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Why do so few people major in computer science?

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Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#221

Post by ashark »

lordnacho wrote: post #107

The grief factor of learning to code is on a different scale to every other major. One missing semicolon will take your whole tower down, and you realise this in the first day of practical exercises. Even if you are of the opinion that CS is math, and coding doesn't come into it, you will hit a coding wall early on. In fact, every exercise in CS has this problem. You add a new thing (eg inheritance), and it breaks. B…

I don't think it's even the programming that's the problem. There's a ton of Stupid Computer Shit we all know, mostly from messing around on our own time, that makes programming or doing anything else with computers much easier. A set of skills for navigating and troubleshooting issues, and a hard-earned intuition for where and how to look for answers.

My CS program was really easy and I still don't know how people who hadn't put hundreds to thousands of hours into picking up that stuff in the years before college made it through. Many didn't, I guess. With some programming background on top of that it was pretty much a cakewalk for me, but the poor n00bs....

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#222

Post by zild3d »

01572 wrote: post #216

To an audience of CS majors this will probably sound like trolling but honestly I have never used any software written by a "computer scientist" that I came to value and rely on -- software that I consciously chose to use. Whereas I have found such software on multiple ocassions written by mathematicians or persons in some other field, e.g., physics, etc. As a user of software , I do not believe that a computer scien…

Do you value and rely on any compilers? Operating systems?

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#223

Post by sien »

dahart wrote: post #130

Whoa, that chart seems really misleading. There are 3x more CS majors than math majors and 2x more than physics. The chart is showing derivatives, not absolutes. That basically undermines the title of the article. Looking at the graph, it's also super important to see the context before 2005 -- that start date adds significantly to the misleading impression this graph is giving. Math had more majors in 1970 than it d…

Fine comment.

I'd upvote multiple times if possible.

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#224

Post by nine_k »

pcunite wrote: post #219
01572 wrote: post #216

To an audience of CS majors this will probably sound like trolling but honestly I have never used any software written by a "computer scientist" that I came to value and rely on -- software that I consciously chose to use. Whereas I have found such software on multiple ocassions written by mathematicians or persons in some other field, e.g., physics, etc. As a user of software , I do not believe that a computer scien…

Programs that you enjoy using are put together by folks with the skills "product and user experience". If they know how to code, good.

I heard that separation of labor is a thing since Renaissance times or so. Does it ever happen in software industry?

Note that the separation may also be temporal ("...and now it's time to redo the UX").

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#225

Post by metaphor »

No discriminant between BS and BA flavors of CS. No numbers to capture those who minored in CS. No breakdown of engineering by discipline (in particular, CpE and EE). Interesting data, but it leaves much to be desired.

Surprising that there's no discussion of CS as a "tool" discipline in the same sense as math and stats are, especially at the bachelor level.

When I consider that "Engineering" comprises far more distinct disciplines than "Computer and information sciences", stats on the former are quite dismal. This becomes even more evident at the master's level[1]: for 2014-15, the number of master's degrees conferred in all engineering disciplines is ~25% less than the number CS bachelor's degrees in the same FY.

[1] https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d16/tables/dt16_323.10.a...

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#226

Post by learc83 »

01572 wrote: post #216

To an audience of CS majors this will probably sound like trolling but honestly I have never used any software written by a "computer scientist" that I came to value and rely on -- software that I consciously chose to use. Whereas I have found such software on multiple ocassions written by mathematicians or persons in some other field, e.g., physics, etc. As a user of software , I do not believe that a computer scien…

Do you use Gmail spam filtering? Google search? Windows? OS X? TCP/IP?

I can assure you that software you've came to value and rely on was written by "computer scientists".

So yes, your comment does sound like trolling. That or you're just completely misinformed.

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#227

Post by [deleted] »

01572 wrote: post #216

To an audience of CS majors this will probably sound like trolling but honestly I have never used any software written by a "computer scientist" that I came to value and rely on -- software that I consciously chose to use. Whereas I have found such software on multiple ocassions written by mathematicians or persons in some other field, e.g., physics, etc. As a user of software , I do not believe that a computer scien…

[deleted]

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#228

Post by [deleted] »

SamReidHughes wrote: post #212
elsombrero wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The grief factor of learning to code is on a different scale to every other major. One missing semicolon will take your whole tower down, and you realise this in the first day of practical exercises >In fact, every exercise in CS has this problem. You add a new thing (eg inheritance), and it breaks. But not only that, it might be broken because of a banal little syntax problem. That can be said for math as well, swi…

The difference with math is, you can get partial credit.

[deleted]

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#229

Post by Retric »

watwut wrote: post #173
lordnacho wrote: post #107

The grief factor of learning to code is on a different scale to every other major. One missing semicolon will take your whole tower down, and you realise this in the first day of practical exercises. Even if you are of the opinion that CS is math, and coding doesn't come into it, you will hit a coding wall early on. In fact, every exercise in CS has this problem. You add a new thing (eg inheritance), and it breaks. B…

> The grief factor of learning to code is on a different scale to every other major. One missing semicolon will take your whole tower down, and you realise this in the first day of practical exercises. I would say that this basically screams "badly taught programming". Missing semicolon does not take down work, it just needs to be put back in and ide should help you. "Even if you are of the opinion that CS is math, a…

I took a short course (1 credit hour) in Java when it was new enough that there where no IDE's. IMO, limiting courses to established languages is kind of a waste.

Re: Why do so few people major in computer science?

#230

Post by madengr »

adrianratnapala wrote: post #153
lordnacho wrote: post #107

The grief factor of learning to code is on a different scale to every other major. One missing semicolon will take your whole tower down, and you realise this in the first day of practical exercises. Even if you are of the opinion that CS is math, and coding doesn't come into it, you will hit a coding wall early on. In fact, every exercise in CS has this problem. You add a new thing (eg inheritance), and it breaks. B…

All this is true, and yet when I was a young'un, Engineering had a plenty high dropout rate. Higher than CS I think.

Yep, 66% or more dropped out.
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