Symbolic Systems Major

Colleges and Universities A-Z Stanford University
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<p>It would be difficult to double major in CS and symsys. The main reason for this is that they’re very similar–and so they require many of the same classes. Because Stanford allows you to double-count units for only a few classes (e.g. the math 51 series), this poses a problem in satisfying units for both majors–both require CS 106B, 103, 107, possibly 109 (depending on what you take to satisfy that requirement), etc. I believe the general Stanford policy is that if two majors require the same classes (and they can’t be double counted), then you apply the overlap courses to one of the majors, and then make up the units for the other major by taking additional classes in that department. So if you chose to make 106B, 103, etc. to count toward symsys, you have to take additional CS classes to make up for those “lost” units. I don’t think you would be able to get a minor in CS if you did symsys–almost the entire minor for CS is already required for symsys.</p>

<p>This same sort of problem happens between symsys and linguistics, but it’s much easier to get around. In fact, there is no linguistics course that you have to for both majors, but there are linguistics courses that can satisfy requirements in both. You’d have to coordinate your courses well.</p>

<p>But that’s granted that you even want to double major. Really, while it’s nice to say that you majored in both, there’s not much point, since CS now has tracks (and of course, so does symsys). So it really comes down to this: do you want to take philosophy and psychology courses (for symsys) or physics/electronics/math courses (for CS)?</p>

<p>As for the peer mentors, it was a program that they had long considered phasing out, and generally students didn’t care much. Why? Because most students had little contact with their peer mentors. Some didn’t have any.</p>

<p>Regardless, there is more than enough advising, for freshman and upperclassmen alike. Every residence has an academic dean and a resident dean, and most have resident fellows; you can talk to those who staff the majors, to professors (you are required to find a faculty member to advise you, eventually), to the staff for various programs (like PWR, etc.)–the list goes on. And of course you can always set up an appointment with a full-time adviser in the UAR, with same-day or next-day service. And of course there’s still plenty of informal peer mentoring, as well as various big sib/lil sib programs. Really, there’s no reason for anyone to feel that they don’t have anyone to give them academic (or other) advice.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the detailed and very helpful reply, Phantasmagoric. One more question occurs to me now: does Stanford tend to be flexible regarding the particular courses that may be taken in fulfillment of major requirements? E.g., would a freshman probably be able to enroll in higher-level courses if he has already completed the equivalents of several of the stated courses for the major, and demonstrated the requisite command of the material?</p>

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<p>Yes and no. You can enroll in just about any course you want (barring certain special-case restrictions); the professors don’t check to see that the students have the pre-reqs. As long as you think you can handle it, it’s fine.</p>

<p>However, that doesn’t mean that you can skip requirements for a major. If a major requires a course, you must take that course (or in some cases, have AP or transfer credit for it).</p>

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<p>Thanks, Phantasm. Can you also tell me more about your double CS and math major? Are there a lot of purely theoretical CS courses available within the department, and what kind of math courses are you pursuing on the other side? Do some CS courses overlap with the math major requirements? How big are the classes in CS and math, generally speaking (unless there is no general rule)?</p>

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<p>Whoa…I randomly wander back on CC after a few years of inactivity and find a symsys thread at the top of the Stanford board. Cool.</p>

<p>I’m a current undergraduate senior majoring in Symbolic Systems (Human-Computer Interaction concentration) at Stanford. I’m not even sure where to begin, but I guess I’ll just cherrypick a few things from this topic, and then I’ll answer specific questions if you have them.</p>

<p>

Slightly less brutal–in terms of fulfilling the minimum requirements. I don’t recall the exact unit count (it’s publicly available somewhere) but SymSys is slightly smaller than the engineering majors. And, importantly, it has significantly more ‘fuzzy’ classes than CS does. But I’d also say that SymSys’s fuzzy classes all have a techie inclination such that you can view the fuzzy class through a technical lens and still succeed. Case in point: even in the philosophy class I’m taking (PHIL80: Mind, Matter, and Meaning - sounds very fuzzy, right?) you can answer the big fuzzy pondering questions with techie topics like first-order logic and automata theory. </p>

<p>Also, some of my friends in AI might argue that the SymSys AI track is much harder than most of the engineering majors.</p>

<p>

Of course I have to speak up here. :slight_smile: You might be right that there are strictly more software engineering job opportunities for CS majors, but that ignores several important factors. First, CS majors and SymSys majors don’t necessarily compete for the same jobs. I’ll discuss this in detail below. Second, practically every company looking for a CS major would be equally happy with a EE or SymSys or MCS major who knows their computer science. These majors all require a pretty significant slate of CS courses anyway, and after the core it’s just a matter of where your interests lie. </p>

<p>The most visible niche for Symbolic Systems students with a B.S. in HCI/AI/CogSci is the Product Manager/UEX Designer/Interface Engineer role (quite common in Silicon Valley, among both startups and big companies). These positions require someone who is very familiar with the technical side of software development, but who has skills beyond coding. The ideal candidate is often someone who, in addition to a significant amount of technical expertise, has an understanding of psychology and user interface design. The HCI concentration in SymSys is pretty much a dedicated four-year program that prepares undergrads for this type of job. </p>

<p>Now, this definitely works both ways: I’d say that companies looking for a Product Manager would be equally happy to hire a CS major who had taken a lot of Psychology/HCI/SymSys classes. So, I guess it’s just a matter of what you’d rather focus on.</p>

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<p>JimmyEatWorld, can you please tell us more about the symsys AI track, to the extent you are familiar with it? Is it a somewhat less “fuzzy” concentration, and what do its graduates tend to do afterwards? Thanks.</p>

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<p>Those who don’t go to grad school often work in jobs in the valley. I don’t have any systemic data, but I personally know several AI folks who got pretty interesting algorithmic positions at software companies like 23andme, and another who went into algorithmic trading. Chris Cox, director of product at Facebook, is a SymSys AI grad from 2004.</p>

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<p>Thanks, Jimmy. I’m responsible for advising a student who would arrive having completed essentially all, of the required courses for the CS major at another university while in high school, and who is also intensely interested in linguistics, philosophy and several other areas. He is interested in the symsys program for its interdisciplinary nature but I think he’d want to stay mainly on the mathematical/theoretical CS side of things. It sounds like the symsys program may be sufficiently flexible to allow this kind of customization, correct? Or would he be better served with a CS/linguistics double major?</p>

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<p>Jimmy: A real symsys major! I was beginning to think they were mythological. :slight_smile: What do you know about post-grad opportunities for the natural languages concentration? It looks like mainly computational linguistics.</p>

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<p>I think most Natural Language people go to grad school (well, a lot of Stanford undergrads in general go to grad school, so…). Some wind up in academia. Those who go into industry often find jobs at tech companies - a lot of software companies, big and small, have use for NLP/computational linguistics folks. NLP has a lot of applications in machine learning, AI, and data mining, which are all pretty hot fields. </p>

<p>I don’t know a whole lot about the Linguistics major, but I do know it’s much smaller than SymSys in terms of number of students. Also, the only people I know who are majoring in Linguistics are fuzzy types interested in social linguistics; the computational linguists I know are all SymSys. Many of the higher level computational linguistics courses are actually in the CS department. Again, anecdotal information, but take it for what it’s worth.</p>

<p>@zenkoan: Given his interest in CS, linguistics, and philosophy, SymSys sounds like a pretty good fit. There are definitely plenty of courses in the mathematical/theoretical CS side, especially in concentrations like AI, NatLang, and Applied Logic. I’m curious how the transfer credit situation would work out, since Stanford probably won’t allow him to bring over an entire CS major’s worth of credit. In any case, I think he’ll be able to find some classes in the Stanford CS department that would offer some new challenges, and certainly those could be applied to the SymSys major.</p>

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<p>Jimmy, I appreciate your input very much. Re: transfer credits, I don’t think there is any concern re: transfer of the existing credits; it’s more a matter of placement in appropriate classes, and depth/breadth of the offerings. I took a look at the symsys web pages also, and it looks like a really great, uniquely-suitable fit. The hardest part for him would probably be selecting just one concentration or track–several of them are likely to be very appealing! BTW,have you decided re: grad school for yourself, vs. a position upon graduation? </p>

<p>Oh, and I have been requested to inquire: how’s the food on campus? ; )</p>

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<p>Yeah, I probably should have said this earlier, but the symsys.stanford.edu website has pretty comprehensive information about the nuts and bolts of the major if you dig far enough. And if the student in question is going to be able to transfer a ton of credit, it seems like he might be able to pass out of some CS requirements, which might give him more time to pursue a second concentration or a double major.</p>

<p>I’m glad we have this topic - the majority of incoming students have never heard of the Symbolic Systems major. Most of those who eventually decide on the major for themselves do not go into Stanford thinking they’ll be SymSys; they discover it once they’re on campus. I think more people might choose the major if they knew what it entailed.</p>

<p>To answer your questions - I’m currently looking for a full-time job upon graduation. I’d like to go back to school for a Masters somewhere down the line, but I think some industry experience would be good for me right now. I’m particularly looking at product management/software engineering positions at software startups.</p>

<p>The food on campus is generally very good. I lived in Stern Hall (big residence hall with a big dining hall) for my first two years, and I think the food there is mostly considered the worst on campus - but I still thought it was great. Last year I wanted a cheaper option, so I lived in the apartments on campus and cooked for myself. This year I’m living in a self-op house, which means we have a private chef who cooks two meals a day for the 45 of us, and we also have an open kitchen. I think it’s a pretty sweet deal.</p>

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<p>Jimmy, thanks again, and may you locate a dream position featuring cool people, fascinating projects, and maybe some options (for when that startup goes public : ) ).</p>

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<p>“Also, the only people I know who are majoring in Linguistics are fuzzy types interested in social linguistics; the computational linguists I know are all SymSys. Many of the higher level computational linguistics courses are actually in the CS department.”</p>

<p>I agree that the computational linguists are mostly in symsys, though the possibility in CS is easy. Also, all of the upper-division compling courses are listed in the linguistics department, and almost all of them are cross-listed in the CS department.</p>

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<p>Well, since symsys actually has a compling track, it makes sense to major there.</p>

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<p>Symsys doesn’t have a “compling” track, but a natural language one which has compling requirements (among others). Also, in terms of subject matter by course requirements, either CS or symsys makes sense for compling.</p>

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<p>Ah–I think of the natural languages track as essentially a compling concentration. The concentration courses ([Symbolic</a> Systems Program](<a href=“http://symsys.stanford.edu/ssp_static?page=concentrations/natural-language.html]Symbolic”>http://symsys.stanford.edu/ssp_static?page=concentrations/natural-language.html)) are composed entirely of CS and Ling courses (some Phil/Psych ling cognates, but those are necessary in any ling study). In fact, since the 6-course concentration requires only 3 distribution “areas,” you could take all 6 courses in “mathematical/computational foundations,” “computational linguistics,” and then one of several different ling specializations. The CS major doesn’t make much sense for compling to me, at least when symsys is available as an option (only at Stanford), because of the engineering requirements–more suited to artificial intelligence than linguistics. Traditionally linguistics has been considered an interdisciplinary social science, with roots in anthropology.</p>

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<p>I saw you were interested in LAC’s. Pomona College’s philosophy department and neuroscience/psychology/cog sci departments are some of the best in the country. The students I know in these majors adore the professors. You should look into it.</p>

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<p>I wouldn’t consider the natural language track to be a compling track–you can do compling within the track, but you can also avoid compling by taking courses in the 4 other areas. So “natural language” is an appropriate generalization.</p>

<p>Also, while CS has engineering requirements (superfluous for compling, as well as AI), symsys has philosophy/psychology requirements (also superfluous for compling), in about the same number.</p>

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<p>^Fair enough. I guess I just see compling as a “softer” discipline, closer to phil/psych/cogsci than to engineering.</p>