- #1
andria191
- 1
- 0
I just finished my first year as an undergrad, and am currently declared as a mechanical engineering major. However, I sort of have this nagging feeling that what I'd really like to study is physics (for the record, I am also considering changing which type of engineering I'm doing). In my frustrating attempts to choose between engineering and physics, I've gotten a lot of pretty vehement anti-physics advice from peers, family, etc. Problem is I don't necessarily feel like I should trust their assertions. Could someone with more experience provide some insight into the accuracy of these claims?:
Also, if anybody who's been in my situation before has other advice about choosing between engineering and physics, I would love to hear it. Thanks!
- Engineers make tons of money, and physicists make hardly any. If you want a good salary, and for that matter if you want better work hours, you'd better go with engineering.
- You might think that you don't mind making less money now, but there's a very good chance that you'll eventually regret choosing the low salary option. No matter how interested you are in something, you won't be happy unless you're earning a decent living.
- There's a good chance you'll have no choice but to teach high school.
- Physicists just aren't very employable. If you want a job at all, you'll definitely need a PhD (not a huge issue since I was planning on going to grad school either way), and even if you do go to grad school, there's a good chance you'll have difficulty finding a job. There are more students trying to become physicists than there are jobs and grad school seats for.
- An engineering major only needs a 3.0 GPA to be pretty sure they'll get a job or get into a good grad program. Competition is a lot more intense in physics; you can't just be good, you have to be one of the best. Since nearly all physics majors are very intelligent, you have to be one of the best of the best.
- Lower level physics classes are fine, but the higher level ones are awful. Physics professors basically all have huge egos, are condescending towards their students, and try to make their class unnecessarily difficult.
- Choosing physics when you should have chosen engineering will be a bigger mistake than choosing engineering when you should have chosen physics.
- You have to be a superhuman genius and a complete workaholic to get anywhere in the field of physics.
Also, if anybody who's been in my situation before has other advice about choosing between engineering and physics, I would love to hear it. Thanks!