<p>Hahaha brew thanks, but I think he is interested in creating (engineering) weapons more than being in charge of them. :)</p>
<p>I don't know if he should be in charge of them.....</p>
<p>collegemon16, its not so much which field your son pursues; each of the big three of engineering (chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering), plus others such as aerospace engineering, can easily be applied to making weapons. It all depends on where (and for whom) he chooses to work. Your son has plenty of time to decide on these two things. For now, he should concentrate on getting the degree in the field that he enjoys the most. You can't learn to fly before you learn to walk.</p>
<p>True hye...but since he is 13</p>
<p>first he needs to go to high school and get good enough grades to apply to a college to get a degree. Whew, I think he is just curious about which degee is best to pursue for his interests and what kinds of jobs there might be in weaponry development/engineering, if any. Are all the jobs in weaponry military?</p>
<p>Oh... I assumed your son was already in high school.</p>
<p>Well, I can't really "tell" him which major to take. He has to decide this on his own, based on his interests.</p>
<p>If he hasn't already, he should visit this site:
<a href="http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm</a></p>
<p>Not ALL weaponry is military... You can go to Walmart and buy a gun. I think that the far majority of weaponry is military or military in origin.</p>
<p>Exactly, but someone somewhere is engineering weapons. He's just wondering what the best major is and what the job opportunities are in weaponry. Hye read my post near the top of the page where I said that my son was 13. :)</p>
<p>Thanks for the link. At this time his interests are quite diverse, but he is beginning to think about what he might enjoy doing for a career.</p>
<p>That would also depend what kind of weapons we are talking about. For the majority of small arms, the government contracts private companies to develop new ones. Pretty much every small arm in use in the Armed Forces has been developed this way (think back to the M1903 to current times like the HK 416). If thats his interest, I recommend a degree in Mech. Eng. and then working in R and D for a firm that gets a lot of govt. contracts (HK, Colt, Smith and Wesson...). </p>
<p>We all know that his interests will be quite different by the time he goes off to college :)</p>
<p>13 year olds shouldn't be thinking about post college plans. I still wanted to be a paleontologist when I was 13. </p>
<p>Hopefully, he'll grow out of the gun phase.</p>
<p>Hahaha someone has to engineer small weapons. Like I said this has been a fascination of his for as long as I can remember. He took a class last summer on chivalry mostly to learn all about ancient weaponry which was a sizeable part of the cirriculum. As to interests they have always been quite diverse. (he is a visionary on the Meyers Briggs Index) I do think mechanical engineering would be a good possible major for him because it is also quite diverse and would afford him the opportunity to explore many areas of interest. Does anyone know how closely engineers work with industrial designers? Are there any schools merging industrial design with engineering? These two disciplines seem as thought they ought to be combined together. (at least provide lots of opportunity to collaborate) Why don't more schools offer industrial design? I think a major/minor of engineering/industrial design would be amazing.</p>
<p>I'm not even coming at it from an ethical angle really. Small arms are just so passe. The weapons of the future will all be about automation and electronics - military robots and nanoscale swarms, emp blasts. Even the most revolutionary new gun is electronically fired:</p>
<p>Navy is working on electormagnetically fired railguns to replace missiles:</p>
<p>Pure mechanical weapons & Biological troops are increasingly being replaced. Electrical engineering or Mechanical engineering w/ a focus on control systems, would be much much more valuable than industrial design. Even if he decides to stay with "defense" and not work in something like energy or robotics, the latter two will make the weapons of today look as antiquated in 20 years as swords look to us now.</p>
<p>Wow merper68 thanks for the links/suggestions. I know he will find this information really interesting. :)</p>
<p>Happy to help. Here's one last link that sums up the US military's game plan for 2025 and onward:</p>
<p>Another awesome link! Thanks so much. I know he will enjoy reading this information when he comes back inside from making some sort of creation outdoors with bamboo and hotglue. :)</p>
<p>merper68 are you in the military?</p>
<p>I am actually an Industrial Engineering student. As far as my understanding goes, we work very closely with other engineers, paying particular attention to ergonomics, cost, efficiency, etc. Small arms design is anything but passe. You really think little robots are going to replace humans in as little as 20 years? Small arms have been evolving for 500 years now. Not going to stop anytime soon.</p>
<p>Nope, I'm about to start grad school in Mech Eng. Most of the projects I want to work are funded by DARPA, so I try to keep track of what they're up to. Plus, most of these projects are just fascinating to begin with. Robot armies? How can you not be interested in that?!</p>
<p>I don't think small robots are going to completely replace humans in 20 years. I think that small robots are already starting to replace humans(See Predator) and their bigger cousins will continue to do so at an increasing pace over the next 20 years. 500 years ago, there were probably less than 10000 people on the world working on actively improving weapons technology. Now there are easily more than 1 million. You can't compare the rate of change in the distant past to what's happening now, even if you don't belive in exponential growth.</p>
<p>Edit: Also note by small arms, I meant conventional, lock and hammer, mechanically fired small arms. Clearly, personal weapons will still be in use in the future, just that research will be more associated with the electronically fired versions.</p>
<p>I was including pretty much anything smaller than heavy mortars I suppose. Rocket launchers, machine guns, etc..go nuts!</p>