<p>Physics is for cool kids.</p>
<p>I’m bio/pre-med and, yeah, there is a (major!) stereotype that all pre-meds are grade-grubbing soulless whores out for the highest GPA, stabbing everyone in front of them in the back. And, yes, there is some truth to that. Some people suck. But I try to take some social sciences classes (no gen eds. FTW!!) and I don’t freak until I get a B+ ;)</p>
<p>In the outside world, everyone thinks I’m super-smart for going pre-med. That’s kind of cool, even if it isn’t 100% true.</p>
<p>I’m marine bio, and when I tell them what I major in, they’re always like, </p>
<p>“Cool, you get to swim with whales/dolphins/walruses etc.!!” (which might be true to some extent, but there’s more to it than that)
or…
“So, what do you think about global warming?” err…
or…
<em>mumbles</em>…“Airhead”</p>
<p>Exhibit A:</p>
<p>“I want to major in Computer Science.”</p>
<p>“Oh… do you not like being around people?” </p>
<p>Exhibit B:</p>
<p>“What do you want to be?”</p>
<p>“Well…” </p>
<p>“You should consider going into the medical field but if you don’t want to use common sense, then you should work with computers.”</p>
<p>Sheesh.</p>
<p>Psychology
“Can you read my mind?” “here I drew a picture, tell me what it means” (come on it’s too common)</p>
<p>I really don’t think you can shed stereotypes off the ‘soft’ majors until later in life when one is successful. That’s the only way I think any major in the humanities or social sciences can gain any respect. In most situations, money speaks.</p>
<p>^^^
Huh?!?!?</p>
<p>Wow. The ignornance of intelligent people.</p>
<p>Psychology/Architecture
A professor mocked, “Psycho-Architorture!”</p>
<p>soft majors? I didn’t know it was soft to get in ph.D for let’s say…clinical psychology. -_-</p>
<p>don’t get all hyper-defensive, now. what he’s saying is that it’s hard for a college sophomore major in philosophy to not get stereotyped.</p>
<p>however, if he’s pursuing a Ph.D in modern French continental philosophy, he’s obviously become successful to some degree.</p>
<p>people see philosophy as an “easy” major because homework mainly consists of reading and writing papers. but you get many options of different kinds of philosophy to study about. such as philosophy of science, phil of math, etc. logic is required, and i’ve heard many people complain about its difficulty. but furthermore, there is intermediate logic, advanced logic, axiomatic set theory, etc. that the department has, and it isn’t only focused on political things. now i’ve heard that if you’re good at logic, you’re more likely to be good at programming, which gets highly praised for anyway. and since there’s so much “philosophy of ________”, philosophy of biology, philosophy of whatever… but people also have the choice of choosing easier philosophy classes. so, even though the philosophy department don’t have too much strict requirements, it really depends on what the person chooses to focus on, that makes the major hard for them or not.</p>
<p>applejack, I’m a social science major myself and I did not mean to come of as ignorant. What I meant was that social science and /or humanities are sometimes seen as ‘soft’ majors compared to the hard sciences or even business majors. Those that are in this situation know this. What is deemed to most as successful today is money - for those who are actually ignorant of majors that are considered a social science and humanities major are more than likely going to respond with a raised eyebrow and a “Huh? Why are you doing that - you’re wasting you time and better off with something practical.”
I have not met one person who asked me what my major was that did not raise an eyebrow. One time I was actually criticized by a woman in front of a group because my major to her was deemed impractical and a waste, the whole room went silent - I was 18 at that time.</p>
<p>^agree. whenever i tell someone what i’m currently doing, the first thing they ask is, “what’s that gonna get you?”, “what can you do with it”, “how much will they pay you”.</p>
<p>I didn’t realize so many people seem a bit uncomfortable introducing their major to others. Glad I’m not alone but it makes sense.</p>
<p>When I tell people my major, chemical engineering, they usually mention money or just go “that’s good” and say nothing else. </p>
<p>I’m always a bit concerned others will think I just chose one of the majors off the top of the “best paid straight out of college” lists.</p>
<p>International Relations and Political Science – it doesn’t help that I’m going to a school in Washington –</p>
<p>“So you want to be in Politics? You are a good liar.”</p>
<p>“Gonna marry a foreigner and bring her back here?”</p>
<p>The first one doesn’t bother me as much as the second because it’s partly true.</p>
<p>washington dc? whats wrong with foreign girls?
pre-med=smart. automatically. they should realize less than 40% of all premed majors get into medschool</p>
<p>[I’m always a bit concerned others will think I just chose one of the majors off the top of the “best paid straight out of college” lists.]</p>
<p>What’s wrong with that?</p>
<p>Others may think that you chose it because you wanted one of the hardest majors too.</p>
<p>blue147…what is your major?</p>
<p>
Funny. I almost have the opposite reaction.</p>
<p>so people think youre dumb because you say youre premed?</p>