<p>Generally, from your experiences, how intellectual is the environment at UCLA? Note, by intellectual, I don't mean the classes(I'm well aware that UCLA is a top school with excellent academics); I'm talking about the students' attitude towards intellectual pursuits, i.e do they talk about classes a lot?; are they nerdy?; do they "brag" about how much they don't sleep b/c of classes?; do they engage in philosophical conversations etc?</p>
<p>Overall, not intellectual compared to HYPSM. I have yet to have a nice "philosophical conversation."</p>
<p>South campusers do talk a lot about classes, but probably not by your definition of intellectualism. I think they care more about the grades than anything.</p>
<p>Why do you call them 'south campusers'? Is there like a division between the north and south campus?</p>
<p>^yes, south campus is where the science/engineering majors are, other majors like art/humanities/soc are north campus. the campus isn't physically separated into two parts though</p>
<p>motus: all of the math/science/engineering classes are in the southern part of the campus, so generally the people there are more "nerdy"</p>
<p>grr jeyday beat me to it</p>
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do they "brag" about how much they don't sleep b/c of classes?
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<p>MrMoo does. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>UCLA intellectualism > USC intellectualism?</p>
<p>Uh oh...well at least it's on the UCLA forum.</p>
<p>If you're an intellectual and you feel like discussing intellectual topics, you'll be able to find them.</p>
<p>There's plenty of mme-lin's out there, trust.</p>
<p>Just curious, why are you mister pink now? Did you get banned or something?</p>
<p>It doesn't feel particularly intellectualistic (I don't think thats a word but w/e)... If you don't have anything to talk about you can talk about classes. People will brag/lie about how little they studied about some test and aced it every now and then, or how hard they studied for it and failed it. With most people, if you get too philosophical/theological, they'll get all shifty-eyed, and probably lose interest really fast. Just my experience...</p>
<p>The student body is too large and diverse to say anything definitively though.</p>
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Just curious, why are you mister pink now? Did you get banned or something?
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<p>Yes. Goddammit, didn't I go through this in another thread?</p>
<p>No, this school is generally, not 'intellectual.'
No, most tend to talk about classes in terms of grades.
Nerdy? South Campus nerdy or North Campus nerdy mostly in the sense of being pre-law or pre-med... mostly pre-professionalism.
Not sleeping goes along with being pre-professional.
Philosophical discussions? Well, in those more theoretical classes - like 'HMT cluster' and upper-division philosophy classes. </p>
<p>If you're looking for that general environment, you went to the wrong school. A better choice would have been Reed, Swarthmore, UChicago, or St. John's College (MD or NM).
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UCLA intellectualism > USC intellectualism?
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I think USC is even more pre-professional - business programs, engineering programs. It's silly to make those comparisons. IMO, UCLA and USC are advertised as all American schools - great sports and academics and balanced students.
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If you're an intellectual and you feel like discussing intellectual topics, you'll be able to find them. There's plenty of mme-lin's out there, trust.
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College Bowl is one place... Bruin Debate for more politics-oriented. Upper division, seminar type classes will aid you. I'm assuming Honors Collegium as well but I haven't tapped that resource.
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With most people, if you get too philosophical/theological, they'll get all shifty-eyed, and probably lose interest really fast. Just my experience...
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Strongly agree. </p>
<p>You'll have better luck in your upper-division Hum/SocSci courses -- especially in Phil, UG-Law, English, Comparative Literature, Honors Collegium, literature classes in Russia/German/French/Italian/Classics departments, and seminars generally...</p>
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f you're looking for that general environment, you went to the wrong school. A better choice would have been Reed, Swarthmore, UChicago, or St. John's College (MD or NM).
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<p>Well, I don't think I really have the stats to get into those schools. I got into Berkeley but I really wasn't into that crazy pressure cooker environment. Plus, the area is sketchy. </p>
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IMO, UCLA and USC are advertised as all American schools - great sports and academics and balanced students.
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<p>Actually, another reason I chose UCLA was because of the well balanced students. I would like to have the option to do many things and UCLA is a great place for that. But I don't know why does being well balanced and all American have to be mutually exclusive with being intellectual. </p>
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You'll have better luck in your upper-division Hum/SocSci courses -- especially in Phil, UG-Law, English, Comparative Literature, Honors Collegium, literature classes in Russia/German/French/Italian/Classics departments, and seminars generally...
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</p>
<p>I'm a south campus math major :(</p>
<p>I don't sleep, but 90% of the time its not b/c of classes. If that was the case, then I would probably be getting A's. My roommate is worse and is a straight up insomniac. I was telling some AMSA officers about his sleep patterns, and I guess they thought I was exaggerating. However, when they came over on several different occasions around 4pm-8pm, and discovered him sleeping EVERY SINGLE TIME. They were all like "WHAT THE ****, I thought you were kidding!" </p>
<p>But ****, I'm sleeping way more than I should because I'm out for summer. Not good either.</p>
<p>Go read about what I wrote on the whole studying/grades pecking order. Forgot what thread it was in. Some of you guys might have caught it.</p>
<p>From my personal experience, I've met a lot more intellectual people here at UCLA than in high school. When I say intellect, I don't mean just book smarts/good grades/talk about classes 24/7. I'm talking about people who you can have deep, profound conversations with.. about almost anything. My roommate was quite an intellectual person too, once you get to know him at least. We would often stay up really late and not sleep (read above) and talk around random ****.. and I'd have to say I don't regret losing sleep for those convos. Plus he was an international student, and had a lot of international friends who I've had the pleasure of meeting. LMFAO @ Jordan, one of the most insecure guys I've met at UCLA. It's pretty cool b/c they all are from different countries and present different views/opinions about random things, which I've learned a lot about.</p>
<p>To me, these are the things that make college so wonderful. You have a GIGANTIC pool of people with whom you may connect with, who can provide you with different views/perspectives/insights and broaden your horizons. Although people like this were still around in high school, they were much rarer. But it is really what you make of it. If you want to really connect with people intellectually and have "philosophical" discussions, then by all means, PURSUE IT. Initiate that sort of stuff in the conversations. Don't just expect it to happen. Oh yeah, TA's are REALLY chill to just hang out and talk to also. I've had a great experience with ALL of my TA's except one, which my math3a TA. But that was a language barrier issue, which sucked ass. Me and a few other students had lunch with our 14a TA for like 2-3 hours and we just kinda chilled and talked about really abstract stuff.. this happened like the 2nd week of school, and OMFG you have NO IDEA how ****ing HELPFUL it is when you have good rapport with your TA. He literally told me what was going to be on the quiz.. HAHA it was more like *opens the book, points at the practice problems and says "the questions will like this one, and this one and this one.. HAHAHA. </p>
<p>Pink, I learned from my LS2 TA that all the TA's grade our midterms/finals together with tons of ethanol in their system. Haha! Grading drinking games!</p>
<p>Oh yeah, I remember this one time when me and one of my floormates(someone who I always make fun of and joke around with) randomly had a 3-4 hour talk about crazy stuff.. we would engage in deep conversation about a subject, then rant about how most people are too stupid too understand, and then repeat with a diff subject. Yeah, arrogant, I know, I love you too. But anyways, it was really funny because after the convo, we had really great rapport and this person acted like we just had sex, it was hilarious. </p>
<p>On a side note. I just had like massive amounts of egg noodles, then like 2 hours later my uncle dragged me out to Pho 54. I think I just had like 2000+ Calories in noodles alone. On the bright side, I love oatmeal.</p>
<p>^Intellectualism. ;)</p>
<p>For some reason, I find your post sickening mrMOO. I can appreciate the gist but the excessive 'intellectualism' and 'deep conversations' - how many can there be in a lifetime and how could they be so congested until 5am repetitively? Surely there's an allotment for those? I hope I'm not sounding like an elitist - I have that tendency. Lets just drop 'intellectualism' all together - the label I mean. And lets ignore the pretensions. </p>
<p>Yours,
Emmeline</p>
<p>intellectual conversations? yeah about every day at school.</p>
<p>I have no idea what is going on.</p>
<p>Summary needed.</p>