<p>^Well I'd agree with you that Engineering is more intense major than dance at many schools, but that's not because of the difficulty of the subject, but because of the way it is taught.</p>
<p>If someone wanted to be a professional dancer and a top choreographer I bet they'd spend hours and hours dancing every day and kill themselves to get succeed. </p>
<p>An engineering major will have to kill themselves in a different way to succeed.</p>
<p>If someone can't dance and tried to get 4.0 as a dance major, I can gaurantee you that they'd either give up or be practicing ALL NIGHT. If you don't have rhythm you probably won't ever have it, but to get something close to it (to get a good GPA) I know you'd have no sleep practicing. </p>
<p>And that also depends on how rigorous the profs are too though.</p>
<p>Still, you might say, well the dance majors on average get better GPAs and sleep more. So, where is the normalization? Why isn't it the same across the board?</p>
<p>Maybe the dance teachers aren't hard enough and the engineering teachers are too hard. That's one reason. The second is that to be a dance major, you must LOVE it. You don't find dance majors who aren't very good dancers and are struggling, they ALL love it. Yet you find a lot of engineering majors struggling who probably don't love it; they just want a nice starting salary and are somewhat math-bent (not enough to be in an engineering major though).</p>
<p>It's a mixture of the two things really--at least I think so.</p>
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You can say Engineering is harder than English, Dance, Psychology and such.</p>
<p>You just can because it is.
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<p>At the undergraduate level, for a variety of reasons, you'd usually be correct. But trust me when I say most engineers would drop like flies in, say, an English Masters or PhD program. The disciplines aren't inherently easy. Many departments have just chosen to go easy on their undergrads.</p>
<p>The dance majors here are probably the most intense majors at the school. The dance performance students have a whole ton of classes they need to take in dance, as well as all the GEs, plus they have to find time to practice and sometimes to be part of the two dance companies we have. The dance pedagogy kids are in class basically from 9 in the morning until 8 at night. And they still have to practice and do their GE hw. And the dance management people have to take business classes, dance classes, and GEs. Plus all of them are going into way more competitive fields than an engineer is going to have to deal with. I could never have enough effort to be a dancer.</p>
<pre><code>Math and Science are easier than liberal arts/dance/music/etc.
In math and science there are right answers and wrong answers. In humanities one must read the teacher's mind to get a good grade. Mind reading is much harder than understanding math and science priciples.
</code></pre>
<p>As a rule, people do tend to get better grades in a general psychology class than a general chemistry class, even without a curve. More people also tend to hate math and science. That's why you don't see a lot of nerdy asian kids in the humanities. Atoms and molecules are just more abstract than human behaviour. Of course a chemistry major would not be able to become a professional psychologist, but that doesn't make psychology comparable to chemistry. You can't use that as an argument, because it's like saying engineers can't play football or speak french, so playing football requires just as much intellectual ability.</p>
<p>
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1. the academic course of instruction at a college intended to provide general knowledge and comprising the arts, humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences, as opposed to professional or technical subjects.
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<p>
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Academic disciplines, such as languages, literature, history, philosophy, mathematics, and science, that provide information of general cultural concern: The term liberal arts connotes a certain elevation above utilitarian concerns. Yet liberal education is intensely useful (George F. Will).
<p>I think the reason why humanities majors believe every major is equally hard is because they belive everything is just that-equal. Sociology was basically created to defend the talentless, "its cultural reltavism, dude-who says selling crack isn't as hard as astro physics, blah blah blah". I'm sorry, sociology and women's studies majors don't make money because they're not smart, not because they don't care about money. Really, you don't care about money, you say? Let me guess, you've got a nice big trust fund that let's you study whatever you want? Well I don't. I just have to go back to my neighborhood to be in a participant observation study of the inner city, I don't need to take a sociology class. I'm not a materialist, I'm a realist. I need a return on investment, and guess what, the majors that have a calcuable return happen to be harder.</p>
<p>Really? The average grade in my Psyc 101 class is a 79 right now. This is at Rice University. Oddly enough, someone told me the average grade for some math class midterm was a 94. This statement, for whatever reason, angered me.</p>
<p>I'm from Chicago, I'm somewhat poor, and in no way have anything close to a trust fund.</p>
<p>You're an anomaly wutangefinancial because actually it's the rich, upper-class kids who are concerned with money and 'making millions' a lot more than kids from more modest backgrounds.</p>
<p>If you want to worship the Almighty Dollar wutang, you go right ahead. I'll be relaxing on a beach laughigh my a** off at you while you run in your hamster wheel. I consider myself a pretty intelligent person and am capable of studying both the humanities and performing excellently in the math/sciences, however I choose not to study math/science or necessarily get specific career training while in college (especially since many people get careers outside their major, and typically change careers 5 times). Versatility, in fact, is probably a more valuable asset.</p>
<p>Anyhow, my priorities in life are many focused around PEOPLE, CREATING MEANINGFUL RELATIONSHP, and genearally doing WHAT I WANT TO DO, and pursing MY PASSIONS, not becoming some corporate sellout or "going back to the grind" being an engineer crunching numbers for 50 hours a week. I'm a MAN, and I'll do whatever the f*** I want to, even if that doesn't involve equations and the scientific method.</p>
<p>Meanwhile you can console yourself with an expensive car (which apparently you need for your self-worth and self-esteem, rather than having pride in your own qualities---- pathetic), work from early morning to late night crunching numbers like a mindless calculator in your fortress of solitude(passionless robot following theories of other scientists, not even creating your own), and then cry yourself to sleep in your big ole house with the armchair that has 4 cupholders and vibrates at 6 different modes.</p>
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You're an anomaly wutangefinancial because actually it's the rich, upper-class kids who are concerned with money and 'making millions' a lot more than kids from more modest backgrounds.
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<p>Not so sure about that point. The trust fund babies don't usually flock to engineering and science. Most of the kids in my ME class are from relatively modest backgrounds.</p>
<p>Some of the poor major in things with "no money," and some of the rich go to those with it. About general trends, I'm not sure. Pull up some data like good sociologists to actually provide support for claims.</p>
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I think the reason why humanities majors believe every major
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<p>I haven't met too many who do. You frame this as if all such people do. </p>
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Sociology was basically created to defend the talentless
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<p>Sociology is very useful and informative if done well. I don't think the purpose of its invention was to defend the talentless, but rather to formalize methods of understanding what happens in various socieities and trying to figure out why they happen.</p>
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I'm sorry, sociology and women's studies majors don't make money because they're not smart, not because they don't care about money.
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<p>What if they go to law school or into IBanking? Do you think consultant firms care what their students from Ivies or Ivy equivalents majored in while they were undergraduates? How about law or medical schools?</p>
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the majors that have a calcuable return happen to be harder.
<p>
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I need a return on investment, and guess what, the majors that have a calcuable return happen to be harder.
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<p>Sometimes yes...sometimes no. I don't really think that business is as hard as physics, yet I bet that the average business major makes more money than someone with a physics BA.</p>
<p>I wonder what the average business and average physics majors make. Business is what, the second most popular major in America, if not the first? Who would have that data, or any data from a large number of business or any major?</p>
<p>I work with a guy who majored in Russian Studies and East Asian Philosophy. Do you know what he does for a living? He has a job as a apartment administrator, he also owns a couple of lofts on the side which he rents out to people (mostly students and 20-somethings) and on he produces limited run hip hop records from underground rappers from the 80's which go for $100+ per ALBUM (he purposely limits their runs). This guy made $25,000 (tax free) in the span of six hours last week just selling 100 copies of a highly limited edition EP online. No, he isn't laughing it up at thug's mansion or taking his Hummer Limo through North America but the man has his s**t straight. </p>
<p>And before you ask, yes, there is a market for obscure rappers from the 80's making comeback EPs and albums.</p>
<p>If you're majoring in the humanities instead of the sciences or engineering, you're most likely doing it because you love what you're doing rather than because you're worried about making money or your parents are making you. It's also naturally easier for the average student to understand and read things written in plain english and in terms of real-life situations than having to learn a lot of abstract scientific or mathematical jargon. Humanities also depend more on personal skills rather than pure genius, so it's pointless to compare the two in terms of which one is more intellectually difficult.</p>
<p>
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If you're majoring in the humanities instead of the sciences or engineering, you're most likely doing it because you love what you're doing rather than because you're worried about making money or your parents are making you.
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</p>
<p>Eh, I'm not so sure you can conclude this. For example, there are plenty of people in the humanities or social sciences because they figure it's easier for them to get a better GPA and want to go to a top law or medical school. I think many science/math/cs/engineering majors have a passion for what they study, although it seems many do not. But many people in the humanities/social sciences study it because it's easier for them. Like before, show me some data about self-reported motivation (and some data about what people tend to lie about) and we'll see if it's "most likely." :) Certainly there's a good chance this is generally one big motivation, but "most likely?" Eh. </p>
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It's also naturally easier for the average student to understand and read things written in plain English and in terms of real-life situations than having to learn a lot of abstract scientific or mathematical jargon.
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</p>
<p>I think this is correct, but plenty of the humanities are filled with jargon, and philosophy jargon is very sciencesque. But anyway, critical theory and modern literary and film criticism has boatloads of strange technical terms that basically never emerge in the average persons life, and boatloads of hard-to-read writers (Derrida, Foucault, Butler, for example).</p>
<p>
[quote]
Humanities also depend more on personal skills rather than pure genius, so it's pointless to compare the two in terms of which one is more intellectually difficult.
<p>The social sciences are just that-- sciences. Many people fail to realize this.</p>
<p>Operational definitions, hypothesies, experiments, theories, probability, variables, cuasation-- yes the social sciences have all of these. It's not simply "Let's pull something out of my a** time!!" like many rather unintelligent sci/eng majors believe.</p>
<p>But really, no one cares about who has the hardest workload or who thinks they are the smartest. Complaining about your workload at top schools usually comes off as bragging, and no one around you cares to hear it.</p>
<p>"Really? The average grade in my Psyc 101 class is a 79 right now. This is at Rice University. Oddly enough, someone told me the average grade for some math class midterm was a 94. This statement, for whatever reason, angered me."</p>
<p>That doesn't mean its any harder than say...math. Throw in a bunch of math or engineering majors in there and I guarantee that psych avg will shoot up.</p>