A common question about Cornell is “how is the workload?” The short unhelpful answer is that it depends, duh. Here is the longer answer:

If you really want to graduate with doing hardly any work, it’s possible. Take an “easy” major, just meet the minimum requirements; it isn’t all that hard. But then if you do that, why are you even bothering to go to Cornell, just to get a certificate that says that you’re smart? If you want to get the most out of Cornell, you will take the major you want to take independent of how “easy” or “hard” it is considered to be. Any major will be difficult if you apply yourself to it, but I can’t really talk about anything other than my own major, AEP, which has been extremely difficult so far.

My life at Cornell has been centered around doing work (especially this semester), I’m always thinking about upcoming tests and assignments; it’s the focus of why I’m here. But of course I don’t do nearly as much work as I ought to, there are always so many cool things to do and only so few hours in the day. Whenever a small break in work comes around and I slack off some, I’m suddenly behind in everything. It’s really tough to keep on top of everything all the time and sometimes I just get sick of the constant battle and need a nice break even at the expense of my work. It’s really hard now that spring has come just look how green it is! But somehow I’m surviving the battle and I enjoy being challenged; I think I’m getting a lot out of my hard classes.

I’ve found it extremely difficult to find the right course load that works for me. Too much, I can’t focus enough on each class, too little I’m wasting my time here. Taking full advantage of everything at Cornell is impossible and it’s hard to find how far to extend yourself without becoming overwhelmed. The following guide may help tell if you have too much work:

You are overloaded with work if you find yourself:

• Trying to get some rest by closing your eyes while walking to classes
• Telling time based on exam dates and when assignments are due, “When was March, like 3 problem sets ago? I forget”
• Applying what you learn excessively, “Wow, I’ve been getting a lot of observations of photons at 510 nm lately” (trans: Wow, it’s been very green lately)
• Being jealous of people reading newspapers during lunch, “Who has time for that, don’t they have work to do?”
• Never posting on your blog as often as you should
• Thinking late times aren’t that late, “It’s only 2:31 am, I have plenty of time”
• Feeling uncomfortable, like something is not right with the universe, when you fully complete an assignment before it’s due
• Trivializing things not so trivial, “After that it’s just algebra” or “After that it’s just Calculus” or “After that it’s just solving the differential equation” or “After that it’s just solving Laplace’s equation in a toroidal coordinate system” or “After that it should be easily solvable somehow”
• Shielding yourself from being hit by an exorbitant number of photons on the rare chance you emerge from your protective shelter deep underground

This morning there was a great archaeological discovery here on Libe Slope. Professor Rumbaugh of the Earth and Atmospheric Sciences department spoke earlier today,

Every year Libe Slope thaws out a little, revealing different things that were once buried deep in snow and ice. Because of todays extremely hot high of 61°F, [the ruins] were discovered.

In light of the discovery archaeologists are scrambling to figure out who these people were and how they survived Ithaca. According to professor Armitage in anthropology,

We believe that these ancient Ithacans lived very difficult lives thwarting hills, prelims, and the bitter cold in order to survive. We take pride in their resilience.

Also… hooray for April fools day. In my math class we all put on masks of our professor in the middle of class. He laughed a little and then went on teaching undisturbed. Other stuff on the internets:

• xkcd is what?
• Awesome stuff at think geek
• Google announces Virgle
• The Cornell Daily Sudoku [pdf]
• List of Google April Fools Jokes
• Wikipedia homepage is strange..

We’ve talked about dark matter somewhat in my Astro class and it came up sometimes in my physics class last semester. I think that it is a really interesting issue in modern science. I’m by far no expert on the subject, but I’m soon to start some serious physics classes next semester and I think the problem of dark matter is representative of many unsolved problems in physics.

Okay, so here is the problem: according to our current standard model, galaxies should be unstable, but the fact that they exist tells us otherwise. Pictured is our closest spiral galaxy, Andromeda (credit: Edward Henry). The solution to this problem is that either the standard model is wrong, or that there is some kind of undetectable mass (”dark matter”) that exists and holds galaxies together, making them stable.

Although most Astronomers today think dark matter is real, there are some who disagree and think that perhaps universial laws are different under extreme circumstances that we haven’t tested. Most aspects of the standard model have been tested to work extraordinarily well at very large and very small distances like Electromagnetism, but some things like Gravity we aren’t as sure of. What would be ideal is to find a new model that works for galaxies as well as everything else the standard model works for, but this is really hard and no one has been able to do it.

The part of this that I find most interesting is whether or not it is valid to “invent” something we can’t detect just because they make our models work. There are a lot of things in theoretical physics that were predicted to exist and were later discovered, but does that mean we can say something exists without ever detecting it (e.g. gravity waves)? At what point is a model shown to be good enough to be accepted as reality; how many unsolved problems is it allowed to have?

This is just one of many crazy things I’d like to learn more about in the nonsensical world of physics. Other things that hurt my head to think about: mass of a photon, wave-particle duality, c is the same in all reference frames, expansion of the universe, quantum tunneling.

Yay, it’s finally time for break. I’m going home to get some serious rest. This is a nice week-long break, although it ends on Easter Sunday arg. My suite is eerily silent as all my suite mates are already gone for the Cornell Glee Club China Tour. Unfortunately I do have work to do on break: a problem set for 322 and I need to implement Conway’s Game of Life for a project in CS 312. I’m not going to be doing much on break so I might as well get work done. It is now about the half way point in spring semester and I’m doing okay so far. My grades aren’t too good but I’m definitely passing everything and that means a lot! It has been a fun and exciting semester so far and I’ve already learned a ton of stuff. Some things haven’t worked out as nicely as I’d like but that’s how it goes.

I’m taking a bus home today so that means yes, I’m cutting a couple of classes and yes, I’m missing Dragon Day. Although I’d like to go to these, I feel a heavy case of laziness setting in and I need a break from school. Yes, Yes, I’m missing Dragon Day, how un-Cornellian like of me. I went last year and it was fun (I mean who doesn’t like a bonfire in the middle of the arts quad?), but it isn’t nearly the all glorious Cornell tradition that tour guides like to paint it as. The Architecture students are really into it as usual. They crashed Duffield the other night dressed up as “Engineers” (I was there; it wasn’t pretty) and ran through the arts quad all painted in green and wearing very little. Anyway, it is finally time for some relaxing. Goodbye Ithaca.

Update: I just learned from the Sun that apparently what happened at Duffield is called the “Nerd Walk”.  The article here.

Bear Access is going to be replaced with PeopleSoft (owned by Oracle) during break. It is cool that Bear Access is created by Cornell, but it is always a pain getting it to work, especially for pre-enrollment, which was all I ever really used it for. From the main page on the Cornell University Registrar site:

We are implementing a new student system that brings admissions, student records, bursar & financial aid together into one system. We started several months ago with admissions & financial aid & this March, bursar & student records go live.

When you return from Spring Break you’ll see the reincarnation of Just the Facts/CoursEnroll with a different interface and new features. There will be some new terminology & we’ll be making the transition from 3 to 4-digit course numbers. The 4-digit numbers are in the current Courses of Study in parenthesis after the Department and 3-digit number, i.e., ASIAN 219(2219).

I hope this new system is easy to use, but there are always problems with such large changes. Cornell has been using Bear Access for a long time and this seems like a sudden switchover. The Sun talked to David Yeh, vice president of Student and Academic Services, about the change:

Yeh confirmed that in the upcoming pre-enrollment, students will be able to make use of five new features — a course-specific waitlist, auto mated section enrollment, swap, reserve capacity and dynamic dates … The new system has gone through “extensive testing,” but Yeh warned that issues could still occur when it is implemented because the system is “very complicated.”

The new system is be able to handle more simultaneous users, a big issue since most everyone accesses it right when it opens. It is will also now be through a browser (yay!) and have new features that will make pre-enrollment and managing classes easier. I’m pretty excited about the switch and think it is a good move given that pre-enrollment has been an unnecessary pain every semester; I just hope it transitions well.

Cornell has been pushing Ruckus, a company that provides free music downloads for students. According to this article in the Sun, almost 6 thousand people have registered for Ruckus at Cornell so far and “over 750,000 songs have been downloaded.” Now what exactly these numbers mean I wonder. I do know a lot of people who have signed up for Ruckus, but I don’t actually know anyone who liked it and still uses it. Also, how do number of songs downloaded relate to number of songs listened? In any event it is clear that some people actually do use Ruckus. I’m not a heavy music downloader, but what is important to me is that I can get what it is I’m looking for and that it is not DRM. Ruckus does not do this. The Sun goes on to say:

Cornell’s agreement with Ruckus is one of many initiatives to decrease illegal downloading and educate students about its consequences … Beginning this coming school year, the University will take further steps to educate new students in an effort to prevent illegal downloading.

Of course if Ruckus really does decrease illegal downloading, it can only relate to music. This does nothing to illegal video and software downloading, which bandwidth-wise take up the bulk of pirating. I personally think that groups like the RIAA and MPAA are fighting a losing battle to control media as it becomes more and more user controlled. Ruckus is a nice compromise for music, but what happens when the user can’t find what they want?

See also Matt Hintsa on Ruckus, Wikipedia on Ruckus, Defective by Design

I have been super busy as of late. I’m always amazed by how much stuff there is to do and get done here at school, especially compared to when I’m at home. Anyway, last week I reached a point where the only way for me to even attempt to complete all of my work was to skip sleeping. It wasn’t because I was slacking off, I just had too much on plate. So because of my love of sleep I dropped MATH 413, I just simply didn’t have any time to devote to it. All my classes this semester are quite good, but it is pointless to take so many if I can’t spend enough time on each one. It is really hard to find the perfect balance between having plenty to do and being overwhelmed with work.

Despite this I’ve been enjoying my semester so far and I’ve already learned a lot. Here are a few random things that I’ve learned in the past six weeks:

• Applying for internships is a pain, but there are tons of cool jobs out there. You might as well apply.
• Even though every week of Mathematical Physics feels like it can’t get more difficult, it can and it does
• If you go sledding down the slope, don’t go down the steepest part with the asphalt path in your way that makes you flip over and fly into the air…
• I can’t survive without regularly consuming delicious Cornell chocolate milk and apple cider
• Simple combinatorics are never that simple
• When you can work with a partner on a CS project you really should, it helps a lot. This might have been why I was having so much trouble with CS 211 towards the end of last year. Speaking of CS211, there is a lecture up on Cornell Cast of 211 taught by Graeme Bailey, check it out. I’ve never had Bailey, but I always hear good things.
• I finally understand Cantor’s diagonal argument
• Astronomers are super clever in figuring out how to measure distances of far away objects
• Functional programing languages are very compact and powerful as well as awesome
• The physics of stars is incredibly interesting, difficult, and cool.
• The methods of solving differential equations are endless
• Being in the MSDNAA is quite awesome
• Always have backup batteries, even the simplest of devices can lead to failure. That and the fact no one uses AA anymore.

Oh, and if you so desire, click on this picture for a short clip of one of my treks up the slope. I’ve been playing around with video a bit but wordpress really seems to dislike embedding video.

Although I wrote how I was enjoying MATH 311 (Intro to Analysis) a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t like the pace of the the course during the second week. I was liking the material, but the math just wasn’t as rigorous as I had hoped and anticipated for. Luckily there is an honors version of the class (MATH 413) this semester and it doesn’t conflict with my schedule. I talked to the professor and sat in on a lecture. Although this class is much more difficult, it was more of what I was looking for, so I decided to switch to the honors course.

I’ve actually never switched classes after they have started before, probably because I was just too lazy to change anything. In retrospect there was definitely some classes I should have changed or dropped after the first couple weeks, but oh well it’s in the past now. Anyway, switching was rather simple, it’s still within the deadline to add a class and I made the change in add/drop in 10 seconds. One problem was that the classes use different textbooks. I bought the honors textbook at the Cornell Store to do the homework while the textbook I bought used online for way cheaper was in the mail. The Cornell Store often doesn’t have a very good price for textbooks, but I love their return policy of 7 days after purchase or 3 days after drop for a full refund. So although it’s a little annoying, I didn’t lose any money from switching textbooks.

Being overloaded with awesome classes as I am, I hope I don’t end up regretting this decision. I love challenging classes, but I hate doing all the hard work required for them. It’s kind of a problem.

I’ve been meaning to make this post for a while now; this is about the class I took last semester.

I had two choices to fulfill my circuits requirements, take AEP 363 or take ECE 210 and 230. While 363 was two labs a week for one semester, the alternative was one lab a week for two semesters. Going into fall classes I was afraid about taking 363. I heard some horror stories such as someone working 20 hours a week in labs for this class. Luckily this didn’t happen to me, but it was still a lot of lab. I spent on average 5 to 6 hours in lab every week.

I’ve had bad experiences with labs before. Often I would go to a lab and just have no idea where to start. Instructions were vague and I just didn’t know what I was doing. 363 has definitely been my best lab experience so far at Cornell. The curriculum is very well integrated with the lab experiments and topics build up naturally going from analog circuits and transitioning nicely at transistors into digital circuits. Other things that improved my lab experience:

• I paired up with a smart senior who knows how to ask questions (something I’m not very good at).
• The TA and professor were very helpful, they didn’t just say “figure it out on your own”, they actually helped me arrive at the answer without giving it to me.
• The lab set up is nice (pictured).
• Instructions were usually clear.
• I used to play around with electronics when I was little so I was kinda familiar with some stuff already.
• I liked the pace of topics (fast but not too fast).

There was also a 2 hour lecture every week. The professor was a little monotone, but he knew what he was talking about and gave everyone donuts in the middle of class : ) One of my suite mates took ECE 230 and when I saw his work I cringed in fear; he had to make enormously complicated virtual circuits. In my opinion once you understand the basics, making something very complicated is just busy work and needless pain. I’m glad I went with AEP 363.

AEP 322: It’s like what I expected. There are a couple of new students who were doing co-op last semester, otherwise it’s with all the same people as AEP 321. Right now we’re doing differential equations (why is this topic so boring and yet so important?).

ENGRD 270: Wow this class is huge. I didn’t expect there to be well over a hundred students. All my other classes are around 30-60 students. The first lecture was pretty dull. The professor told us that he found out he is teaching this class only 4 days ago. Apparently the first couple weeks is very easy and then it suddenly gets challenging. I’d like to better understand stats, but this class is not going to be very fun.

ASTRO 332: Seems to be kinda light on the work side of things with only seven short HW’s for the semester. The first two lectures have been fun and I learned some interesting things from them. It’s intended for Engineers so it will probably be the best intro space class for me. To really get into space stuff I would need to take General Relativity, which I hear is extremely hard.

MATH 311: This class is like a breath of fresh air. Even though I’ve been taking math for every semester I’ve been at Cornell, I haven’t approached math with this kind of rigor before; it is a nice change of pace. I suppose there isn’t that much practical use of this math in Engineering, but I enjoy learning it anyway.

CS 312: I decided to try this class out on a whim. Some people recommended it and said it was fun. Although I did poorly in my last CS class, I decided to give it another try. CS can be very frustrating and/or very fun. Although this is considered the third basic CS course (after CS 100, 212) the class size is much smaller and is made up of mostly CS majors. I was surprised to learn that this class doesn’t use OOP but instead functional languages. I never was very proficient with OOP so maybe I’ll be better with this style once I get familiar with it.

Course Load: So that’s 19 credits of science/math (270 is 3 credits, the rest are 4). The classes I’m most unsure about are CS 312 and ENGRD 270; I might drop one of them. Right now I see the difficulty order starting with the hardest being 322 > 312 > 311 > 270 > 332. I wonder what I’ll think at the end of the semester. I should be able to handle this course load without serious problems if I keep up with everything (which is very hard to do).

Schedule: More spread out than last semester and now I have no labs and only one class on Fridays. My classes now are in many different buildings so I don’t feel cooped up like before. My day starts a lot earlier, which is probably a good thing and will help me get up and do my work. Downside is that I’ve already been very late to one of my early classes : (

Weather: When I left for my first class Monday morning, it was 5 degrees Fahrenheit outside. That’s as cold as it has gotten so far, now it’s around 20. It really isn’t too bad because all the buildings are warm and I don’t have to walk all that far. The big downside is that there is no snow to play with.

Blogging: I know I’ve been real lazy. I’m going to post every Wednesday and Sunday now so please email me an angry rant if I miss a day.