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I should have loved biology too

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Re: I should have loved biology too

#151

Post by milesrout »

bruce511 wrote: post #138
999900000999 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I basically found this in college too, I quickly gave up on computer science as a major. I'd rather just go out and learn how to build what I want to build versus hearing a 3-hour lecture about how the jvm works. The answer is it's magic and no one cares, now let's go build some games

Firstly, and this is worth pointing out, "computer science" is not about programming. It's about science, in this case specifically the science that makes computers work. At school I thought "computer science" meant "programming" - which it doesn't. So well done for recognizing this before wasting your much time. (Seriously, not sarcastic.) programming can easily be learned outside college. To other general readers h…

This is a myth. Computer science absolutely is about programming. The science that makes computers work is called physics.

There are theoretical parts of computer science, but it is fundamentally a practical subject. All of it is in service to programming. Type systems are about typing programs. Algorithms are implemented using programs. Data structures are for use in programs.

The very worst computer science lecturers are those that forget it is a practical subject and try to teach it like abstract mathematics, because they believe (whether they realise they believe it or not) that it is more prestigious to teach abstract concepts than practical concrete things.

It is the same in mathematics, where unfortunately there has developed a tradition since Bourbaki of trying to teach abstract notions as fundamental while concrete problem solving is left to the engineers. The result is that many engineers are much stronger mathematicians than many mathematically-trained students, and those students have to relearn the practical foundations of the subject before they can make progress at the graduate level. If they don't, they get stuck doing what looks like maths, but is actually just abstract roleplaying.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#152

Post by irishsultan »

andsoitis wrote: post #126
gh0stcat wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an absurd take. We should not bend language around ignorance. There is a beauty to effort. Please take a second to explore this for yourself.

Tbh, I’m more critical of commonly confused words in English like affect and effect, or discrete and discreet. In more forgiving of mixing up homophones, even if one of them is a registered trademark (Segway).

Aren't discrete and discreet homophones?

Re: I should have loved biology too

#153

Post by abletonlive »

juped wrote: post #137
abletonlive wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually it's not an absurd take at all. The absurd take is that we "should not bend language around ignorance." That's precisely how language changes over time. Language is not a strict set of rules. It's based on understanding and consensus, so sometimes things that are "wrong" do end up being accepted. I suggest this as a great introduction into what languages are and how they evolve over time https://www.amazon.c…

[flagged]

Was that the point? Don't forget that you're on hackernews, not reddit. Strawmans are less accepted in this community. Individually, you are neither a consensus that was described nor did anybody in this thread implied that "all errors of usage are correct" and accepted. Your sarcasm is unwarranted and provides little value to this conversation.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#154

Post by milesrout »

hfgjbcgjbvg wrote: post #11
kleiba wrote: post #2

A while ago, I taught CS for a year in a local high school. I can very much relate to the notion of "astonishing facts were presented without astonishment": as a teacher, you don't have the freedom to teach whatever you want (of course), but you're very tightly bound to a curriculum that's developed by the state government. And for CS, this curriculum was so uninteresting and uninspiring (what a surprise: 13 year old…

Imagine if they taught the history of English to kids before they could read

The history of English is taught in English classes. Historical context is important and interesting. You don't really understand a subject without knowing a bit of its history.

My favourite classes were those where we didn't just get taught facts and theorems but we also got taught a bit about who proved the theorem for the first time, who discovered this fact, what this algorithm was first used for, etc. So much easier to remember too.

This is one of the best things about studying law: the very nature of it makes it impossible to teach it without the historical context.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#155

Post by milesrout »

tqi wrote: post #90
PicassoCTs wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those curiculums developed by sould-dead gremiums in consensus on the minimum knowledge you goto have are a blight on western civilization. Instead of giving students the ability to discover a topic, or built something they are interested in themselves and then give them a understanding and fascination with the discoverers who have gone before them. Instead they kill the subject.. I must confess, it gives my dry old…

Ok... what would you do differently? Keep in mind you have to educate millions of students across an enormous spectrum of abilities, socioeconomic backgrounds, and interests.

No you don't. There is a narrow range of abilities at each level if students are properly held back when they haven't mastered the material.

Their interests are built by what they are taught. "Socioeconomic background" is a tautology. Their backgrounds are irrelevant.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#156

Post by JR1427 »

Balgair wrote: post #66

Aside: Hey, a lot of fellow biologists here! A few questions: Is there a 'hacker news' for biology that I'm missing out on? Where do you get your biology news from? Where do you think the field/s are going? Is bio harder than other STEMs? I'm a neuroscientist/bioengineer by training and profession. I followed the path that a lot of commenters here did too, in that I came back to bio after a harder STEM career (physic…

I have a PhD in cell biology, as well as post-doctoral research experience. I'm now a software engineer for a big chip designer.

> Is there a 'hacker news' for biology that I'm missing out on?

Not that I know of. Could be cool. I produced a prototype platform that was a searchable DB of all papers published on PubMed, with a comment and karma system. The idea was to incentivise continued debate on published papers. Currently discredited papers continue to get cited for many years, because almost no-one publishes their critiques once the paper is published.

> Where do you get your biology news from?

Back in the lab, we would mostly just closely follow our small field with automated searches of PubMed. We'd find out about wider stuff by attending talks and speaking to other scientists. Often new and exciting things will take years to publish, so you would often find out before publication via talks.

> Is bio harder than other STEMs?

Only because the traditional high-school and university education in biology does not prepare people for the realities of cutting-edge bio research. I did a load of coding, image analysis, complex microscopy, chemistry etc etc, during my PhD and post-doc, none of which was taught during my degree or high school.

To thrive in biology research, you have to be comfortable not knowing about a thing, but figuring out how to do the thing, which likely no-one has done before.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#157

Post by darkwater »

ern wrote: post #144
1auralynn wrote: post #39

The field of biology was created by people who love to classify/name things. This has resulted in what we have now: A subject where the prerequisite to understanding is the ability to read long passages of text littered with jargon and visualize what that might represent. Even if everyone's reading skills were where they should be, the second part is not a super common skillset. It's one of the reasons why I work in…

The use of latin doesn't help either. "Cytoplasmic net" (or better yet "plasma net") is a lot easier to understand, visualise and remember than "endplasmic reticulum".

If you are an English speaker. If you are native in a Latin-based language, "reticulum" is pretty clear (reticolo, retículo, réticule etc). So, it's just a point of view and dictaded by the most used language within research/education at a particular point in time.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#159

Post by tlb »

kleiba wrote: post #2

A while ago, I taught CS for a year in a local high school. I can very much relate to the notion of "astonishing facts were presented without astonishment": as a teacher, you don't have the freedom to teach whatever you want (of course), but you're very tightly bound to a curriculum that's developed by the state government. And for CS, this curriculum was so uninteresting and uninspiring (what a surprise: 13 year old…

What a horrendous crime, to turn a fascinating subject into a boring curriculum to be forced on teachers and children.

I've received great intellectual satisfaction from various well-taught subjects. I would rather chop off a finger than lose them. So curriculum committees that make subjects boring are doing something worse than chopping off millions of children's fingers.

Re: I should have loved biology too

#160

Post by ponector »

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #87
MattGrommes wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of companies will pay for at least part of whatever college classes you take, without auditing whether or not it would be good for your specific job. I encourage people to look into it, it's a benefit a lot of people have but don't use and it's leaving money on the table.

Every company I ever worked for constrained it in many ways 1. Masters degree only, they won't pay for anyone to get a bachelor's or associates 2. Must maintain a B average or better 3. Cannot take any time off, it has to be entirely on nights and weekends 4. Reimbursement after the fact, so you're taking on the initial financial risk up front.

I had a job with an education budget listed as benefits.

However, to use it there are constraints: 1. The topic should be related to technologies used by company. Cannot get a Google cloud certification as they are using aws. 2. To get it you need approval by line manager, hr, and director of the office. 3. If it is more than €250 you need to sign up loyalty agreement for a year. Meaning if you will return some amount of you quit.

With all that strings attached it is just a marketing bullshit to attract new hires.

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