<p>Based on what I've been told by a few (non MSE) professors and looking at old exams, it seems like MSE is more of a descriptive science than the heavy duty quantitative majors like EE and ChemE. To what extent is this true?</p>
<p>I guess I should thank RacinReaver in advance for answering this question and a couple of my previous ones.</p>
<p>Haha, I’d say it’s pretty true it’s more of a descriptive science than an analytical one. Generally we’re pretty happy with order of magnitude predictions since for many things it’s difficult to do much better than being right within a factor of two.</p>
<p>That said, you will need to know at least up through differential equations to understand what’s going on, we take a slightly more abstract version of math than my friends in MechE did (mostly their thermo consisted of plot reading to get values off and plug it into various equations). I did also have to learn the Navier-Stokes equations and be able to use them, but I have a feeling it was to considerable less extent than friends in ChemE or MechE. </p>
<p>Of course, if you want to get into mechanics or the real science of what’s going on in materials you’re going to need plenty of math to describe what’s going on. I forget who it is around here that’s said it, but at the upper graduate level all engineering fields kind of merge into one, as the math and techniques required to properly study them are all the same (just different boundary conditions).</p>
<p>I have a question on top of that. In scope of all engineering degrees, where does materials fit in difficulty-wise?</p>
<p>Like most, it all depends on what you’re good at. I know a number of people here have claimed their single materials classes to be one of their most difficult, but I found most of mine to be pretty straightforward.</p>
<p>If you’re worried about using higher level math I’d say it’s easier than EE or ChemE, but probably on par for about the rest. For the most part in MSE if you can understand the fundamental concept of what’s going on you’ll be able to develop a strong intuitive feel for what the answer should be and that helps out a ton with the work. I’d say my hardest classes consisted of Thermo (whole year of it) and my sophomore year required classes. It’s when homework problems really started to be a new style of question and they weren’t just busy work to make you learn the machinery you learned in class.</p>
<p>I think we need a giant stickied and locked post at the top that says in plain English that no one engineering major is the hardest and it is all relative to the individual.</p>
<p>My apologies.</p>
<p>And one describing the differences between EE, CE, and CS…</p>