Sometimes I think I should have been a philosophy major who's interested in science, instead of the other way around. There's really no way to go back once you've gone into hard science, though I intend to try and bridge the gap once I'm done with grad school/post-doc.
I feel like I used to be a much more interesting person than I am right now, and not even that long ago. Just last year. I think I realized why: I'm no longer involved in anything other than chemistry. I'm no longer taking classes in computer science and philosophy and mythology. Very few people I talk to on a regular basis are not chemists, and even then we hardly ever discuss anything intellectual. The result isn't that I've become boring, simply that I've become bored Anyway, I'm getting off-topic--this entry isn't supposed to be complaining, it's supposed to be brainstorming ideas.
Do you suppose it's possible to miss something you've never experienced? If so, then I miss the days of the Aristotle of old where one could be knowledgable on more than one subject and still be a respected academic. If not, then replace "miss" with a word you think works better. Problem solved.
I've always been interested in a bigger picture than any one field can paint. I've only really concentrated on chemistry within the last year, and I feel like I've been herded into it because it was a convenient career move. I miss having conversations with the faculty member of our philosophy club in which we would discuss my ideas and how I view the logic of reason.
You've all heard seemingly wild statements like "music is a mathematical beast", among others. Language itself, if you stick to the pure form that you see in literature, official documentation, etc. is a very mathematical thing (see Noam Chomsky, or, depending on how you feel about him, just cringe and move on
). Even most art consists of systematic deviations from "normal" or "reality". I'm firmly of the opinion that all subjects can be reasoned using the exact same mental tools; that a mind that can grasp such a set of tools is equally capable of studying any branch of science, philosophy, human behavior, politics, writing, art, and so forth; that the boundaries we have set forth between fields are entirely artificial.
These boundaries are useful at times, certainly. It gives people a confortable niche in which to place themselves. It gives people the ability to make statements like, "I don't really like science, so it's a good thing I'm in business and I don't have to think like that." I can understand that.
On the other hand, they really hurt our society. They force people into exclusive groups where everyone thinks the same. It prevents much needed collaborations between fields (such as using scientific methods to analyze business and economic trends, or mathematical analysis on language). It even makes many academics laugh at words like "interdepartmental".
Right now, people are starting to realize that we can't all be this separated. It's happening a lot in science, where you see things popping up like computational biology and biophysics. Technology is forcing other areas such as law to actually sit down and think about how science and technology work, occassionally using what they learn about the latter to rethink the former. But right now it's really only happening as necessary.
One of the small goals I've set for myself is to establish firm overlaps between fields. One example, and probably the first project I'm going to be pursuing, is forming undergraduate majors in the sciences for those who come to school wanting to do science, but may be interested and talented in computers. Every major field of science could be interwoven with computer science to a point where one could imagine a "____ With Applied Computer Science" degree, where the blank could be chemistry, physics, biology, etc. I really think people would be interested in such majors if they were available, and they're certainly needed. Hopefully that, if successful, could be a launching pad for more varied integration of fields in the future. We'll see.
I feel like I used to be a much more interesting person than I am right now, and not even that long ago. Just last year. I think I realized why: I'm no longer involved in anything other than chemistry. I'm no longer taking classes in computer science and philosophy and mythology. Very few people I talk to on a regular basis are not chemists, and even then we hardly ever discuss anything intellectual. The result isn't that I've become boring, simply that I've become bored Anyway, I'm getting off-topic--this entry isn't supposed to be complaining, it's supposed to be brainstorming ideas.
Do you suppose it's possible to miss something you've never experienced? If so, then I miss the days of the Aristotle of old where one could be knowledgable on more than one subject and still be a respected academic. If not, then replace "miss" with a word you think works better. Problem solved.
I've always been interested in a bigger picture than any one field can paint. I've only really concentrated on chemistry within the last year, and I feel like I've been herded into it because it was a convenient career move. I miss having conversations with the faculty member of our philosophy club in which we would discuss my ideas and how I view the logic of reason.
You've all heard seemingly wild statements like "music is a mathematical beast", among others. Language itself, if you stick to the pure form that you see in literature, official documentation, etc. is a very mathematical thing (see Noam Chomsky, or, depending on how you feel about him, just cringe and move on
![wink](https://dz3ixmv6nok8z.cloudfront.net/static/img/emoticons/wink.6a5555b139e7.gif)
These boundaries are useful at times, certainly. It gives people a confortable niche in which to place themselves. It gives people the ability to make statements like, "I don't really like science, so it's a good thing I'm in business and I don't have to think like that." I can understand that.
On the other hand, they really hurt our society. They force people into exclusive groups where everyone thinks the same. It prevents much needed collaborations between fields (such as using scientific methods to analyze business and economic trends, or mathematical analysis on language). It even makes many academics laugh at words like "interdepartmental".
Right now, people are starting to realize that we can't all be this separated. It's happening a lot in science, where you see things popping up like computational biology and biophysics. Technology is forcing other areas such as law to actually sit down and think about how science and technology work, occassionally using what they learn about the latter to rethink the former. But right now it's really only happening as necessary.
One of the small goals I've set for myself is to establish firm overlaps between fields. One example, and probably the first project I'm going to be pursuing, is forming undergraduate majors in the sciences for those who come to school wanting to do science, but may be interested and talented in computers. Every major field of science could be interwoven with computer science to a point where one could imagine a "____ With Applied Computer Science" degree, where the blank could be chemistry, physics, biology, etc. I really think people would be interested in such majors if they were available, and they're certainly needed. Hopefully that, if successful, could be a launching pad for more varied integration of fields in the future. We'll see.