questions for physics majors.....

[Dawsonkw]

is there anyone an this site who majors in physics?

if so whats the workload like?

How much free time do you have?

If I'm not the best person in math classes would it be wise for me to major in this, i mean I'd love to learn about physics (theoretical mainly) but when i was in high school that was probably one of my worst subjects. its not that I'm bad with numbers i guess i just never had good study habits or had a teacher that would take the time to help me learn they all just threw it at me and hoped i would catch it all in my head.

Basically i would like to know if a person of my stature would be able to digest it all or would i just be screwing myself in the long run?

Thanks for the help and Happy late Memorial Day

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[Klemptor]

I am a biophysics major. It's not as hard as people make it out to be. The workload is heavy, don't get me wrong, but I think physics is mostly mindset.

A lot of people get turned off by the mathematics, the "word-problem" nature of the material, and the time it takes to get good at it and become confident in what you've learned.

If you did poorly in physics in high school, you should examine the reasons for that. Did you not take it seriously enough? Did you not dedicate enough time to it? It sounds to me like these may be your problems, rather than a genuine problem with comprehension.

In my opinion, you need to be able to apply yourself to both physics and mathematics to feel comfortable with physics. If you don't feel like you can do that, I wouldn't suggest a physics major for you.

 

[MilkmanAl]

The workload is moderate but extremely difficult. You'll probably spend an entire day with people from your class trying to figure out how to do your problem sets, but you should have a reasonable amount of free time overall. If you're also taking the med school pre-reqs, that free time will diminish substantially.

If you're interested, give it a shot. It'll be pretty tough to maintain health school-ish GPA, but it's possible.

 

[EyEnStein 07]

im a prospective physics major with a possible bio physics concentration.
I suggest if your serious about this to get your math skills very much improved.

I dont think its possible to be a physics major without atleast completing calculus 3, ordinary/partial differential equations. I also know many schools have crosslisted classes with the math department for classes like "mathematical techniques in physics"..

If you devote the time and its somethign your good at (like if you scored high on SAT II or if you have good knowledge of AP physics) then you will be fine. Ofcourse you have to study hard and the concepts can become complicated..

My best advice, keep the physics major in mind, when you get to college take the calculus based physics (its not easy...im taking it now..and barely averaging a B, when in highschool i took the college algebra physics course and got A's). If you can do well in the calc physics course i think you might have a better clue as to how you might be able to deal with future physics classes at your college/univ.

I have friends who are mechanical engineers (now) and other engineering, which involves lots of physics classes, and though there smart and went to many universities, they got use to the fact that they are not going to get A's in most of the classes in their major. I suspect physics is like that also.

Lastly, if you decide not to do medicine and pursue a PhD in Theoretical Physics...know that Theoretical is considerably harder to get into than experiental, you need higher gpa and higher gre physics scores to be competitive.

 

[Dawsonkw]

Thanks for the replies and Klemptor i never got the chance to take any physics courses in high school i withdrew and got my GED before i was able too. But it has always been something I've been interested in. That and Astronomy are basically the two things that aside from medicine i would want to study.

The way i see it is as long as the teacher helps walk the class through it or i can get a tutor i should be able to do it right?

I've always been a bright kid (made the stupid mistake of running with the wrong crowd in HS though) and i have usually been able to pick something up relatively quickly if i simply put my mind to it and study hard.

thanks again for the help and any other things you want to add are appreciated

btw the reason i have been interested in physics is I have been reading Michio Kaku's books lately, they're so entertaining to me i don't know why...

 

[EyEnStein 07]

Thanks for the replies and Klemptor i never got the chance to take any physics courses in high school i withdrew and got my GED before i was able too. But it has always been something I've been interested in. That and Astronomy are basically the two things that aside from medicine i would want to study.

The way i see it is as long as the teacher helps walk the class through it or i can get a tutor i should be able to do it right?

I've always been a bright kid (made the stupid mistake of running with the wrong crowd in HS though) and i have usually been able to pick something up relatively quickly if i simply put my mind to it and study hard.

thanks again for the help and any other things you want to add are appreciated

btw the reason i have been interested in physics is I have been reading Michio Kaku's books lately, they're so entertaining to me i don't know why...

Isn't kaku more astronomy? lol, but he is a theoretical physicist though.
Becareful where you go though to get your physics degree i guess...for example the cuny system where kaku teaches..except for his college, im not sure the other ones well maybe a few provide a lot of help (in tutor centers) because the material is quite difficult. If your taking the calculus chances are a tutor there will be for regular physics. But anyways besides that i think you should be ok. Just take it one step at a time, take an astro course and a physics the calc based (because this is required for the majors). The class sizes of the calc based should be small i would imagine, and the teacher can help you so much. its in your best interest though to not slack and DO sample problems, more than just your teacher assigned.

My professor told us all throughout this semester, that practice is everything. Believe it or not there were times the whole class including my professor were stuck on difficult problems, but when you do practice your able to work together and come up with intelligent solutions.

 

[Dawsonkw]

thanks EyEnStein 07 that makes me feel a bit better. random not forum related question have you read Einsteins Life and universe? only reason i ask is cause of your name.

i was also wondering if i go into my cc as an undeclared major then decide on it when i get to the university will Med school's look down upon that since technically i didn't do 4 years of one major?

i cant wait till i get my college started even if it is only CC to start with I've been out of school for almost 3 years now and I'm getting bored of doing nothing/ letting my brain collect dust lol

thanks for the help again anything else is appreciated

 

[xnfs93hy]

Physics is evil

 

[mathlegend]

No physics is awesome! At least high school physics is...I wish theres Physics C at my school, but they only offer Physics B

 

[EyEnStein 07]

thanks EyEnStein 07 that makes me feel a bit better. random not forum related question have you read Einsteins Life and universe? only reason i ask is cause of your name.

i was also wondering if i go into my cc as an undeclared major then decide on it when i get to the university will Med school's look down upon that since technically i didn't do 4 years of one major?

i cant wait till i get my college started even if it is only CC to start with I've been out of school for almost 3 years now and I'm getting bored of doing nothing/ letting my brain collect dust lol

thanks for the help again anything else is appreciated

Sorry for the late reply i have not checked this thread nor did i see it updated.

I have not covered many topics except minorly on Einsteins Gravitation. This is because i think relativity in my school is covered in the second physics portion. My user name is based on something different I guess lol. Its because i like physics (and like stuff i have read but not completely understood about einstein) and i want to either do ophthalmology or optometry hence the "EYE"...

Dont worry at all about major! I bet you even though most people who are physics majors or atleast a lot of them, though they know they want to major in physics dont declare it til there 2nd year anyways. It will not matter one bit that you went to a CC as undecided and then switched over to physics. Because the truth is though im a prospective major who just finished my first semester i havent declared it (mostly because i want to see how i do in the 2nd semester, its actually quite hard for me and only a few people passed my class including me and i didnt do so hot) but i might next semester (2nd year). I think the general rule is you declare a major by 60-70 credits depending on your school and graduation requirements. Its usually half the number of total credits you need to graduate. So i wouldnt worry about it. In fact, if you want to get a jump start, maybe take physics classes without declaring it at your CC, that way you can be ahead. Be ware of what you take, if your taking the calc one, you can almost be sure it will transfer over to your state school or whereever you decide to go. Med schools will only look down on you if you get a high GPA in CC and then cannot continue it in 4 year.

If you want you can always get a head start on textbooks or something, like maybe an AP physics C book to brush up and some calculus wouldnt hurt.


to Jefgreen: Physics is not even but it is difficult. I do honestly believe that atleast with the algebra based physics, people make it seem harder than it actually is, and because when enough people tell us something is hard, we believe it ourselves before giving it a chance.

 

[Narmerguy]

I'm a biophysics student as well. The physics workload is challenging but it's doable. I find that a lot of physics is simply working problems and becoming familiar with "the game" of how problems work. You start to pick up trends of how different information can be used and when is the proper time to apply certain types of calculus.

More importantly, I find that physics simply doesn't "click" with some students. It seems like the way they think just isn't suited for the way you typically have to think for physics.

If you struggled in math that can be worked through easier than if you can't understand when to apply the math. In other words, it's better to be able to know the physics theory and when to apply certain concepts than simply to be unable to perform the math. However, you have to be able to do both if you want to do well...it's just that if you can't seem to put physics concepts together or struggle to "think" in the way most physics classes demand than it's a lot harder to fix that than simply getting better at math.

 

[sumstorm]

I was not a physics major, but had 3 close friends who were. They were not any more/less tied to studying than the chem majors.

Also, I found physics far easier after calculus (3 semesters + a semester of stats that required calc) and when I TA'd (yeah, I am a geek, I TA'd in gen studies physics) I realized I was very fortunate to have taken calc based physics. Everything made far more sense with more of the math behind it.

 

[Dawsonkw]

thanks for the replies guys i think im gonna do the undeclared major to start with then decide when the time comes. Right now im at a toss up between Physics, Philosophy, Psychology, Astronomy, and some kind of Engineering (most probably would be Aerospace) ((god my grammer is lacking today lol))

but yea i figure i got 2 years at most to dwell on it so i'll probably take classes in a few of em to get a feel for and decide on what i want to do thanks again for the help.

 

[Kickback]

thanks for the replies guys i think im gonna do the undeclared major to start with then decide when the time comes. Right now im at a toss up between Physics, Philosophy, Psychology, Astronomy, and some kind of Engineering (most probably would be Aerospace) ((god my grammer is lacking today lol))

but yea i figure i got 2 years at most to dwell on it so i'll probably take classes in a few of em to get a feel for and decide on what i want to do thanks again for the help.

Just to let you know, astronomy is just astrophysics nowadays.

A little heads up- a problem that you may encounter with going into engineering a year late is that they have very detailed course sequences that require BS engineering-specific classes. If you really want to go to medical school, engineering is basically just applied physics, and I know that some of the physics majors can take engineering classes at my school. If you're taking physics b/c you like it, engineering really isn't worth the pain if you aren't passionate about it.