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Yours is a story filled with contradictions.
For one who shuns the Humanities, Languages and English, who'd rather read fantasy than literature, you seem to care an awful lot what society will think of you.
You identify yourself with 'one who can be respected and seen as extra talented' but why would you care what others think? Colleagues and coworkers? Why would their inferior opinion matter?
Your big paycheck, what would you spend it on? A big house, expensive car, nice clothes? All items used for status in society - to what point and purpose?
I don't think you're done with society. Your fear of becoming an average Joe points to an ambition. Use that ambition to seek more knowledge than the Joe would ever even want. You say History and Sociology are dull studies - easy and without challenge, but so is everything if you just skim the surface.
If your love for the mathematical language and the challenge of logical interpretation is true - seek then to understand the world around you through the studies of Physics. Your family seems wealthy enough to be able to support your until the time when your post graduate research will take off and Cambridge is an excellent university. But if you truly wish to challenge yourself - pursue your fathers dream. Unravel the fabrics of society itself and become better prepared to greet your own children and welcome them into our very human world. Learn the workings of the laws of our society and question the truths you've taken for granted.
As lawmaker or witness to the unveiled face of nature, you will live your life an explorer. A seeker. All but average.
Don't become a physician unless you aim to seek a cure for a terrible affliction, or you'll have spent your days a cog in a machine which you'd never come to understand.
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Your dad is a wise man.
I can't stress this strongly enough - follow your heart. No matter what, if you do the things you like to do, you'll be a happy person, and that's what it's all about.
"Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life." - Confucius
I can tell you from personal experience that truer words were never spoke. Early in my life, I made a decision to do what I wanted to do in my heart instead of studying one of the quintessentially revered professions associated with "success." I can tell you it was one of the best decisions I ever made. Now, when I go to "work" (and I do use that term loosely), I actually have FUN doing it. Not many people can say that, and let me tell you, it rules.
Good luck.
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Hey man, you make it sound like it's a cakewalk to take your steps and get a residency in the US. Fact is, placement is getting harder and harder for IMG's, especially if you need a visa. Many programs are turning down foreign applicants outright, and the best shot you have is at a rural community program. It's dumb of you to even consider the US route right now, it's just too much of a longshot.
Edit: This might sound dumb, but even I'm making it sound too easy. First off, IMG's are barred totally from a number of specialties, you are basically forced to do IM, Surg, Peds, FM, or Psych. Even those are super tough. That's assuming you do training in the US, because you don't have a snowball's chance in hell if you haven't done a few rotations state side. This year there were record breaking applicant numbers, which means hospitals weren't forced to interview IMG's aka IMG's were basically fucked. By the time you graduate it'll be 10x tougher.
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You should try and work at Google. Do some research, see what education / training / experience you need to work their and do that.
They have the best workplace environment in the world, and you would be on the cutting edge of everything.
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Some fantastic points which you guys have brought up, thankyou very much.
I've not really been able to find much information online about the possible salaries of jobs stemming from a computer science degree, so if anyone had any info there that would be excellent.
I spent a lot of time today re-reading everyone's comments and talking to teachers at school. Obviously they were all telling me to do their subjects but there were some interesting tidbits in there, such as stay the hell away from structural engineering if you want to earn more than 75k per annum, or if you don't want to be sitting in an office all day crunching numbers.
At occasions I even considered just gritting my teeth and going for medicine.
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Don't have to like humanity to be a good doc. Look at House.
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- don't have to like people (specifically) in order to help humanity (generally), though for medicine I think you might
- solve the problems you like solving
- are you just choosing your major / university right now? just pick anything, challenge yourself, and ignore any BS you find along the way. any field can be really interesting if you focus on the right parts or its framed in the right way. if you think history is boring read some Plutarch, for instance.
question though: "rubbish" about circuits and waves? get some curiosity about the world around you and how it works. if you learn about the experiments and the theorizing and stuff its pretty interesting...
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I started off as a chemical engineering major, but after taking a few classes, I felt like I was beating my head against a wall. I just had zero interest in it. I loved the programming class I took (zero experience prior to the "all engineers must take this basic programming" Engineering 101) and wanted to try it out. I had a similar choice to yours. I had to decide between the safer, and well paying Chemical Engineering, with something I found much more interesting, computers.
But I did not want to just sit and code all day, I wanted to do other things (and hopefully have a higher salary than just a career programmer).
After doing my research, I was thrilled to find that there were tons of options for a CS degree.
Besides the typical "go work for Microsoft/Apple/Google and write code 24/7" there were tons of other industries to explore that can (potentially) make a bit more while mixing things up. At our school's career fair, virtually every company needed a computer science major in some way. We had financial giants come to our school to recruit business/finance majors......and CS majors. Personally, I found a really cool technical consulting job that I'll be working at between semesters. It combines software develpment (which I love) with a standard business job (which can often lead to more career advancement/salary). I am really excited to try this out, because I feel like its a good mix.
I dont know if you have any interest in business/finance, but it could be a good way to still pursue a computer science degree while having the opportunity to make a bit more money, and not JUST program code for a living.
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I started off as a chemical engineering major, but after taking a few classes, I felt like I was beating my head against a wall. I just had zero interest in it. But i found that I loved the programming class I took (I had zero experience prior to the "all engineers must take this basic programming" Engineering 101) and wanted to try it out. I had a similar choice to yours. I had to decide between the safer, and well paying Chemical Engineering, with something I found much more interesting, computers.
But I did not want to just sit and code all day, I wanted to do other things (and hopefully have a higher salary than just a career programmer).
After doing my research, I was thrilled to find that there were tons of options for a CS degree.
Besides the typical "go work for Microsoft/Apple/Google and write code 24/7" there were tons of other industries to explore that can (potentially) make a bit more while mixing things up. At our school's career fair, virtually every company needed a computer science major in some way. We had financial giants come to our school to recruit business/finance majors......and CS majors. Personally, I found a really cool technical consulting job that I'll be working at between semesters. It combines software develpment (which I love) with a standard business job (which can often lead to more career advancement/salary). I am really excited to try this out, because I feel like its a good mix.
I dont know if you have any interest in business/finance, but it could be a good way to still pursue a computer science degree while having the opportunity to make a bit more money, and not JUST program code for a living.
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EPT
