So, my last post was pretty lame since I had just ridden a bus for 16 hours and I thought it necessary to make a better, less lame post.
It's kind of hard to focus when your boyfriend and his friend is playing Resident Evil on professional level on his new Xbox 360 and trying to kill this parasite infested troll swinging a pole at his face...
But I will try to focus. I found this book in my boyfriend's house called A Whole New Mind: Why Right Brainers Will Rule the Future, and it has been quite inspirational for me because the right brain is basically the artistic, caring, humorous, more abstract side and the whole book is about basically why careers like accounting, programming, law, and being a doctor (doctoring-wtf?) are either being totally restructured where the focus is on people skills (doctors), otherwise they are being shipped overseas since they will do it faster and cheaper (programming), otherwise robots are doing it (accounting, law).
Some of the other reasons right brainers are taking over is because right now is a time of plenty where a product that will "do the job its made for" isn't enough. The function is expected since the market is overflowing with so many varieties of the same thing (for example, cell phones) that now everyone is calling on designers to make their products stand out and sell better.
This book is both inspirational and disconcerting to me, because I was thinking about majoring in Computer Science and Art. Art, obviously, from the perspective of this book, is good. However Computer Science is one of those majors that people in India do cheaper and better. Yet at the same time, my creative/ people skills might help me come up with ideas for programs and implement those ideas rather than necessarily being the programmer per say. So maybe being a computer programmer is still not such a terrible idea.
You see, my parents are always worried that majors such as creative writing and art are wildly impractical and from the beginning they wanted me to be a doctor, but now that is definitely not in my cards (I am simply not cut out to be a doctor, and I am not a big fan of science) so they were hoping that I would pursue Computer Science since I rather enjoyed my Python and Computer Animation classes.
They beat the troll. Yeah!
Uh, anyways.. haha.. What was I saying?
I guess I wanted this post to be a bit of an inspirational thing for all those artists out their whose IQ's aren't super high and worry about their futures -it's OK! You'll be fine, and probably better off! People will love you for your creative spirits because that's the future! K? Good.
I still don't know what I should do.. double major in Computer Science and Art or.. something else. I also want to minor in Creative Writing. Really I wouldn't major in computer science if one of the classes (game design) wasn't way in the upper level. In order to get up to that class, I basically have to major. I just thought if I wanted to do animation.. or games.. I would want to go there. But for that I need to take math classes and... programming classes.. *sigh*
So I found this thing on one of the blogs I watch called the 250 Words a Day Challenge.. basically.. try and write 250 words a day, and don't like get let down too much like in Nano and give up. KEEP GOING. And 250 really isn't that big of a goal. I think maybe.. just maybe I can do it. Because I have this story, see.. and I've been procrastinating it. Plus 250 words won't really take away much time from my boyfriend/ friend time so you know, I think I can handle it. I've been working on this sci fi story where the premise is basically that the world is moreorless apocalyptic.. but humans basically made this place called Haven.. where only the elite humans are permitted to enter.. and basically they are chosen in such a way that Haven is a utopia of only kind, caring, respectful people led by a group called Royale. People that aren't in Haven kinda hate it.. obviously.. and one man is on a certain.. vendetta.
I want this story to be done so yeah... I need some kind of motivation.
Being back in Minnesota.. it's a little weird, but I was here for Spring Break so I guess.. I dunno. Part of me still feels like I live here, and I know that staying here for a month I might really have a hard time transitioning back to my er.. real home? in Cleveland. Even though I will go back to Oberlin pretty soon after. I did live in Minnesota for 5 years. I might even move back after college. It's a more familiar place than Ohio is even though I lived in Ohio as a kid. I still spend most of my time in Ohio at Oberlin, and most of the people at Oberlin don't live in Ohio. So when I talk to people at Oberlin knowing that they go back home in like, California every holiday I feel like I'm not that different from them. I just spend a portion of holidays at "home" and then the other portion at my "second home" I guess.
I'm not going to lie, it kinda sucks. I miss my boyfriend and my friends, sometimes I have to resort to just.. avoiding thinking about it. Which I've gotten pretty good at. Plus I do have reasonably good friends at Oberlin that make me laugh and take my mind off of things. And you know, the workload generally keeps me occupied.
Did you know that IQ accounts for only 4 to 10 percent of career success? Isn't that crazy?
My boyfriend didn't seem surprised but I was. I guess within the career path you find yourself in, your moving up in the ranks is more thanks to a good sense of humor, empathy, etc. Oberlin is kind of all about being smart.. so now I want to make even more sure that I don't focus too much on the smartness quota, even though that's the only reason I got into Oberlin. Other things matter too.
That's all for now, folks!
2 comments:
Lots of different types of smarts which IQ doesn't even begin to measure. Examples, Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences. The more I read about IQ tests, their history and usage, the more I believe they're bunk. Malcolm Gladwell's written a good piece here—I did my own research into the history of the SAT when I was in high school and found much of the same. Course, Gardner's theory is suspect too since he's basically just redefining "intelligence" and as the wikipedia article points out, it's unfalsifiable—nevertheless, the point stands. Different skills contribute to different successes. My theory is that career success is largely connected to being open and friendly and making the right connections. Social smarts, I guess (Gardner's "interpersonal" intelligence). Being a successful artist, writer, or musician is much more about perseverance than innate ability. You can read Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers" for more on that—he oversimplifies things a little, but the basic premise of the book is that you have to work hard and get lucky. In any case, writing every day—very good idea.
Still, I think you're right about getting into Oberlin being much about the smarts. I think, whether or not they'll admit is, that's one of the admissions office's highest criteria. I could be wrong though.
I'm interested in this theory that artistic types will win out. I used to believe it, but I haven't been seeing the evidence. Maybe I'll pick up that book.
Sorry bout the essay. Sounds like you're having a good summer. See you in not too long.
Don't write off programming entirely! I'm a programmer, and I'd like to think that I'm pretty creative. Programming can be a very artistic process. It all depends on what you do, what you're creating.
It's certainly true that the vast majority of people graduating with computer science degrees and going to work indiscriminately at random companies tend to not be "creative" types. Those are the jobs that end up being outsourced to India, because they're standardized, boring, simple jobs.
But, there is plenty of programming that can be considered "creative", and as with writing, you don't have to take a class to learn how to do that. You just need to want to do it. I've known people that take computer science classes but don't actually know that they want to program until they learn and do so on their own, creatively.
Now, that all said, whether or not you can be creative with your programming depends on how you understand and enjoy programming. If you do not find it fun to think about things abstractly, then you're probably not going to be very creative as a programmer.
If you want to create video games, then ask yourself what part of the process you could and would enjoy contributing to. In most cases, I wouldn't say the programming that goes into video games is particularly "creative", as most of the time you're solving problems common to all video games, and the creativity and innovation that comes with new video games tends to be more in the visuals, audio, story, and the way everything is put together into a whole.
Anyway, yeah, programming may or may not be for you. If you'd like to talk more about it, you know where to find me! Also, you should take mine and Harris and Kriti's ExCo next semester, "Practical Software Development".
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