Good with math, but poor with physics?

[nlsherrill]

At least you are being honest about it, which I thank you for. I am tired about hearing all of the people on this board who say all it takes is just "hard work". Yeah, right. I doubt most qualified physicists today ever struggled with the introductory classes and concepts.

At least I know I gave it my best shot, after all, most people aren't good at physics and there's a reason why most people hate it (and it's not purely because of bad teachers, like other posters on here like to claim). Meh, I'll just stick with math. At least I won't have to be good at physics and I was always interested in math, physics was just something I was moderately interested in since I found it pretty interesting to see the real-world applications of math.

Think again.

Anyway, if you want one persons opinion to sway you away from an interesting field, be my guest. It takes hard work to be a physicist or a mathematician, even if you are naturally good at the kind of thinking required. If you think math is much easier for you, then come back and tell us that after you take real analysis.

 

[SophusLies]

Think again.

Anyway, if you want one persons opinion to sway you away from an interesting field, be my guest. It takes hard work to be a physicist or a mathematician, even if you are naturally good at the kind of thinking required. If you think math is much easier for you, then come back and tell us that after you take real analysis.

I struggled much more with my first Calc classes than I ever did with analysis. I also struggled more with my intro physics classes than my upper level ones. After an entire math degree plus a little more I found that I'm really not cut out for research level math. My math insights are weak and my generalizing abilities are shoddy. But from my first physics classes I felt that I thought differently from others regardless of struggling.

If -Dragoon- feels a certain way with math then so be it, I don't see why you're taking offense to it. Not everyone has to like physics.

 

[-Dragoon-]

I don't mean to be impolite, but maybe you are just not good at Physics. That's why grades lower than A are for.

I find the last part of your statement to be laughable. If that is your definition of "being good at physics", then why do many physics graduate programs except students with less than A average (<3.7 GPA)? Clearly, they are not good at physics by your definition, so why do graduate schools still accept them? Are their supervisors idiots or something?

 

[homeomorphic]

At least I know I gave it my best shot, after all, most people aren't good at physics and there's a reason why most people hate it (and it's not purely because of bad teachers, like other posters on here like to claim). Meh, I'll just stick with math. At least I won't have to be good at physics and I was always interested in math, physics was just something I was moderately interested in since I found it pretty interesting to see the real-world applications of math.

Physics is more than just an application of math. It's a part of math. The roots of a lot of math are in physics. It's possible to be a successful mathematician without knowing any physics, but I don't know that I would recommend it. Eventually, if you go far enough in math, there are parts of physics that will just be "more math"--as I've been saying, no different from the rest of math, except as some weird superstition that you have in your mind that they are completely different subjects. You can look at some things from a very mathematical point of view, if you want.

Even when I was studying electrical engineering, I thought the theory side of it was the same thing as what I'm doing now, studying math. I use the same sort of thought processes to understand all of it.

 

[Dickfore]

I find the last part of your statement to be laughable. If that is your definition of "being good at physics", then why do many physics graduate programs except students with less than A average (<3.7 GPA)? Clearly, they are not good at physics by your definition, so why do graduate schools still accept them? Are their supervisors idiots or something?

Graduate programs also require you take a set of obligatory physics courses. If you get a B- (less than 3.0 on a number scale) in Physics II, then what would you expect to get in Classical Mechanics, Theoretical Electrodynamics, Quantum Mechanics, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics, all required by graduate schools? Surely, your GPA would be below 3.0, or even 2.5, which would not be enough for a grad school admission. Thus, your point is moot.

 

[homeomorphic]

Graduate programs also require you take a set of obligatory physics courses. If you get a B- (less than 3.0 on a number scale) in Physics II, then what would you expect to get in Classical Mechanics, Theoretical Electrodynamics, Quantum Mechanics, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics, all required by graduate schools? Surely, your GPA would be below 3.0, or even 2.5, which would not be enough for a grad school admission. Thus, your point is moot.

Baloney.

There are tons of stories of people who didn't do well in some classes and then managed to turn it around. To some extent, I fit that description, myself. I got two C's in "easy" math classes, early on, but had above a 3.9 gpa in my last two years in undergrad.

 

[-Dragoon-]

Thus, your point is moot.

I don't even want to go to graduate school in physics, I just find it something interesting to think about from time to time. I'll still be taking classical mechanics, E&M, and quantum despite what people like you think. I don't care if I do terrible in them, I just want to see what they are about and see the math applied to those rigorous topics.

 

[-Dragoon-]

Physics is more than just an application of math. It's a part of math. The roots of a lot of math are in physics. It's possible to be a successful mathematician without knowing any physics, but I don't know that I would recommend it. Eventually, if you go far enough in math, there are parts of physics that will just be "more math"--as I've been saying, no different from the rest of math, except as some weird superstition that you have in your mind that they are completely different subjects. You can look at some things from a very mathematical point of view, if you want.

Even when I was studying electrical engineering, I thought the theory side of it was the same thing as what I'm doing now, studying math. I use the same sort of thought processes to understand all of it.

Thank you for all these tips, I've always been interested in the more mathematical aspects of physics and proving theorems rather than doing pointless computations (I can easily prove and derive most equations out of my textbook), I am just not exceptional with the computations. I find computations to be tedious, useless, and very boring which might explain why I'm not very good at doing them.

 

[Dickfore]

I don't even want to go to graduate school in physics, I just find it something interesting to think about from time to time. I'll still be taking classical mechanics, E&M, and quantum despite what people like you think. I don't care if I do terrible in them, I just want to see what they are about and see the math applied to those rigorous topics.

Good for you.

 

[SophusLies]

Graduate programs also require you take a set of obligatory physics courses. If you get a B- (less than 3.0 on a number scale) in Physics II, then what would you expect to get in Classical Mechanics, Theoretical Electrodynamics, Quantum Mechanics, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics, all required by graduate schools? Surely, your GPA would be below 3.0, or even 2.5, which would not be enough for a grad school admission. Thus, your point is moot.

lol.. This is just not true.

My case is similar to homeomorphic's in terms of getting better as time went on. My early class grades weren't very good but almost all of my upper level physics and math classes were a lot of A's. For me, the ideas in higher level math and physics classes were much clearer than intro classes.