics majors end up doing the same work or similar work to engineering majors, and many physics majors end up with the job title of engineer. I'll conceed that. But I still maintain that being an average engineer with a bachelor's dgree is harder work than being an average physics bachelors graduate or math major for most industry positions. I maintain this by the salaries of the average graduate. My school has a website that shows the average starting salaries of graduates with various majors. The median math and physics majors each start at about 40K, while engineering physics and EE majors make a median starting salary of 53K and 62K, respectively. If it wasn't harder work, I doubt that industry would continue to maintain these exorbitant salaries if they could get physics majors to do the same work for less money. They obvious answer would be that the average physics major can't do what the average engineer does.
I would commend you for the ability to except PhD's above if you didn't dive right back into the doctorates just a few sentences later. Again, I'm not just "mostly" looking at undergrads; that is the center of this argument. We're all planning to get our graduate degrees in medicine (at least, that is the point of the forum). So the contention here is about the difficulty of the undergraduate major. NASA, Los Alamos, etc depend on research scientists with PhD's for their innovations. A PhD research scientist in any field is a highly trained, educated individual. You seem to think that the work of a PhD scientist has **** to do with the difficulty of the undergraduate major--let me let you in on a secret: it doesn't.
Some mathematicians make great contributions. Not undergraduate math majors. Math majors learn math. Engineering majors learn to take their BS and put it directly to work in industry. Scores of engineers are between taking the important ideas of a few gifted mathematicians and the application of those ideas to useful applications. Deal with it.
Lawdhamercy, you can't have it both ways. Two pages ago, you were using the difficulty of math to discuss the weakness of the EE major, with all of your points about their not having tensor math, blah blah blah. Now, I understand that this may just be my school, but whether you're a physics major, or any of either BioE, ChemE, civil eng, mat sci & eng, mechE, or nuclear engineering, you are require to take four and only four math courses. However, if you major in EE, eng phys, eng math, or IEOR, you are required to take additional math courses beyond those required for physics.
Beyond that, however, if you truly believe that engineers don't learn "more" physics than premeds in the 3 semester sequence, there's also thermo, mat sci, and electrical eng courses that are all physics heavy and are all required for all engineers at Cal. As for my own major of ChemE, I'm also required to take 3 courses in fluid dynamics and transport phenomena, and a full year of physical chemistry. All of these courses are physics-intensive and mathematically rigorous. Take your pick--math or physics--and either way, I have a ****load more experience and understanding than a premed doing the traditional MCB route. Moreover, there is a great deal of physics that cannot be rightly understood without delving deep into the mathematical intricacies, which is why physics requires more math than, say, molecular biology.
You say that EE's don't learn more physics, and use the "complicated"ness as a measure of this. make up your mind. Is the EE understanding of physics lacking in complexity, mathematical sophistication, or depth of understanding? Personally, I think it lacks none of these, but as soon as you can decide what you're trying to argue, we'll move forward from there.
I won't disparage MechE, because I'm not as familiar with their courseload, but anyone who thinks that ChemE doesn't require mathematical sophistication is deluded. And my exgirlfriend, who majored in EE at UCSD always seemed to be doing very little but math. If you think that your school has a weak EE program that isn't challenging, and as a result you felt you needed to jump majors, that's fine and dandy. But I think that the average EE major has a far superior understanding of both math and physics than the average non-engineering, bio-route premed. I also feel that the average person with only a BS in engineering is capable of more work and more difficult work than the average physics or math major, and I take as evidence the starting salaries as posted on my school's website, as well as all information that was presented to me by both the news and the career center at my former school at the time I made my decision to major in engineering.
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You seem to equate salary with how hard people in a particular profession work. This equivalency is a false one. From your argument, the average NBA player works much harder than the average neurosurgeon because NBA players have higher starting salaries. Just because engineering undergraduates have higher starting salaries than physics and math undergraduates does not mean they work harder in undergrad or in industry. They get paid more initially because they are specifically trained for the jobs in undergrad and thus are more attractive than a physics or mathematics major who might need to be trained extensively. It is pure capitalism. In a capitalist society your pay does not always correlate with how hard you work but how much your skills are in demand. During the internet boom, web programmers (many with just high school diplomas) were more in demand and thus were paid higher than traditional engineers. From where you stand, their certification training was more difficult than the undergraduate training of traditional engineers. Go figure.
If you followed my debate with kingcer0x closely, you would have noticed that he called ALL mathematicians useless. H/She did not distinguish between undergrad and grad students. You join a debate to fight others' battles for them and then you try to define the debate in a way that best suits you. I am not going to let you have it your way. If you want to start a debate about the difficulty of various undergraduate degrees, fine, but then don't make references to arguments I made in posts to others in which I was arguing in a different context. When I said I would leave Ph.Ds aside for a moment, I was just trying to accomodate you but I didn't have to.
Actually very few engineers directly put the ideas of the so called "few gifted mathematicians" to work. Most undergrad engineers work in industry as glorified technicians. Deal with it.
Again you are taking my arguments out of context and making them seem contradictory. People on this thread were arguing that EE involves advanced physics and I interjected that most EE students lack the mathematical maturity needed for advanced physics. The main reason I brought up mathematical rigor at the introductory level is that many people, engineers and bio majors alike, are under the impression that you learn more physics if a physics course involves a lot of math. This is somewhat true at the advanced level but not at the basic level. As I pointed out in an earlier post, advanced mathematics is needed to gain deeper insight into complex physics problems, but not introductory physics problems. I attended a top undergrad in NY and I took 3 semesters of calculus-based physics. I even took the honors version of engineering physics(reserved for able physics and engineering students) and we used Ohanian for the first 2 semesters instead of the standard Halliday and Resnick, which is used for engineering physics at most competitive schools. Although Ohanian was even more mathematically rigorous than Halliday and Resnick, the physics was not necessarily more difficult. The best introductory physics series ever written is The Feyman lectures on physics. EVERY physics program has a copy somewhere in its library, but there is little math in it. This is because what is important at the introductory level is not necessarily the mathematics but the ideas behind the mathematics. What physical concepts at the introductory level cannot be adequately explained without delving into mathematical intricacies? The most important reason why engineers and physical science students take calculus-based physics is to get them used to mathematical problem solving not because they would necessarily learn more fundamental physics by doing more math.
Again, mathematical sophistication is only necessary at the advanced level and most EEs don't have that mathematical maturity. I know this because I did both upper level EE and physics. EE's don't lack in-depth understanding of basic physics. In fact they have a solid grasp of it. What they lack is an understanding of advanced physics and the mathematical sophistication it comes with. Beyond the first 4 math courses that both math, physics and engineering students take, physics students also take other upper level math courses depending on which fields they want to specialize in. These days it is almost standard for physics students to double major in physics and mathematics because of the great overlap with applied mathematics. EE courses in areas like electronics, E & M, signal theory and communication etc niether require advanced math or physics. Fourier and Laplace transforms, basic probability theory, and linear second order Differential Equations are not advanced mathematics niether is simple applications of Maxwell's equations such as EM wave propagation in waveguides advanced physics. The only thing I will concede is that engineers are more adept at quantitative problem solving in the physical sciences than premeds. However, the MCAT doesn't significantly test that. It tests conceptual understanding of physical science at the introductory level.
Just because one does a lot of math does not mean one does a lot of sophisticated math. Accountants do a lot of math (arithmetic), but not sophisticated math. Same goes for many engineering fields but not all . I guess what one calls sophisticated math is all relative. Also, the main reason I switched from EE to math and computer science is not because EE is "weak" but because I thought it was boring. I feel it is more fun to solve problems in applied mathematics or design software than to do logic design for electronic circuits or analyze statistical noise in communication channels. It was a taste issue not because EE is not challenging enough. Engineering is not a cake-walk by any means, but I reject the notion that it is more difficult or involves more work than mathematics or physics.
I remember attending some conference and some dude was presenting something on X-pinch and the like, and one of my profs (a theoretical physicist) asked him for some mathematical theory behind the work and the guy was at a loss.
Gbemi, I agree with you very well. Your argument is finely developed. your name poses a sort of national origin . . . but nice argument to walk of.
Gbemi, I agree with you very well. Your argument is finely developed. your name poses a sort of national origin . . . but nice argument to walk of.
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Agreed, I'm surprised people would say such bad things about math and physics. Both are very worth while and difficult (more so than engineering if your at a decent school). I good friend of mine (physics) would help often with Micro E stuff even though he had never taken the courses. He certainly understood the math and concepts though.
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Have you ever seen the MIT "Nerd Pride" pocket protectors? Hilarious. One of my LOR writers used to have one taped to her file cabinet
Sorry for all the replies bunched together here. B/t turkey day and tiling my new house, I haven't been able to get to SDN.
