theboombody said:
Yeah, but my undergraduate is in math, not in sociology. However, if I would have taken all math classes, I would have drowned in the difficulty. I padded it out with sociology classes to make achieving a math degree, much, much easier. Because math is hard, and sociology is not. And that's probably how it is for 99% of people.
If I would have taken all sociology classes, it would have been much easier for me, and I would have gotten a sociology degree, but I wanted something that was more of a challenge. Something that I had to work much harder for.
I have no issues with what you've written, except for the bolded part - you just conjured that number out of thin air. However, it only describes how difficult these things were
for you. Your experiences do not necessarily mirror everyone else's. They do not mirror mine, for instance.
It's great that you want to challenge yourself, and I totally understand your motives. I share them - that's why I turned to the social sciences. They provide intellectual challenge for me at a level that the natural sciences do not. Statistics is a grey area for me, where the actual mathematics of it is routine and discussing the theoretical implications of the results is what I find challenging and rewarding.
I've studied law, economics, statistics, theology, history, political science, philosophy, sociology and social work at an academic level. Of these, I have studied statistics, political science, philosophy, sociology and social work at an advanced level (2nd cycle according to the bologna process, i.e. master's level). The clear trend for me is that the more marginal the quantitative component, the more intellectually challenged I feel, because the qualitiative component requires a greater deal of abstract thinking from me. This does not mean that I think qualitative analysis is intellectually superior to quantitative analysis, only that my talents are more suited for the latter, making the former more intellectually challenging
for me.
theboombody said:
There are times I think, man, I should have studied engineering instead, where I'd have a career all set, but looking back on it, I'm not sure I could have handled the course load there. I did as much as I could handle at the time. I suppose if I would have stayed in college longer and padded out my schedule some I guess it might have been possible, but who knows. That would have cost a lot of extra money too.
Again, I take no issue with this. You find engineering hard. This is entirely in the realm of possibility. As is not finding engineering hard.
theboombody said:
But to suggest an biochemist wouldn't have the "skillset" to obtain a sociology degree is beyond laughable to me. Whether it's rude of me to say so or not. Now there may be more than a few sociologists out there who very well could have been biochemists. I'm not saying they're incapable. But I AM saying EVERY single person with a biochemistry degree could have easily, EASILY obtained a sociology degree. Every one of them. Biochemistry is much more difficult to study than sociology.
I wish you would stop making definitive statements about reality when these statements have no clear empirical grounding - anecdotal evidence is not acceptable evidence. Your experiences do not mirror the experiences of the rest of humanity. You have absolutely no basis for the claim that every single biochemist could have easily obtained a sociology degree.
I do not dispute that every biochemist could have gotten a sociology degree. Just like I do not dispute that every sociologist could have gotten a biochemistry degree. It's all a matter of effort, and hence I do dispute the "easily" part. Being skilled at one sort of intellectual activity does not automatically confer skill at another sort - on this, there is very firm empirical grounding. Both Spearman's G-factor [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G_factor_(psychometrics)] and Gardner's multiple intelligences [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences] have (on very separate grounds) provided good evidence for this, for instance. If we're sticking with anecdotal evidence (which is actually acceptable when disputing a categorical claim about "everyone". Even one deviant case will sink that ship.), I could personally name a few examples of people with degrees in the natural sciences (although not specifically biochemistry) and engineering that seemed to have a very hard time grasping fundamental concepts of political analysis.