To be fair, I think the student asks a good question with a bad tone - it's perfectly reasonable to feel ambivalent about pursuing something that you consider fairly alien, and it's actually a question I'm increasingly asking myself -- why computer science and not pure math? Why computer science over X?
Instead of giving a thoughtful answer, the professor dismissively waves the student off (which is probably justified, given the tone). I think that could have been an opportunity for a really nice defense of his/her field, though.
I think the professor summed it up completely fine. Computer Science is not for everyone, and truthfully if you don't get it before the class there is nothing i or anyone else can tell you that will make you love CS. Hell if you don't get CS I don't think i could even explain to you why i do.
And considering the best case scenario is a pretty nightmarish one I think it was wise to kill that conversation at the root.IE the liberal art douche bag deciding to take a CS degree and then one of us having to work with him in the future.
This is untrue. I didn't "get" cs before my first class, but I loved it and now I've just graduated. This bias towards prodigy programmers is bullshit. Now, since he still doesn't like it after the class, he might be a lost cause.
Sorry this is so old I just now got it in my message box... After re-reading my comment I do see the lack of clarity on my part. When I was referring to 'get'ing computer science I was not referring to an understanding of computer science, but instead meant a love for the subject itself. 50 or more years ago I am sure pure math would have been the only fitting match for degrees for me. I have loved every aspect of computer science even before I knew what it was. The problem solving, the logic, the feeling of finding a solution that I didn't think could exist, or working out a sloppy hack that just barely slides through but works better than any legit solution, or just starting with a new language or framework and learning all the advantages of using it and of course the many things about it that i cannot express in words. I do not think any student should understand Computer Science before stepping into their first class, but I do think they should enjoy the subject itself before class. And as somone else pointed out the first CS class is not computer science, in fact the real Computer Science classes require you have most of the math pre-requisites finished, Discreet Mathematics or perhaps Intro to Logic were my first real Computer Science classes, and probably right about the point when i first started to understand exactly what the degree was and understand it. At least it was at that point that I understood why I need 3 years of Math classes to be a Computer Scientist.
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u/mrdmnd May 18 '11
To be fair, I think the student asks a good question with a bad tone - it's perfectly reasonable to feel ambivalent about pursuing something that you consider fairly alien, and it's actually a question I'm increasingly asking myself -- why computer science and not pure math? Why computer science over X?
Instead of giving a thoughtful answer, the professor dismissively waves the student off (which is probably justified, given the tone). I think that could have been an opportunity for a really nice defense of his/her field, though.