- #1
maxstronge
- 4
- 2
Hello. First of all, I'm really glad to have stumbled across this community. You guys seem amazing, and I can't wait to keep lurking (and hopefully, one day, participating).
I'm in a strange situation and I could really use the guidance of some people with experience. If the explanation is unclear, it's probably because I've only recently figured out myself exactly what it is that I mean, so apologies in advance. It said to include as much detail and support as possible, but there is a TLDR at the bottom. Here's the story:
(This paragraph is technically skippable, but provides context for why I'm asking this question.) I'm a Canadian student currently in the second year of a political science honors major. I got into political science, and the social sciences more generally, because I'm really fascinated by human behavior, human interaction, and the ways that individual humans come together in these really complicated patterns like states, economies, etc. I love what I study, and I don't regret choosing this as a major, but I've come to the conclusion that what I'm really passionate about lies closer to the domain of physics and mathematics. Here's what I mean: I'm somewhat dissatisfied with the inability of social science to come to definitive conclusions about the definitive nature of reality. I like learning about different theoretical approaches to things like war and politics and international relations, but eventually it seems like there's just nowhere to go, no way to progress in our knowledge. While interesting, social sciences do not have any means (as of right now) to actually understand the true nature of reality. I'm a scientific realist - I believe that because human beings, and all the phenomena associated with them, are fundamentally the result of certain arrangements of particles and energy. Therefore, I believe, even though we collectively don't understand it yet, that things like market operations, warfare, or migration, can be explained as the result of physical laws of the universe. Even though I'm technically in the faculty of arts at my university, I've always been passionate about and attracted to science, because I want to understand the universe. I'm sure all of you can relate.
Over the course of independent reading and such, I came across a number of books that showed me some places that social science and physical science interact. From what I can understand, given a regrettable lack of mathematical literacy, these works are in the domain of complexity theory, chaos theory, and quantum theory. Specifically, many of the books come from the Santa Fe Institute (https://www.santafe.edu/). They talk about the implications of theoretical biology to social behavior (using equations from epidemiology and mathematical biology to understand things like arms races, revolutions, the spread of drugs in a community, etc.) Another one, by Alexander Wendt, explores the possibility that consciousness is explainable as a quantum system, and what implications that might have (Though I've been informed that most physicists don't put much stock in this theory, which is grounded in the work of Roger Penrose). Basically - I found a bunch of interdisciplinary work that looks at the fundamental nature of things from a physics perspective, rather than trying to explain things strictly from within the social sciences. The most interesting books are on complexity, how emergent phenomena like consciousness, biospheres - looking at things like ecology, evolutionary theory, and human behavior from the lens of complexity and chaos (and sometimes quantum theory).
For a much better description of what I want to get into, assume that my ultimate goal is admission into this STRUCTURES program: https://www.thphys.uni-heidelberg.de/~structures/index.html
I feel like the type of work described in the last sentence is the thing I've been searching for my entire academic life. I don't care how hard it is, I don't care how long it'll take, I'm going to do it. So the question is:
TLDR: What do I need to do to get from point A (social science student, limited post-high school math/physics understanding) to point B (able to work in and understand the paradigms of complex systems, analysis, complexity, and chaos)? How do I get from where I am now to where I need to be?
From what I've been able to understand just by looking into this on my own, my best option might be to restart my undergraduate degree in physics with a minor in mathematics so I can build up the toolkit I might need to do this type of work. I'm a disciplined student, I'm moderately intelligent, and I'm willing to do whatever work I need to in order to achieve these goals. I'm currently in the process of self-studying calculus for the first time and building up some strong foundations for when I start to make the switch. I don't care about money as much as I care about trying to understand things about our universe: as long as I can get to a place where I can make enough money just to literally survive, I'm satisfied.
Is there anyone on this forum that works in complexity/chaos/complex analysis that can offer insight into how I can maximize my chances of working in these fields?
Sorry for the long long write-up, and thanks in advance for any insight you can give,
Maxwell
I'm in a strange situation and I could really use the guidance of some people with experience. If the explanation is unclear, it's probably because I've only recently figured out myself exactly what it is that I mean, so apologies in advance. It said to include as much detail and support as possible, but there is a TLDR at the bottom. Here's the story:
(This paragraph is technically skippable, but provides context for why I'm asking this question.) I'm a Canadian student currently in the second year of a political science honors major. I got into political science, and the social sciences more generally, because I'm really fascinated by human behavior, human interaction, and the ways that individual humans come together in these really complicated patterns like states, economies, etc. I love what I study, and I don't regret choosing this as a major, but I've come to the conclusion that what I'm really passionate about lies closer to the domain of physics and mathematics. Here's what I mean: I'm somewhat dissatisfied with the inability of social science to come to definitive conclusions about the definitive nature of reality. I like learning about different theoretical approaches to things like war and politics and international relations, but eventually it seems like there's just nowhere to go, no way to progress in our knowledge. While interesting, social sciences do not have any means (as of right now) to actually understand the true nature of reality. I'm a scientific realist - I believe that because human beings, and all the phenomena associated with them, are fundamentally the result of certain arrangements of particles and energy. Therefore, I believe, even though we collectively don't understand it yet, that things like market operations, warfare, or migration, can be explained as the result of physical laws of the universe. Even though I'm technically in the faculty of arts at my university, I've always been passionate about and attracted to science, because I want to understand the universe. I'm sure all of you can relate.
Over the course of independent reading and such, I came across a number of books that showed me some places that social science and physical science interact. From what I can understand, given a regrettable lack of mathematical literacy, these works are in the domain of complexity theory, chaos theory, and quantum theory. Specifically, many of the books come from the Santa Fe Institute (https://www.santafe.edu/). They talk about the implications of theoretical biology to social behavior (using equations from epidemiology and mathematical biology to understand things like arms races, revolutions, the spread of drugs in a community, etc.) Another one, by Alexander Wendt, explores the possibility that consciousness is explainable as a quantum system, and what implications that might have (Though I've been informed that most physicists don't put much stock in this theory, which is grounded in the work of Roger Penrose). Basically - I found a bunch of interdisciplinary work that looks at the fundamental nature of things from a physics perspective, rather than trying to explain things strictly from within the social sciences. The most interesting books are on complexity, how emergent phenomena like consciousness, biospheres - looking at things like ecology, evolutionary theory, and human behavior from the lens of complexity and chaos (and sometimes quantum theory).
For a much better description of what I want to get into, assume that my ultimate goal is admission into this STRUCTURES program: https://www.thphys.uni-heidelberg.de/~structures/index.html
I feel like the type of work described in the last sentence is the thing I've been searching for my entire academic life. I don't care how hard it is, I don't care how long it'll take, I'm going to do it. So the question is:
TLDR: What do I need to do to get from point A (social science student, limited post-high school math/physics understanding) to point B (able to work in and understand the paradigms of complex systems, analysis, complexity, and chaos)? How do I get from where I am now to where I need to be?
From what I've been able to understand just by looking into this on my own, my best option might be to restart my undergraduate degree in physics with a minor in mathematics so I can build up the toolkit I might need to do this type of work. I'm a disciplined student, I'm moderately intelligent, and I'm willing to do whatever work I need to in order to achieve these goals. I'm currently in the process of self-studying calculus for the first time and building up some strong foundations for when I start to make the switch. I don't care about money as much as I care about trying to understand things about our universe: as long as I can get to a place where I can make enough money just to literally survive, I'm satisfied.
Is there anyone on this forum that works in complexity/chaos/complex analysis that can offer insight into how I can maximize my chances of working in these fields?
Sorry for the long long write-up, and thanks in advance for any insight you can give,
Maxwell