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Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
181–190 of 452 posts
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#182Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is the social status of computer scientists zero, or do computer scientists choose not to go into politics or other leadership positions? I suspect it's the latter [anecdotal; opinion; citation needed]. CS people are a tribe on their own (if I may generalize); I've not met anyone with an interest in participating in politics. They have strong opinions on politics, but not to the point where they're willing to represe…
The creator of PHP's Xdebug (Derick Rethans) unsuccessfully stood for local elections recently. I can't think of many others though!
We need "proportional representatives". So people who are known national but not locally can gain access to congress.
It also helps against gerrymandering.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#183Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think part of this is the limitations of interest that come from a film. You can write a whole movie about an electrical engineer building robots and visually show the struggles along the way. If you compare that to a software engineer searching for another fucking memory leak or something then it's just not going to be as visually interesting. An interesting thing about this is that I think it's easier to show in…
Valgeind and vim are both pretty neat looking IMO. Showing the real tools occasionally is something I’ve enjoyed seeing in some recent Sci-Fi movies. Tron Legacy and Chappie are both examples and even though the end result was unrealistic I thought they did a neat job showing the engineer working for years tediously on the project.
> I thought they did a neat job showing the engineer working for years tediously on the project.
I don't think that would look very appetizing for someone considering their career options...
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#184There's one other possible, additional reason. I recently asked a 17-year-old high school senior who is heading to college what she's planning to study, and she said it would be mathematics, biomedical engineering, or some other kind of engineering. She's self-motivated -- says she will be studying multi-variate calculus, PDEs, and abstract algebra on her own this summer. She maxed out her high school math curriculum…
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Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#185Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is the social status of computer scientists zero, or do computer scientists choose not to go into politics or other leadership positions? I suspect it's the latter [anecdotal; opinion; citation needed]. CS people are a tribe on their own (if I may generalize); I've not met anyone with an interest in participating in politics. They have strong opinions on politics, but not to the point where they're willing to represe…
As an engineer many political compromises make no sense to me to the extent I cannot support it. Compromising between, say, quality of a solution and the available resources to implement said solution makes sense to me and it is clear what the trade-offs are beforehand. A political compromise to keep all parties involved happy that mixes parts of totally different solutions and creates a system you know beforehand it…
I think you hit the nail on the head and that this is one of the primary psychological reasons many programmers don't pursue politics.
I studied psychology and communications and so much of my studies and to an extent my aspiration were in the political/communications/leadership/management field, where in my earlier teens I was I more focused on programming and anything nerdy.
After university, I realized that I didn't (yet?) want to professionally go in the direction of my studies, so I dusted off my PHP knowledge and started 'doing websites'.
Since then, it's become clear to me that I generally prefer and thrive in this world, much as I sometimes miss the 'attending x meetings, being involved with y projects, going to z meetups' side of things just a little bit.
What I've noticed is a few things: 1) these two 'worlds' seem very distinct and I can't switch between the two easily, 2) the more time I spend in 'programmer mode', the harder it is to draw from the 'political compromise' / meetings well, not just in ability but also in patience. I've had to learn to 'manage' and make sure to feed both these separate energies to do my job as a freelancer/consultant.
For example, if I know that I have a meeting with a client on Tuesday afternoon and it's preceded by a few days of serious, focused programming, I make sure to at the very least keep Tuesday empty until the meeting, and ideally some of Monday. When I don't do this the world won't end, but I notice that I'm much worse at handling the improvisational nature of a meeting. I also need more time to prepare for the various permutations of the conversation I imagine might become true.
On the other hand, if I haven't done much programming for a while, I tend to be much better at handling the vague, suboptimal, compromise-focused stuff. And perhaps I get sloppier with my code too, but I'm not sure if that is true and it strikes me as a bit too neat to be true. Still.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#186Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't think CS is a high social status field at all. I totally agree with you. I believe this is one of the factors why women hesitate to enter the field. They are more socially aware than we are. Also, even in IT areas, technical capable people are relegated. We get good salaries but we don't get fancy titles. We are the only profession that allows to be managed by outsiders. Financial firms(and finance departme…
>They are more socially aware than we are. Is there any evidence that women are more likely to choose careers with high social prestige? I find this doubtful, since in North America at least the traditionally female-dominated job sectors seem to be the ones with lower social prestige. Compare the prestige of a nurse with a cardiac surgeon: which is more stereotypically male?
This also isn't true in places other than North America. In countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, there is way more gender parity in IT than in the USA.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#187I don't think CS is a high social status field at all . You're deluding yourselves. Outside of our peers also in the industry nobody cares that you're a staff engineer at Google. Absolutely nobody. They'll assume you're doing IT work like the characters in the IT Crowd if they even bother to think about it at all and haven't already walked away. Here's a concrete example to make it really obvious. How many computer s…
Computer science is pretty esoteric, there may be physicists but are their theoretical physicists?
Also, it's a relatively young field really, in terms of the HoL.
Lord Sugar ran Amstrad, a computer company, but he doesn't strike me as even being a programmer or electronic engineer (I could be wrong). But HoL is a sort of upper-upper management type gig AFAICT.
Should computer scientists have some special social status? I imagine it's like, Idk, soil science, people probably don't know it exists and then probably think you're a farmer (IT support/Programmer).
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#188Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is the social status of computer scientists zero, or do computer scientists choose not to go into politics or other leadership positions? I suspect it's the latter [anecdotal; opinion; citation needed]. CS people are a tribe on their own (if I may generalize); I've not met anyone with an interest in participating in politics. They have strong opinions on politics, but not to the point where they're willing to represe…
Scientists - not just CS, but biologists, chemists, etc. - are not in elected leadership positions very much. I agree they are frequently not willing to represent. But again - why? A few opinions: * scientists (computer, life, or otherwise) do not think their talents are best used in making public policy. There are so many other ways those talents and intelligence could be used * perhaps worse pay (though the benefit…
I remember reading somewhere that the Chinese government is full of engineers/STEM degree holders, Physics, Civil, etc as opposed to lawyers in the U.S.
Assuming that's true, it makes sense from a 30,000ft level. CCP requires leaders to meet some socio-economic goal and that requires competency and a loose ability to apply scientific methodology.
In the U.S. it's much more important to argue your case, sound good and wiggle your way through the rules of law to get your way.
The above is an obviously charitable view of the Chinese system, but I can't help but feel that the U.S. has become too comfortable and apart from reality which this pandemic is now checking us for.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't think CS is a high social status field at all. I totally agree with you. I believe this is one of the factors why women hesitate to enter the field. They are more socially aware than we are. Also, even in IT areas, technical capable people are relegated. We get good salaries but we don't get fancy titles. We are the only profession that allows to be managed by outsiders. Financial firms(and finance departme…
Please don't assume everyone on HN is male.
Vast majority of users on HN are male... He is just talking to them.
Re: Why do so few people major in computer science? (2017)
#190And yet, it feels like it's increasingly competitive to get into a prestigious CS program?