/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.9510088]

Why is physics considered harder than mathematics?

[Anonymous No.9510102]

Its not, its about same complexity, but people who are interested in physics will find physics easier, and people who have interest in math will find maths easier.

[Anonymous No.9510207]

physics is literally applied math

[Anonymous No.9510302]

>>9510088
In practice I think the experimental aspect of physics can make it more difficult, at terms of progress. You have to both devise mathematical structures which explain and describe the phenomena you observe, but also devise experiments which obtain the values you're looking for (or not) or confirm the existence of something predicted by the mathematics. Without experimental data it's meaningless and you're often trying to detect the supposedly undetectable.

Mathematics at the highest level can be done with brains and a supercomputer.

but in terms of learning from 0 to current understanding, they're probably comparable.

[Anonymous No.9510306]

Because it is. Not even comparable.

[Anonymous No.9510316]

>>9510088
I think this graph is a bit disingenuous towards computer scientist since they're being lumped together with information sciences.

Also economics being that high and even being higher than electrical engineering is kinda ridiculous.

[Anonymous No.9510326]

>>9510088
Because there is one task that is harder for a physics theorist than for a mathematician, and that is engaging in a literature of seemingly disparate and incoherent results and making them into a cohesive whole.

When a mathematician publishes a result, it's (generally) clear which assumptions he used and where his paper fits in the chain of theorems and deductions.

When physicists publish, it's not always clear where their results stand. It's supposed to be things that are "true", but that doesn't give you a clear indication of which theoretical framework will be needed to explain those results.
Contrary to popular beliefs, when a physics paper is out, it doesn't clearly state "ok, this paper expands on a particular subsection of such and such string theory". It's up to other theorists to then make it fit somewhere.

Honestly, dealing with the general confusion is probably the hardest part of physics.
t. solid state physicist

[Anonymous No.9510353]

This graph also, ironically, shows all the male dominated careers at top and the female dominated careers on the bottom. Coincidence?

[Anonymous No.9510413]

>>9510088
Why become something wich has not changed or almost improved for the last 50 years. If for self interest i get it halfway if it's money you want in change for a job. But this fucking lost is so bullahit i cannot say it clearer. It is a hoax. Btw psychology should at least be higher. It's more like the smarter you are the more advanced it gets. And psychology is heavier than low grade trash edu. Just because so much stupod study it. I met so many wasted psyxhologists. They are some messed up induiduals who is fableing up wild fantasies about some subjectice waste with no attachement to truth that it can be considered valid so it jist becomes far out pseudo shit they trash in peoples faces. But if your good. Then fuck me it's kind of straight forward based on the ground principles to maneuver to dirwct diagnosis. But it can be harder then some of the hardest philosophy you can fall over. So i say psychology and philosophy is equally hard. How can you miss that. Don't be lame.

[Anonymous No.9510473]

Physics is hard because it's not axiomatized. Every physics course is basically handwavy crap with almost zero formalism.

[Anonymous No.9510494]

>>9510088
Tbh I was in Maths BSc, and changed to Physics. And holyshit it was harder

[Anonymous No.9510499]

>>9510473
If you only act on knowledge you have fully formalized, you're not gonna do anything at all. We don't know everything yet, suck it up faggot.

[Anonymous No.9510501]

>>9510088
Hah, this graph reminds me of pòlya: "I thought, I am not good enough for physics and I am too good for philosophy. Mathematics is in between."

[Anonymous No.9510544]

>>9510088
>physics considered harder than mathematics
... by no one who ever studied graduate mathematics.

[Anonymous No.9510550]

>>9510088
Chad physics beta math

[Anonymous No.9510556]

>>9510316
it's just the IQ general value of the people getting that education dude
it's not the graph's fault that people are getting economics degrees are slightly higher IQ-ed than those getting electricity degrees
I'm with you on the IT item though

[Anonymous No.9510557]

>>9510088
My IQ isn't on that chart and I'm studying civil engineering

[Anonymous No.9510563]

>>9510557
are you an 85 points brainlet

[Anonymous No.9510569]

>>9510088
First of all: no.

Second of all, math includes things like actuarial science which would explain the graph.

[Anonymous No.9510668]

>>9510544
This guy>>9510494

And maths is only memory, unlike physics you never use intuitivity or critical thinking or problems solving

[Anonymous No.9510678]

>>9510088

>tfw I studied Comp. Sci
>was too imature, gave no fucks, was failing all around, thought it was the course
>changed to economics, graduated, got a finance market job on a wall st. bank
>tfw I will never work on a STEM field tho

[Anonymous No.9510701]

>philosophy is 2nd highest
literally how?

[Anonymous No.9510703]

>>9510701

You need to have a extremely high IQ to pick a course that will make you go starving throughout life

[Anonymous No.9510705]

>intended major
what does this mean?

[Anonymous No.9510763]

>>9510703
LEL

[Anonymous No.9510771]

>>9510088
it has a higher level of entry than math

[Anonymous No.9510776]

>>9510701
>me after reading one Plato

[Anonymous No.9510809]

It seems like it actually is from what im hearing, but it could also just seem to be, because in most universities, they make the physics course a lot harder than the pure math course. I go to a top 15 Uni and here 60%+ fail physics, but only like 45%+ fail math in the first two semesters.

[Anonymous No.9510810]

>>9510088
fuck university level physics. i have to study it 24/5 in order to follow along with the program. math on the other hand is not that hard for me. especially calculus. compared to uni level physics it's piss easy.
that said, i don't know anything about non-entry level math/physics classes.

[Anonymous No.9510811]

Average IQ can be boosted by things like >>9510771
I think the way physics is taught requires a lot of lateral thinking because in introductory physics courses everything isn't as well defined as in math. Doing that would require an undergraduate understanding of math from a middle/high school kids, so they are left with a lot of guesswork to figure it out on their own without the fancy math tools which make it easy later on. Also, the mathematical prerequisite for physics makes a physicist somewhat a competent mathematician, while a mathematician can be ignorant of physics and do just fine.

[Anonymous No.9510868]

>>9510668
Literally what kind of idiot math have you taken?

[Anonymous No.9510869]

>>9510776
What the fuck game is played on a 4x6 checkerboard?

[Anonymous No.9510872]

>>9510316
Economics is almost entirely math and statistics based

[Anonymous No.9510877]

>>9510668
>And maths is only memory,
topkek found the dude who only took calc I

[Anonymous No.9510885]

>>9510872
Technically yes, but no math beyond calculus, and people studying economics at the undergrad level don't even have to learn the underlying math. I know people about to graduate with econ degrees that haven't had math since high school precalc.

[Anonymous No.9510886]

>>9510809
I didn't know there were 60%+ fail physics courses, now I understands
>>9510810
when you get to upper level courses it no longer as shallow

[Anonymous No.9510897]

>>9510088

>Why is physics considered harder than mathematics?

Nature is the best mathematician of all.

[Anonymous No.9510900]

>>9510885
>Technically yes, but no math beyond calculus
you'd have to be taking shit tier economics to not use anything past calculus.

Graph Theory, Set theory, Linear Algebra, Real Analysis And Vector Calc, and Statistics are all fields used in the last 2 tiers of Economics on the undergrad level, and then become much more complex on the graduate level. The problem is the number of buisiness brainlets that major in economics doesn't let them go full out math tier like physics can.

I know this because I major in both

[Anonymous No.9511367]

>>9510885
> no math beyond calculus in Economics

No math beyond calculus in shitty tier Universities.

Any respectable Economics program should include at least Real Analysis, Differential Equations, Game Theory, Actuarial Math & a lot of Statistics.

[Anonymous No.9511397]

>>9510499
CS is largely axiomatized and accomplishes more than physics. Let that sink in.

[Anonymous No.9511400]

>>9510088
Its mathematics, but you also have to be careful of your negative signs.

[Anonymous No.9511418]

>>9510088
In math you get to study whatever abstractions you want. In physics if you aren't studying ones that reflect some aspect of reality, with the intention of being predictive, you are just doing math. Ie, the universe forces physicists to work with only certain math, while mathematicians can study whatever they want.

[Anonymous No.9511423]

>>9511397
>CS is largely axiomatized
Because CS deals mostly with finitary (or at least recursive) structures, and they don't need to compute probabilities doing weird integrals on infinite dimensional topological vector spaces.

>accomplishes more than physics
that's dumb

[Anonymous No.9511448]

>>9510302
Hmm you make a fair point, I can see how that would make it difficult, not to mention the way reality works could completely disprove your work, but at the same time I'd say the fact that you can rely on experiments could help you get some intuition, you see what's happening and try to explain it, we can't do that with math.

[Anonymous No.9511449]

>>9511418
what's the point of devoted your life to studying something that is not grounded in reality

[Anonymous No.9511455]

Math includes PhD's in Math Education. There. Gosh.

[Anonymous No.9511457]

>>9511397
The axioms get shittier though the further you get from a Turing machine.

[Anonymous No.9511500]

>>9511449
There are two main answers to that question.

The first, and perhaps "most true" is that if you enjoy studying it, it is worthwhile to you, even if it isn't worthwhile to anyone else.

Second, huge swaths of mathematics that were once considered "pure" mathematics have eventually become "applied" mathematics. The only difference between the two is if someone has found a use for it yet. So, for example, all of Computer Science could have been formalized and studied long before computers (and some of it was), but with the development of computers it became "applied math" and is now studied so heavily that it is considered it's own discipline. The same is true of cryptography, and a fair amount of physics. Things that were once just "math for the sake of math" ended up providing invaluable tools with real-world applications.

Related to the second, there's a lot of value in understanding I'm general how to work with systems of rules and abstractions. In the ancient past the formalization of logic helped make philosophy a real discipline. Today still, mathematics provides us the tools to investigate and analyze hypothetical situations of all kinds. Hypothetical universes & physics, hypothetical computers, hypothetical philosophy - that is to say, even pure mathematics is "grounded in reality" because the human imagination is grounded in reality. Mathematics provides a framework for studying anything you can imagine.

[Anonymous No.9511508]

>>9510088
>estimated from average GRE scores
So really this is just a plot of GRE scores by major, with the assumption that since high GRE means high IQ, they can pretend to know IQ by major.

[Anonymous No.9511537]

>>9510088
I can only speak for myself (physics and math double major):
I personally think physics is harder because an analytical mind won't get you as far in physics as it would in math.
Don't get me wrong - both are extremely hard an require a very analytical mind, but in math, if you know your definitions and theorem really well, and have a very logical mind, you can do just about anything by yourself (at least at an undergrad level) - it might take time and hard work, but you'll probably get there through wits alone. But in physics it's just not enough - at least for me. You need to have something else - something between good intuitions and the ability to skillfully approach problems. I personally lack both, so I find math less difficult.

[Anonymous No.9511550]

>>9510877
nah, Topology, Geometry, Numbers theory...
it's all just memory

[Anonymous No.9511563]

>>9510088
>math
Here's a function
>physics
This function represents the curvature of an object after being thrown on the surface of the earth

[Anonymous No.9511577]

>>9511550 >>9510877
>And maths is only memory,
Isn't pure math basically just memorizing Theorems & Proofs?

[Anonymous No.9511611]

>>9511508
>implying a test can't be g-loaded

Brainlet pls

[Anonymous No.9511616]

>>9511550
>it's all just memory
>not proving the theory along the way

What kind of brainlet institution did you study at?

[Anonymous No.9511626]

>>9511616
you learn the prove of the theory you fucking brainlet, I was in Maths don't try to fool me as if you're going to find some proof out of you own butt

[Anonymous No.9511629]

>>9510088
Math majors have the highest scores on Quantitative part of GRE Exam.

[Anonymous No.9511642]

>>9511629 >>9510088
>Math majors have the highest scores on Quantitative part of GRE Exam.

No! the Quantitative scores of Physicists are higher.

[Anonymous No.9511643]

>>9511626
yeah, I think he hasnt heard about the standing on the shoulders of giants part.
I mean if youre a genius, maybe you come up with your own strange shit and stuff, but generally speaking you need the knowledge thats already there to graduate

[Anonymous No.9511689]

>>9511629 >>9511642
Average GRE Scores by Major

Quantitative GRE:

Math(163) >Physics(162) >Finance(161) >Engineers(159) >Chemistry(158) >CompSci (156)>Biology(154) >Else

Verbal GRE:
Philosophy(160) > Theology(157) = Art History(157) = EnglishLanguage(157) > physics(156) = History(156) = PoliticalScience(156)

>https://www.prepscholar.com/gre/blog/average-gre-scores-by-major/

[Anonymous No.9511705]

>>9510302
Really this is a debate about which method of knowledge acquisition is more difficult for humans (empirical vs rational). The experimental parts of physics have an allegory in mathematics in the proof structure one must use to prove a concept exists and makes sense.

[Geometric Unity No.9511713]

Real Analysis was definitely the hardest class I ever took.

[Anonymous No.9511801]

>>9511642
>that R squared

[Anonymous No.9512919]

>>9511418
This.

Solving nonlinear, coupled, relativistic differential equations is harder than picking and choosing axioms that are easy to solve; then again you can't just approximate the zeros required for the Riemann hypothesis and call it a day. However, even finding suitable approximations is a hard task at times. It seems like most breakthroughs in math were motivated by real world problems. You can't really decouple math and physics though.

[Anonymous No.9512927]

Because it literally is. First of all, you need tio have proficiency in many areas of mathematics no matter what field you are specilizing. Secondly, you need both math and physics skills; it isn't applied math. Third, you need practical skills that being computational, experimental or both.

[Anonymous No.9514609]

>>9510326
>Solid state physicist
Yeah go play with your quasiparticles Bogoliubov.

I'm just joking but I couldn't resist

[Anonymous No.9514745]

>>9510088
If you read the graph you would see that its not saying its harder but the people getting the degree are more intelligent

[Anonymous No.9514772]

>>9510703

i actually loled, thank you anon

[Anonymous No.9514774]

>>9511563

/thread

[Anonymous No.9514789]

>>9510088
>math
people come up with problems

>physics
problems come up with problems

[Anonymous No.9514792]

>>9510088
Pure mathematics is still harder than physics, it's just that enough physicists are smart enough to know not to study something that has absolutely no practical application that it skews their average IQ to the right a bit.

[Anonymous No.9514810]

>>9510088
Why are you posting estimated IQ when discussing difficulty? Just because high IQ tend towards an area, it doesn't mean it's more difficult. You could even argue they go where it's easier.

[Anonymous No.9514871]

>>9510207
>yes applying math
>to harder problems than math

[Anonymous No.9516584]

>>9510701
I hear it's actually really difficult. It's all abstract logic and reading+synthesis. People don't usually consider it because like other anons mentioned, it doesn't return the investment, and so it's an unpopular major in a lot of places. Plus philosophy is usually associated with pseuds who aren't smart enough to go into STEM.

[Anonymous No.9516588]

>>9510668
Math can be done through memory, but any good mathematician will Intuit answers during the process of memory, and so develop a deeper understanding of the theorems because he knows why they work, not just how to plug numbers into an equation.

[Anonymous No.9516614]

>>9510207
math doesn't concern with properties of matter etc.
i know this is a meme but i know some mathfags that think this unironically.
math is just a tool for physics, which is the purest of sciences.

[Anonymous No.9516619]

>>9511713
Because you didn't took Quantum Mechanics

[Anonymous No.9516644]

>>9510088
engineer
>assume the horse is sufficiently restrained
physicist
>assume the horse is of uniform density in a vaccum
mathematician
>assume the horse is a sphere

[Anonymous No.9516655]

>>9516644
Comp Sci
>assume the horse is CGI

Geologist
>assume the horse is a bunch of minerals stick together.

Economics
>assume the horse is a valuable financial asset & economic investment

Humanities
>fights for social justice, assume the horse has humans feelings so also human rights.

Biologist
>assume the horse is an animal ... oh wait ... it is indeed an animal.

[Anonymous No.9516671]

>>9516655
Gender Studies
>we can't assume anything and "horse" is a social construct

Culinary Arts
>assume the horse is freshly ground

[Anonymous No.9516676]

>eoonomics

[Anonymous No.9516686]

>>9516671
history
>assume history of horses ancestors cultural climate will affect horses present and future
psychology
>assume horse is subconsciously homosexual
political sciences
>assume that horse is a right wing retard

[Anonymous No.9516690]

>>9516644
>>9516655
>>9516671
>>9516686
Kek

[Anonymous No.9516697]

>>9511642
Who the fuck put a fit on this? Please fire that person

[Anonymous No.9516698]

tfw you're just a lowly chem cuck

[Anonymous No.9516707]

>>9516655 >>9516671 >>9516686 >>9516690

Philosophy
>Debates about Horse's existence.
>Questioning "what it means? "what his purpose"? "why are you asking"?
>Concluding that you "cannot know nothing" about the Horse

[Anonymous No.9516717]

>>9511642
R^2=0.08
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Anonymous No.9516754]

>>9516614
>math is just a tool for physics
Oh so that's why Physics was non existent up to Newton.

[Anonymous No.9516772]

>>9516754
>this is what physicists actually believe

[Anonymous No.9516840]

>>9511642 >>9511689 >>9511801 >>9516697 >>9516717
>R2=0.08
Lmao. I reverse image search it. And found out that a Brainlet Pajeet Anthropologist called Razib Khan made that chart:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2010/12/verbal-vs-mathematical-aptitude-in-academics/#.WoSrqecfPIV

https://twitter.com/razibkhan

It confirms that Anthropologists are Brainlets.

[Anonymous No.9516850]

>>9510088
Statistics brainlets are lumped together with mathematicians retarding the statistic (lol)

[Anonymous No.9516858]

>>9516840
razib khan is /ourguy/

[Anonymous No.9516867]

>>9510701
Lawfags go into Philosophy as undergrads

[Anonymous No.9516887]

>>9510701
Philosophy is a great tool and complements scientific thinking well. If ur only good at quant stuff, then you suck donkey dick. Real patricians master philosophy as well as stem subjects

[Anonymous No.9516895]

>>9516850
Astronomy brainlets are lumped together with Physicists retarding the statistic (lel)

[Anonymous No.9516904]

>>9516858 >>9516840
Based Pajeet

[Anonymous No.9517371]

>>9516671
<chuckle>