I Hate Astrophysics

[@chunkygumby443]

its okay jeff, the adsense money from this video might be enough to eat one cheap burger for the day

[@zcqm]

A McDonald's burger is better than no burger

[@storytimewithjeff]

If I’m lucky I can afford to eat meat tonight 🙏

[@ZealanTanner]

@@zcqmnot if you’re morbidly obese

[@n0mad385]

@@storytimewithjeff My man Erik could help you with that

[@zcqm]

or like a membership

[@thecrakp0t]

The 3.797 was brutal to process 💀

[@THE-X-Force]

Insanity really.

[@nitrocharge2404]

This isn't an astrophysics problem, this is a teaching one

[@zaleshomeowner3493]

Exactly. The professor sounds like one of those professors who are literally only there to teach the class, while their real focus is on whatever research they're doing. They only exist to show up, give the lecture, give some half assed feedback or response, and leave.

[@derrickbonsell]

@@zaleshomeowner3493 Professors really really hate teaching classes because it takes away from research. The problem is that teaching is how their institutions make money.

[@adoringfan6995]

​@@altan5910Only at the undergraduate level

[@debtcure]

Woosh.

[@fariesz6786]

​@@derrickbonselli slightly disagree. sure, pretty much every professors first passion is their research, and a lot of them hate teaching. anyone who doesn't hate it however (and, naturally, some people are actually really enthusiastic about it) will be peer-pressured into pretending to hate it bc the group is afraid of losing this highly valuable bargaining chip. and this begins early. i was subtly nudged in the direction as a tutor; a friend of mine in a completely different field worked as a proper teaching assistent and was told to his face that is never to say he likes teaching ever bc that was basically inappropriate language. i still remember at least two professors who _clearly_ were passionate about teaching their subject, and one of them once cynically dropped the "we professors hate teaching" thing during a lector, kind of with a wink of an eye as if to tell us to be careful about the path ahead.

[@yagnn]

Its just so crazy that she waited until the actual presentation was happening to give feedback instead of giving feedback when you asked for feedback

[@cewla3348]

"feedback" "no" "HOW THE FUCK DID YOU MISS THIS??? YOU MORON!"

[@aukora129]

Crazy he did a presentation on feedback and wasn't given any feedback on it

[@Koffiato]

Happens all the time in Industrial Design, especially the studio classes. No real feedback until grading, and it's way too late then.

[@antitorpiliko]

Bro college is a smoke and mirror game

[@liberval9425]

Sh'ounds like menopause

[@rez505]

Look man if a professor told me "im good to go" and then proceeded to give me a 78%...... the emails would be biblical

[@asdfasdf-dd9lk]

Hey so I'm not American, over here for physics courses what we count as a "good grade" is very different. Is 78% that bad?

[@tonymartin1913]

​@asdfasdf-dd9lk it is a c+ slightly above just passing

[@rez505]

@@asdfasdf-dd9lk We have something called the grade point average here (GPA) and on that scale a 78% would equal a C+ and would count as a 2.3 out of 4.0. Of Course this could differ between universities but regardless a C+ could really drag someone's GPA if they're already at a high 3.8> GPA range.

[@asdfasdf-dd9lk]

@@rez505 Ah ouch, we don't use letter grades at uni in the UK but that sounds rough.

[@-Robert]

@@rez505 why are such high grades required for scholarships? I understand the "elite of the elite" but it's not like 3.797 is anything to scoff at and doesn't mean this is all that was possible, but rather that this was graded in consequence of the classes they took.

[@zmr3352]

That was incredibly irresponsible and unfair of the professor and that's putting it lightly.

[@jolynecujoh3784]

it def was but professor don’t really care about you. one of mine last semester never mentioned in his syllabus that you could retake missed exams if you just talked to him and came to him so i stressed out about it until i talked to him

[@dislikereporter2271]

@@jolynecujoh3784 but if what jeff said is true, this doesnt just sound like "the teacher doesnt care" it sounds like "the teacher does care but purposely wanted him to fail"

[@whong09]

There's plenty of people like that in academia. This was abuse lol.

[@alexlowe2054]

Time to go talk with the Dean of the college!

[@SupChad735]

@@jolynecujoh3784 Eh that seems like he wants you to actively reach out and sit down with your professor instead of just retaking a test. Let the kids that care enough to reach out be able to re-take tests seems 100% fine

[@spatel8344]

If Astrophysics is so good, then why haven’t they made Astrophysics 2??

[@danielsieker9927]

They have. It's called cosmology

[@illford]

​@danielsieker9927 no that's the spinoff

[@WhiteRabbit644]

If the average grade from Astro1 is B and C , I don’t think anyone will be smart enough to study Astro2

[@rai_l]

@@WhiteRabbit644 eh at my school galactic astrophysics is astro 2, and stellar is astro 1

[@shroomer3867]

Linear Algebra so good they made Linear Algebra II

[@ethanc94]

as an asparing mechanical engineer, a "basic understanding of calculus 3..." hurt me like an insult to my mother.

[@josephrupsis4623]

Eyyyyy fellow mechi! Recent grad here. In my experience calculus isn't used as much in the later classes (though that might be my school) but fluid mechanics and heat transfer were my hardest classes. I feel they make it harder than it needs to be though. Keep up the good work! There is a light at the end of the tunnel!

[@Athropod101]

Ehhh….Calc III isn’t really anything new. It’s moreso just 3D shenanigans and applications of Calc I & II.

[@sebagomez4647]

​@@Athropod101honestly worst part of calc 3 is the proofs. Some of them are easy but some are like ??? And you cant tell someone worked their ass off to get to that solution.

[@tylerrolfe8516]

Uk physics student here.. what kinda stuff is calc 3

[@josephrupsis4623]

@@tylerrolfe8516 calculus in 3D

[@Mikemk_]

You need to talk to the dean/chair, whichever applies. This is clearly a case of targeted unfair grading, and maybe even attempted exploitation in terms of you unknowingly advancing her own research.

[@FlutterSwag]

Exactly, its affecting the scholarship $$$ so its not just a moral thing

[@muffinconsumer4431]

Research: Case study: Absolutely dunking on this kid in my class lmfao

[@Malvium]

Don't know what she expected out of some kid who doesn't even know why he's there.

[@davidhildebrandt7812]

Lol, an undergraduate student with no prior knowledge of the area, in two weeks. There's never going to be anything even remotely worth stealing. How did a thousand people like this comment?

[@whalefall413]

He wasn't advancing her research. He was given a topic that she was so familiar with that any mistake that he made would be under a magnifying glass to her. It was unfair, but not exploitative

[@JazzyWaffles]

Some professors are actual monsters, not gonna lie.

[@StoryTeller796]

I would rather eye down Freddy or Photo-Negative Mickey than most of my old public school teachers.

[@giran4914]

@@StoryTeller796tbf photo negative Mickey is very unthreatening

[@StoryTeller796]

@giran4914 Honestly, it's basically like the grunt, a "Zombie" compared to the rest of the rest of the monsters, especially with the Room Zero monster's ability to just slowly drive people insane and apparently be able to kill them at its own whim or siren them and others to their deaths. This doesn't remove Photo-Negative Mickey's threat level, you just have to avoid it at all costs, which isn't even remotely difficult to do and basically applies to every other Abandoned By Disney character (with some being impossible to do so after initial contact.) So TL:dr, yeah, it's the least dangerous but it's still an uncomfortably psychotic killer who seems to somewhat be able to understand what's going on, just have zero self-control in actually intellectually interpreting any of it or reacting to it in a sane manner.

[@SacajaweaSastre]

I experienced teachers and professors like this all the way from high school to grad school.

[@rileymichael2694]

Yup. Had to sit down with a chemistry teacher about 40 years my senior and explain that hey, I’m physically disabled and get sick very easily, here’s the paperwork to prove it, could he PLEASE put the notes he wrote out in class online or email them to me so I can access them when I can’t make it to class (the way this man taught was by writing the lesson in Microsoft one note as we went along… we had no textbook or anything else to go off of. he did things this way to incentivize people to come to class 🙃) He said no, and I unsurprisingly bombed the course as a result of being unable to learn the material, costing me a seat in a prestigious orgchem research lab I’d busted my ass to get into. Anyway TLDR fuck the teachers who do this kind of thing.

[@loopcat4369]

I feel like you were saying: "But wait, it gets worse" for 12 minutes straight

[@AhDollar]

i feel like that's every video at this point lol

[@leolen8029]

And everytime, it gets so much worse

[@x--.]

It's this kinda Prof shenanigans that convinced me course shopping is the way -- I don't care how much profs complain. Far easier to avoid than try and fight it out with them.

[@bray7299]

as someone who had a 3.749 before the last semester causing me to not get graduation honors announced at the cerimony even though I increased it to 3.77 that semester I understand the gpa gripe

[@andrewzheng4038]

ong dropping a fraction of a decimal below a particular threshold is the worst

[@xiphosura413]

me, on a GPA of 3.0 and change:

[@evekatsumuki734]

@@andrewzheng4038 easy solution: use probability instead of thresholds(lower GPA = lower probability of getting grant or getting in uni or whatever) or fix SAT and use it in conjunction with a system of extracurricular activities, which would increase the SAT score. for example contests. we have something like that in russia. SAT analogue is not yet ideal tho.

[@jordankupfer3265]

Recent astrophysics grad here... on behalf of the rest of us in the field, I am so fuckin sorry. If it makes you feel any better, I dropped a course really similar to this called Galaxy Evolution during my master's because even after getting a whole ass bachelor's degree in the field, I still had no fuckin clue what was going on. It'll be okay, Jeff :)

[@jessicadoan9261]

uh oh this don't look too good for me then...

[@stevensanchez4739]

i just don't understand how you were confused if you had already gotten ahead in the game with ur bachelors... did they miss out on material during undergrad?

[@jordankupfer3265]

@@jessicadoan9261 I can promise you'll be fine!! Just gotta put the work into the degree, but also put the work into looking after yourself. It's a tough balance to find, but you'll get there :')

[@jordankupfer3265]

@@stevensanchez4739 The specific material covered in the course was stuff I hadn't directly seen before. At that point it got so specialized and niche that it was just... new material. I wouldn't say they missed anything, I had the background knowledge and stuff to get started in the course. Can't say much else other than astrophysics is just hard and there's always going to be something new you don't know hahah

[@i-vbag]

As someone who wants to study it, what other advice would you give?

[@mrwinemaker]

In winemaking college, one of my professors had bred a couple grape varietals and had a PhD in dirt sciences. Anyways, in our first viticulture class we had to write a report on a certain grape varietal. After we picked, the professor said "I pity any of you that chose L'Acadie Blanc" as that's the varietal she literally invented lol

[@alnd]

at first i was like who the fuck goes to winemaking college then i read your username and figured it out

[@melancall5960]

@@alndcomgratuionrations… you have discovered a Context Clue! Please pay $3.99 to unlock the rest!

[@makssachs8914]

Lmao dirt sciences

[@justadot_5258]

I didn’t know winemaking was a such a field of science

[@bubblesbomb8949]

​@@makssachs8914 Not even Soil Science. DIRT science.

[@thcottquistafoi1597]

At least in my university, you have grounds ro appeal the grade she gave. You could cite the entrapment and the inconformity with the rubric as a case for a biased assessment of your work and solicit an independent review of your presentation for a fairer grade from another professor in that area. Obviously a ton of asterisks depending on the regulations of your university.

[@ryankasch5561]

The "professor saying something is good to go, then ripping into your project plus grading harshly" feels like my experience with stem class in college, as a person who mostly did non stem subjects (econ, history and archaeology). In my non stem classes if a professor gave feedback prior to the final submission and you made changes, the lowest you could get was an A-. In stem classes it felt like professors just decided that it's a good learning tactic to hide info and spring it during or after the final submission, even with talking to them prior.

[@Jonas-Seiler]

I guess no feedback is better than falsely positive feedback

[@JackAndTheBeanstalkr]

yes, STEM is like real life.

[@danksheev66]

It's like the most interesting sounding physics when you're young, then you find it's the most annoying one mathematically.

[@michaelking8391]

It is definitely not "the most annoying one mathematically". Unless this criterion is defined with respect to the expected level of mathematics. In general, Astro is not even considered theoretical physics, where "the real" math begins, and even there there is a huge range in its use.

[@donnymcjonny6531]

Astro is fun because you can make a bunch of assumptions and ignore a bunch of stuff. Like when you start a problem, you don't have to figure out every term, you just start putting ideas together until you get a magnitude that sounds right. If you're in the ballpark, it's good (i.e. you're not getting a galaxy of 10 solar masses but in trillions of solar masses, you're probably going in the right direction)

[@insertcoolusernamehere9518]

Damn you astrophysics professor was absolutely diabolical

[@sebagomez4647]

In college the topics are so complex and deep that if your professor wants to be an ass they will absolutely destroy you no matter how good the work done is. Ive seen it several times. Sometimes you never had a chance at all

[@ethanbottomley-mason8447]

@@sebagomez4647 It depends on the course. Especially in graduate topics courses, they really don't care. A friend and I gave presentations in a course on algebraic curves and surfaces, and the professor just gave 100 without really caring how good the presentations were.

[@gregsam5840]

This video make me cry. Not just because of the professors bait, but also because 78% was said to be a low grade...

[@sebagomez4647]

Honestly for the effort he put in and the in my uni 60% is a pass but if the professor confirmed the presentation was ready before the exposition i would expect nothing less than a 9.

[@jetblack5941]

It probably is for an upper div class (grad class?)

[@NormanWasHere452]

@@sebagomez4647 Yikes. I'm literally relieved when I get a 50% half the time

[@fsdds1488]

I used to get a C- for 70%, and since I get a lot of 70 something I got a ton of C... And I have to rely on general electives (things like introductory materials science, financial engineering and Introductory climate science, and a few art and history class that I excelled in) to remain afloat.

[@genessab]

I took a star formations class last semester as a high energy physics masters student, and I had a very similar experience. It’s crazy how easily physics branches off into dozens of mutually unintelligible fields.

[@muffinconsumer4431]

It’s like music genres, if one gets too oversaturated make up a new one

[@Xiph1980]

Yeah, but at least with astrophysics, there are some shortcuts in all fields. Chemistry? Hydrogen, Helium, and ehh.... Metals or so, whatever. Math? 6.8*10^4?, meh, 10^4 is good enough... 😛

[@glenyoung1809]

Brings back memories for me, did a Physics/Astrophysics dual major back in the 1980s. What you went through isn’t uncommon, same BS, different eras, lots of profs love to pull the bait and switch when it comes to class research topics. I had a 4th year independent study course in Astrophysics(not core to my degree), was told on the syllabus I could pick my own research topic and be supervised by the course instructor. I chose the topic to be the study of the cataclysmic variable star Eta Carinae, even had an outline sketched out for our first meeting. Got to the meeting with the course prof. and he was waiting at his desk with a thick folder of paper. I told him I had worked out an initial topic outline for the course as requested. He looked a little put out, he then grumbled that he had picked out a topic for me already, it was on Planetary Nebulae and it was part of his current research program. He wanted me to do some data analysis on some new observational data he had acquired. In essence he wanted me to be an unpaid research assistant doing work for him for free. What? I thought we were allowed to choose our own topics? He bluntly told me if I went ahead with my own topic he couldn’t provide any ‘help’ to me. It was also hinted my final grade would not be all that great. I was told to think it over, I left that meeting, walked straight over to the Registrar’s and dropped the course. Another student taking the course was more flexible, he went along with it, worked his ass off and got an A as payment for his efforts. Almost 40 years later and I still don’t regret doing what I did, research assistants were paid positions and I was being asked to work for free in exchange for grades, that didn’t and still doesn’t sit well with me.

[@balala7567]

"How does the [techno babble] work"? sounds like if someone presented on the commodore 64 and then the professor asked what each pin and instruction on the 6502 does

[@JackAndTheBeanstalkr]

or the z80 even?

[@piggaming3346]

On today's episode of JEFF GETS SCAMMED: Joins astrophysics class, gets his cheeks clapped by harsh grading Will he survive the course? Find out in this episode!

[@Dr.Livingdark]

Jeff hates astrophysics because the intelligence required to create his masterful illustrations makes it look like child’s play. Astrophysics? The stars stay in the same place every night, why would you calculate how they move?

[@TheBadassTonberry]

Because they do move. It's the enormous scale and distance that that makes them appear stationary.

[@lordthicknipples-gt2oq]

@@TheBadassTonberry my conscience : don't do it. don't do it. don't do it. me: *WHOOOSH* haha I make funny and original joke

[@zekayman]

@@lordthicknipples-gt2oq Cringe

[@lordthicknipples-gt2oq]

@@zekayman well... you're not wrong

[@imbabywild]

@@lordthicknipples-gt2oqcringe

[@pixel6854]

God I LOVE MAJORING IN ASTROPHYSICS I LOVE MAJORING IN ASTROPHYSICS I LOVE MAJORING IN ASTROPHYSICS

[@storytimewithjeff]

most sane astrophysics major

[@cjshakes]

I'm an astro major. I'm amazed you never encountered professors like this in your physics classes. A lot of my university's physics and astrophysics professors are like this. It is a shame but definitely not a thing unique to astro. This is a real problem in physics as a whole and departments need to work on it.

[@CeoMacNCheese]

Honestly I don’t think professors should be people who are actually researching and leading the fields their teaching but people who learned the field and not researching anything new like I don’t know like high school teachers?!

[@JackAndTheBeanstalkr]

apparently the dept need a respectful workplace advisor with cocoa and cookies on Fridays

[@childcannibalism5080]

@@CeoMacNCheese Not the problem, that would make it more likely that a teacher has a passion for the subject and teaching. This is a separate problem.

[@soap9277]

Man, my dumb CompSci major brain cant understand these hard math and science words

[@madhavgullapalli505]

I understood galaxy :)

[@jonlow_snow3039]

My psych major brain with a hatred of math vaguely understood what was going on. Though at one point I wanted to be an astronomy major, so yeah.

[@rai_l]

CS+Astro major here... yeah sometimes words brain hurty but it's the fun hurty

[@chrisriverata1917]

​@@rai_lDon't lie to me, you're actually a Masochist.

[@NOISECOREMafiaTV]

This is why I became a niche internet noise musician and professional jackass instead of an astrophysicist

[@yeetonmydeet7013]

if you become an astrophysicist youre also a professional jackass by default

[@muffinconsumer4431]

Let’s be real who’s getting the better deal out of life here

[@AlexandroGarcia6492]

500 views in 3 years

[@Harwey-lz4gp]

@@AlexandroGarcia6492😂😂

[@siriuslydont]

0:52 Defending the decision to require real analysis: if your college didnt have a dedicated "intro to proofs" course this is likely one of the first classes that makes you write rigorous proofs (the other common choice is discrete math, which is probably even less relevant for a physics major), which is a heavily required skill for any higher level math course. Likely if you took these classes without real analysis or similarly leveled mathematical background the pacing would've been too fast since you aren't used to it. Also, real analysis gives you the rigor of calculus (mostly differentiation) which allows you to treat all those subjects that as you said may just require calc knowledge, but that's just for knowing what the machinery is, which is probably enough for a physicist, but not for a mathematician (likely the main audience of these courses). I took a grad diff geo class, and if I never took the second real analysis course I probably would have died 3 weeks in, nevermind the first one. Math majors don't just study how to use mathematical objects, they need to be able to reason with them and prove properties etc. (Lmao sorry for the rant I just think about this/have this convo a lot as a physics math double)

[@siriuslydont]

And yeah we have a intro astrophysics class with a very harmless name and is basically required for astro majors to take as a sophomore, plus a lot of nonmajors take it as an elective. And it is terrifying, precisely because of what you said - astro requires a lot of other physics background that sophomores (and nonmajors) simply don't have yet, so what follows is a semesterful of "what the hell is going on" and confusion and suffering lol (I may be exaggerating)

[@ssun190]

You need complex analysis for anything beyond intro to quantum mechanics and differential geometry for general relativity, two pillars of modern physics. In general, being introduced to math in a physics class is a terrible idea as they never actually explain what is going on. I have seen so many students get completely lost in quantum field theory because they never had any complex analysis.

[@FlaminTubbyToast]

The thing about analysis is that it’s generally also the introduction to proofs for most math majors and while technically you could learn the other topics with just calc III. They aren’t going to ask you what is the answer, they are going to tell you to prove that the statement is true for all values. It’s not the fact that you need to go back and understand calc I-III it’s that you need to have a formal and rigorous understanding of logic, proofs and mathematical structures. A mat 300 course is about understanding the math and not just learning it.

[@abyssimus]

I've had similar experiences with professors whenever my research got anywhere near their specialty. Thankfully, as a humanities major, I got pretty good at figuring out what their interpretational framework was, what subject areas they were knowledgeable about, and only acknowledge the assigned topic just enough to an opposing framework with completely unfamiliar subject matter.

[@Luxof_]

no way bro had to get a mental profile on his professors to pass the damn course 💀💀

[@bitcidic]

Ok, you can't fool me anymore, this is just casually explained's voice

[@ZealanTanner]

I took one year of college and still regret it to this day. My favorite subject was programming but the teacher completely ruined it for me

[@benzemamumba]

🤨

[@supdog8786]

🤓

[@ZealanTanner]

😔

[@JackAndTheBeanstalkr]

sounds like you were brainwashed and not programmed properly

[@selaichi1893]

idk man i kinda like astrophysics but i guess everyone's tastes in music are different

[@autopick1902]

i scrolled all the way down here to see them mentioned, worth it

[@nave_3030]

🤣🤣 f

[@leirex_1]

Some professors are just insane in their expectations. I had a professor who was absolutely obsessed with electronics that it got me worried, but he repeatedly gave us sympathetic stories about blacking out during exams, getting confused and that it's all not a big deal and as long as we attended the lectures we would be able to at least pass. The preparation exams were also kind of easy. Unfortunately I couldn't attend the first real exam because I got sick but I still got to see the results... 60% failed, average grade D In a footnote the professor told us to repeat some basic math, like real basic and I thought "huh maybe they were just being morons" They weren't... On the repeat exam I got to truly see why so many people failed. We got 4 huge tasks with multiple sub questions, one of which was analyzing a huge voltage controlled oscillator, which we did not cover in depth and one set of random smaller questions and *not even 75 minutes to solve it all* This time 75% failed and the average grade was "E+" I guess, so less than 50% of all possible points. Btw I failed, too. No one, not a single student solved the VCO task correctly. I'm not repeating this class until this guy gets replaced.

[@Tylerr_Creative]

I relate with this so much, during my second semester I did the same shit picking an industrial design class as a graphic design major, thankfully the class was specifically about blue printing stuff for ID work but it felt so weird being the only non ID Major in the class, and made me learn how bad I am at drawing with perspective

[@evanwatson819]

In the academic field we refer to this as a skill issue

[@harjingle]

Great seeing you post Jeff, You've been one of the most funniest channels I've found of all time

[@nicolasmarin7289]

I think you're at my school and as a math major here, the fact that the math classes are locked behind real analysis is a mercy given how the professors grade. Theres a grad physics math toolkit course which might be useful for you bc honestly its probably the more effective way to cover algebra and topology for physics majors. It's also the only class that does Lie stuff.

[@The.RandomTube]

As an Aspiring astrophysicist this videos makes me feel excited to start my classes! Definitely..

[@ericgolightly8450]

I want to be an astrophysicist too. I'm going to choose my classes carefully, and if that doesn't work I'm going to call the professors out. And if that doesn't work, that's when I learn to fight.

[@pacotaco1246]

Its not the most reassuring solution, but research your professors' research before you do any projects in their classes. Also if you know what professors they hang out with, look up their research too. This way your presentations will be more attuned towards what your professor is looking for or will be newish material for them if you pick a subject outside of their research topics

[@envycollar]

i applaud you for not bursting in rage at any point in the video

[@josephrupsis4623]

That happened to a friend of mine at school. He was in a group with two other guys. One of them was his friend and the other was an oddball guy. We needed to write a 25 page report with 25 sources and then give a presentation on it. The two guys did all the work in the paper, then during the presentation the oddball guy was late (as he usually was) the two guys were competent though the professor would stop them mid presentation to ask about certain images because that was the subject of her research. At one point the oddball guy when asked basically said that the subject of their research was not their research. I really felt for them. I went after them and we did really well and our classmates weren't bored during our presentation.

[@Falconguygaming]

I have been having fond memories of college and wishing I could go back. My PTSD has been reawakened and I am no loner wishing I could go back. Thank you

[@kryptonprimus]

8:37 "Looks good" is what she said What she was thinking was "yep there's plenty of content in this presentation to follow up on once he asks for questions" Then she performed the vibe check and you fumbled the bag. I know from experience that you can't make a single mistake with these things, bc the professors will exploit it. You gotta sniff these kind of professors out early so you can put them in check when it really matters Also, my condolences about the scholarship.

[@ericgolightly8450]

He lost a scholarship over this? If that happened to me, someone would have to face consequences.

[@daviddougherty5714]

I sympathise. My own experience was a required world history blue book exam. Background: physics/math major, love history. The class: required all majors undergrad cattle herd, 350-ish classmates. Randomly chosen topic from pool of unique topics. How do you prep for such an exam? Day of test: I draw the question "Discuss inflationary fluctuations of the 14th century florin". I draw a sigh of relief: I had drawn a topic I knew something about. Wax eloquent I did. No fluff, every line incisive, no repetition. Feverishly I wrote, even calling for a second blue book and I write small. My grade: D-, with a penned note from the surely hell-bound grad student who graded it; to wit "get serious about your studies". My love of history survived intact, but will spit a parting curse upon grad students from my deathbed.

[@whatisrokosbasilisk80]

To wit, lmfao

[@chrisxd146]

I'd be livid too in this situation. Thankfully my astrophysics professor was super chill when I took the class with her (shout-out to Dr. B!). Depending on the university, you could elevate this to the head of the physics department and request a manual grade override. We had a professor at my college who routinely failed his students on the final exam only for the head of the department to automatically override that grade with an A. It's not the best approach, but at least it guarantees students don't get screwed over due to a vindictive professor.

[@gabelluc9573]

In my third year of undergrad, I participated in a big competition that took me and my teammates all our summer and the first half of the fall semester. At the end of the project, every team (350 teams in total from all over the world) would fly to the US to present their projects and receive the results. In preparation for our week in the US, we asked our professors to move midterms when they overlapped with the week in the US, and they were all very cool about it. Except my machine learning professor. When i approached him about it, he firs ttold me that he couldn’t allow me to take the midterm at a later date and that all my grade would have to rely on the final. I was okay with that, tho i gave me no margin of error for the final, but i could live with it. So we went to the US, presented our projects, and actually ended up winning the first prize, becoming the first team from our country to win first prize in the 20 years since the competition had been founded. So we came back to school obviously very late in our studying but proud of ourselves, and we worked extra hard to catch up for the midterms that had been postponed. But as I come back, my machine learning professor intercepts me and tells that he changed his mind, and that I would actually need to take the midterm the following week, as it would “be unfair to the others if all my grade was the final”. I obviously hadn’t studied one bit for that so I looked at him in disbelief and told him “I don’t actually need the credits from your course, so no thanks.” Went to the academic services and dropped the course right then and there.

[@TeaRex]

I am a aerospace major and in Europe so maybe our grades scale differently but a 78% is pretty banging, like aside from a few outliers most of my class would be happy with that grade, especially after being torn to shreds. The only time I had a group presentation torn into we got a 6/10 and that was just barely a pass.

[@LazerWolf21]

At least you got a group. For my final project for Real-Time Machine Learning, the group member I was going to work with bailed on me to join another group, so I was SOL. So I decided to try to improve one of my older projects with much larger images (48x48 -> 640x480). At several points during the project, I completely exhausted my GPU memory (RTX 3060 w/ 8 GB RAM) and I had to switch to PyTorch from Tensorflow, but I managed to get top marks for the project (95%).

[@DennysGrandSlam2]

Man, fuck that guy gald you did well tho

[@torgeirHD03]

Real Time Machine 😳

[@ordinarylady157]

Just a minor point as a recovering graduate student: you can often skip math course prerequisites by reaching out to the professor who teaches the course. If you're a non-major, chances are they'll let you take their course or at least audit it just for the satisfaction of knowing that someone outside of the department gives a shit about what they're teaching.

[@Name..........]

You totally can't do that everywhere.

[@TomorrowSalad]

That sounds like a hell of an ego trip by the professor

[@levaniandgiorgi2358]

I'm a third year studying physics and in my university real analysis one and real analysis two were mandatory subjects(these two subjects gave me way better understanding of calculus then any actual calculus class),also differential equations,complex analysis and vector/tensor calculus Next semester I will be learning elements of topology and differential geometry along with field theory and quantum mechanics All in all physics major feels like most of what you are taught is math

[@stanieldev]

I feel ya man. I had a class called Math Methods that prepares you for higher-physics by teaching you relevant material. However, the professor did very similar things to yours and always criticize how "American students just don't try" because we didn't get these topics. I was one of like 3 in the class who actually understood what was happening. Fortunately, I'm his TA this semester and will be helping him work with the next year of students with my support and feedback. He's receptive to adjustment, but you can tell he's at our university for research and not for teaching.

[@lincolnsand5127]

1:13 This is honestly pretty common for most math departments in my experience. This is at least the case for my school (UofU). There's some exceptions, for instance, PDEs and other more "applied courses" *usually* only need linear and ODEs. The main reason afaict, is because most upper division math classes are heavily proof based and the real analysis courses are usually more about teaching formal proof methods rather than necessarily real analysis per se. This is why topology and abstract algebra require real analysis even though you really don't need a lot of knowledge of the subject necessarily. (I'm a CS and pure math major btw)

[@ricem672]

I don't study anything similar to physics, but I go to a "top" university in my country and what's funny is that I got so used to this kind of treatment that when you listed all the things your professor had inflicted onto you, I was like: ok and??? Because the three years I have been here, I have had assignments without marking rubrics, not enough time for assignments, last minute changes to classes and tasks, little to no teaching support... I had one lecturer that didn't even respond to me asking him for proper feedback for my essay, which was composed of a few highlights and question marks. I've always chalked it up to lecturers not being paid enough or given enough time, but I guess I should have been fighting against that.

[@TheKastellan]

Yo wtf.

[@ahppa]

You literally got walked all over. Good work getting through it, but you clearly were wronged

[@psychoedge]

Often "top" universities spend money in the most useless places and don't give a flying fuck about how good their prof's teaching skills actually are.

[@ricem672]

@@psychoedge Yup... I basically pay to have the university's name on my resume. I can't even switch because my degree is a bit niche and not a lot of other unis teach the same thing :/

[@beidoded]

@@ricem672 curious, what's your degree?

[@suitablegames8641]

My man I really respect Physics students. I study/ struggle English and History and all you need to know for those things is how to read. Could not imagine your pain so best of luck on your journey.

[@Pikachu-kw4fv]

Me as a dutch student where the literal only requirement to admission to anthing is "you've passed the previous step" be like. "Passing grade is a passing grade what are y'all ppl on about?"

[@Zooted1278]

Had a similar thing happen to me at my uni, not to the same biblically damnable extent as what happened you but definitely infuriating none the less. Some of these profs are egotistical bastards who want nothing more than to see their students suffer man. Keep strong brother

[@ericgolightly8450]

Violence isn't the answer, but it is considerable in a situation this bad.

[@IsomerSoma]

That's not what was going on here.

[@alanhe4476]

this is peak "why isn't anyone passionate about astrophysics anymore? we need more funding and bright young minds into the field!" energy

[@portalwalker_]

5:55 to be precise... You don't see the shockwaves of jet fighters unless you are really close, then you might see a very thin distorted line because of the high pressure zone. What you are talking about as a vapour cone that is formed because of water vapour condensing in low pressure areas which don't even require super sonic speeds

[@donatedorb4094]

Was your voice always this deep?

[@azaraniichan]

this gave me flashbacks cuz' that's essentially how half of my professors behaved in one of the universities I went too, why is this so common and accepted in academia god damn

[@DiveAtlantic]

Astro requires you to wear a lot of hats. I skirted this in my undergrad degree by focusing on relativity. That way I didn’t need geology, chemistry, and a host of other fields. All said, tensors were not too bad after diffy q’s and vector calculus (coming from a guy NOT gifted in math), and GR was really fun to learn about.

[@florianbuerzle2703]

(Former) Astrophysicist here. Just discovered your channel and your content is really great, love your sarcasm 😊 Binge watched most of your videos 😂 When I watched this one, I felt really bad for you. If I had known you back then, I would have told you that any course on any advanced astro topic could easily be relabelled as Gas Dynamics and Radiation (perfectly matching the two volumes of Shu's Physics of Astrophysics textbook 🤭) and that the prerequisite for any such course is: all of physics. You would have been better off choosing GR 101 or Condensed Matter 101 or, for that matter, almost anything else. When you started explaining supersonic turbulence in GMCs you made me laugh uncontrollably 🤣 I did my PhD on star formation and my co-advisor was Ralf Klessen, one of the originators of the concept. I haven't thought about this stuff in years and certainly didn't expect to see it in a YT video... thanks for bringing back something buried deep in the unconscious part of my brain 😉

[@woodsgump]

Yeah Astrophysics sucks too, very complex and somewhat hard to grasp. But basically what you need to know is…. When you’re going very fast in a spaceship, you use the gravitational orbit of a planet to SLINGSHOT yourself very far!

[@lexgrayson2736]

this is not astrophysics babe

[@OatmealCreamPie]

5:49 That is an impressivle well drawn Stick-71. Bravo.

[@therealjezzyc6209]

This is karmic justice for believing that physics has nothing to do with real analysis

[@rinosanchez2150]

Totally agree with you. He would have been boned if he skipped that real analysis prereq.

[@JackAndTheBeanstalkr]

that's a complex analysis you've stated there

[@destructiveodst1199]

Not taking real analysis is a skill issue

[@destructiveodst1199]

Seriously though your professor is fucked up for doing that

[@danjbundrick]

To be a professor is to never be held accountable for your bad decisions.

[@5678plm]

that's true, all a student is supposed to do is politely obey no matter what happens

[@Taksheel]

Yeah that's one thing about my physics lectures that annoys me so much they expect me in first year to be an expert in the field

[@KertaDrake]

Man, that's how you end up turning in a research paper dedicated to how terrible every aspect of your professor's teaching methods are.

[@Astro_weeeeee]

Honestly you are really good at describing space and physics things with the CGM description.

[@rileygoddard7181]

I love astrophysics for one reason: it's a great insult to tell someone to go into Astrophysics. It's basically a way to tell someone they're good at taking up time and space.

[@oak3785]

i feel you man, this shit sucks. i had to do a final project for my lab about the topic of doping and semicondoctors while having exactly 0 background in solid state physics, shit killed me

[@chintex_]

damn that sucks! your teacher is a real piece a work. from the way you described your first class I'm still impressed with how well you seem to have done in the end tho.

[@Laszer271]

Watching you, I'm happy that I was never concerned with grades. There are many paths to success, disregarding grades doesn't mean giving up, it just means that you have to find your opportunities elsewhere (e.g. not through scholarships).

[@xymaryai8283]

so for the CGM question, my guess of radiation pressure was technically correct? just instead of EM radiation, its sound radiation

[@spongee5445]

Im in my fourth year of my physics degree and listening to you talk about the difficulties of trying to plan electives was so real, and somehow the astrophysics professors at my school sound similarly terrible. I had a computational physics course taught by an astronomy prof and all the assignments and examples in class he used astronomy situations so none of the physics or math majors could never understand what was going on

[@kylewitter2806]

“I’m a physics major” Why would you torture yourself like that? Alternatively Oh, so you’re a masochist

[@macky400]

these videos are giving me college flashbacks and not the good ones. Reminds me of the time I had a group project where one of the people plagiarized without me knowing, so obviously, I also got punished for not checking his work for plagiarism

[@trk20.]

This video makes me grateful to be in software engineering

[@lorenzodicapo6305]

I've been lucky enough to have some of the best teachers around. I also had an anthropology professor who was so doddering that he explained the same box of bones to us three times in a row, even after we told him, and for the final, held us responsible for many things never mentioned (much less covered) in the course. Half of the declared majors quit anthro after taking one of his classes. He was the head of the department, and despite numerous complaints to the administration, we were told nothing could be done. Why? Tenure. So good luck with your case, but you don't have one. Academia builds very effective defenses against any kind of criticism.

[@claytonhiggins7526]

My college has two astrophysics classes: astrophysics 1 and 2. I took the first last year and it was literally the hardest class I've ever taken. I'm taking the 2nd this year...

[@nealreiersen6823]

I can highly relate to this experiences, As a freshman in my undergrad going for my psycology degree, I ended saw a course called behavior and neuobology. I had the same expreience being in a class full of seniors and all of them had already taken a neuro biology, and I failed my first test and promplty droped that class because I wasn't going to make it through.

[@aukora129]

And this is why I make a habit of reading through school policies and procedures, so that I can dunk on teachers right back when they pull stuff like that. I also keep my phone on audio record 24/7 when I'm outside my house which I know people hate but by god does it solve problems like this so quickly.

[@unflexian]

any good apps for doing that?

[@SisypheanRoller]

What do you use to record?

[@aukora129]

@@unflexian iPhone has an app called voice memos or smth like that, works very nicely

[@shen4379]

The voice memos thing sounds great but aren’t there legalities involved with recording someone without their knowledge or explicit consent?

[@unflexian]

@@shen4379 every country is different, try googling yours

[@lc9245]

I had the exact same experience about a first year cross-disciplinary elective class, “music theory”. I just joined the uni, having no concept about how to game the system and thought it could have been a fun, simple introduction to music theory. I should have walked out the moment I realised none of the other students are non-musician. They weren’t even taking notes during class while I know how to play notes on the recorder.

[@quaackyt]

watching this as someone from the UK, American university is so weird

[@tylercrowley2559]

Had a similar thing happen to me with a presentation but luckily the professor was nice enough about me disregarding a primary field of research for them. Always check what your professors are researching. Always.

[@smallguy1113]

5:30 hey you made an error here, positive particles don’t repel negative particles

[@shaved_almonds7829]

Through the course of my undergrad physics major, I had 5 physics professors. 2 were genuinely excited to teach and foster new physics academics, as well as share their research with students. 2 of them were strict, had high but usually fair expectations, and felt like they did care but demanded excellence, which I can understand. 1 was incredibly smart but also incredibly less empathetic than the others, and sometimes downright passive aggressive or cruel.

[@alfrink1c]

As a astrophysics graduate I can say that this is basically the whole experience and sadly you just kinda "have to get used to this" and thats all you can do

[@ChaoticNeutralMatt]

If you choose to stay. *Maybe*

[@xryeau_1760]

Does this stay entirely within the bounds of legality and school policy?

[@Dokattak]

Oh my god if that happened to me, the teacher saying “it’s good” knowing damn well you are easy pickings for her, the universe would crumble with my rage.

[@thelastasolplayerrip7640]

On the topic of academics, I have pretty bad adhd that drastically impaired my ability to succeed in high school, but I’ve been spending the last 2 and a half years drastically overhauling my approach to life, having to learn how to learn and study again, having to adjust to a significant cognitive improvement to focus, discipline, and work ethic; 3 years out of high school and a college algebra level understanding of math… I hope my aspirations aren’t a delusion when I say I want a career in astrophysics. I’ve fallen in love with studying to learn, now that I have the real ability to successfully do so on my own, -but I want to know if my efforts will be in vein if I truly want to delve into the language of math and physics at this point in life, because it sounds to me like I’m submitting myself to hell on Earth, to accomplish this outlandish goal of mine. I don’t mean to explain my entire livelihood like it’s some kind of sob story, I’m just genuinely curious as to what it’ll take to succeed in academia, having to literally start as a level 1 noob astronomer.

[@person1420]

Your story is my story. I am 22. And I want to go to university to study physics and Math this year. I would need to pass the entrance exam for that first, which means a lot of preparation. I also want to delve into the language of math and physics, like you said. I want to really understand it. I think it would get easier if I truly understand it intuitively. I am trying to read some books that explain it that way like Introduction to Mathematics and Introduction to Differential Calculus etc. But it is hard. I haven't been able to finish any of this kind of book that I started. My ADHD really makes it hard for me to consistently read a book everyday to finish it. But I am trying.

[@faijro9260]

US emphasis on grading and incredible grade inflation is always wild to me. Not only does a 78 out of a 100 sound perfectly fine, but also, due to scholarships and the like, picking easy classes to game your GPA is encouraged. It discourages learning, which should be the primary goal of uni. For reference, a GPA of a 3.5 would be the GPA of a top 5% student where I live. Enough to get you in the best universities (well within the top 100 globally).

[@theweredragon9887]

I was SOOOOOO ready for this video

[@tsyf1]

Stuff like this is why I learned to not sweat any grades in higher education. I didn't get academic excellence (Highest grade-based academic recognition in my country) because I was sick the day of a test and the institution just decided not to allow justification for stuff like that because they were up for accreditation that year.

[@bennettchristensen6877]

I don't think the math courses being locked behind the analysis sequence has to do with your school being greedy. The large public university I attend does the same thing, and the LAST thing they want is students staying longer than they need to. I think the reason my university and others do this is because math departments believe that students can't handle the type of teaching done in upper div math courses without being introduced to it through the "core" upper div courses (which is generally analysis at most schools), so it might have less to do with the actual content and more to do with change in teaching style between upper div and lower div classes. I think this logic is still kind of BS though, but my assumption may just be flat out wrong.

[@crashstudi0s]

I just saw "Tensor Calculus" and got flashbacks, and I barely used them. Mad respect for physicists.

[@GiantFrog]

Is this just the upper-level astronomy experience? They gave us a "refresher" lab on doing things with our data in Matlab, but nobody had ever used it past basics. I was the only person with a programming background though, so my group was consistently doing the best in labs. I carried math major friend through the labs and he carried me through the homework. Because he did all the meandering and working out on his paper while I tried to help or just keep up verbally, I got to neatly go directly to the point on my paper after we figured it out, so I got higher grades on our identical homework about a third of the time. Once I had gotten a question right on a test and he did not, but we compared afterwards and had taken the same approach. He brought them both in to the professor to ask about why, and she decided I probably shouldn't have gotten it right either and took some points away from me. When he had to drop I did too. Most of the class we started with had already dropped before us! I just couldn't do the homework without him, and he said almost half his study time was spent on this one class and it was bringing everything else down. Tanked my knowledge of linear algebra, I took that pretty late during the same semester and hardly know much because all my time went to that class, I really loved astrophysics and wanted to do well. But yep, just had to drop and take a W (ithdrawl, they should call it an L). Money spent, pass/fail rate down, no progress made.

[@innocentsmith6091]

Matlab in an astrophysics class? That's definitely a red flag.

[@jcuevasproductions]

I have subscribed…not only because you have nice presentations, but because I too am a constantly angry college student from all the hogwash in college.