Quote:
Originally Posted by Undertoad
This is good. Man I know this sounds weird but I wish I knew some organic chem. I think I would understand some of the world just a little better. Good on ya Winslow.
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Not nearly so weird as you think. It's a great thing to want.
Engage head in the clouds:
Though it's got a reputation, fairly rightfully deserved, as a bigtime "i think i'll change my major" career-wrecking classes, it's also been one of the biggest highlights of my academic career. Starting in Gen Chem, chemistry as a topic has been one of the most intellectually formative, mentally stimulating, and overall interesting and informational course sequences I've had to date in my academic career. Admittedly a big part of it is likely due to having an absolutely incredible set of professors at a small community college with close personal interactions. Even so, the material is as eye-opening as you let it be about the way *everything* works, from a quantum level to the way your body works to the paint on your car to the food that you eat, to the ocean and the air and the rocks and trees to the sun, stars, and planets.
In a real sense, chemistry isn't just vials and potions, it's an utterly fundamental way of viewing all of creation, from nature to man's own handiwork to mankind itself. It's a bit much to take in over just two semesters
Four if you include General.
Throw in some essentials of physics for a real mind-blowing experience: if you can manage to see the relationships between the two disciplines, suddenly Science. You start to see things in a very special context that is both analytical and enlightening. You know when the news is making shit up and what the difference between propylene glycol in your twinkies and benzaldehyde in your cookies is and you can make a more informed decision when your local government asks you if it can start (or stop) fluoridating the water supply, and you learn down to an atomic level why it is that we breathe in oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide. Learn how soap works. We made biodiesel in one lab, even. It's shockingly easy. We also learned how to make TNT and a few other nasty things, though we of course didn't make anything like that in lab. You can read that bible-paper insert that's in with your pill bottles. Make sense of the back of a shampoo bottle when you're, uh, needing reading material in the bathroom.
Chemistry is marvelous.
I already got sad today that I won't have another class with the professor who has been a mentor and father figure for two and a half years of chem. But at least there is more chemistry to be had: I'll probably end up in biochem soon though, which is a whole different complicated ball game of seemingly never-ending reaction pathways in the body.