> Believe me, you're better equipped than someone burdened by a liberal arts
> background. It's been said that the liberal arts teach you how to enjoy
> life without the high-paying job they prevent you from getting. But I don't
> think they're even successful at that anymore. Having spent many
> frustrating years as a ghostwriter trying to give the crass, inchoate
> effusions of corporate technocrats a veneer of logic and erudition, I am
> sorry I didn't pay more attention in math class as a youth and become a
> civil engineer.
I came close to abandoning a physics degree for German due to a newfound love of linguistics and trouble with the physics. I eventually got fed up with the bread and butter of translating, at least Czech to English -- contracts and business plans. No doubt transitioning through technology (no stupidity and self loathing in working in pharma and insurance, no sir!) eventually back to science was much easier with a physics degree than it would have been with a German degree. Linguistics and languages work much better as a hobby.
Joanna will like this: Henry Stommel, a huge figure in physical oceanography and mentor to some current leaders in the field, was never accepted into a PhD program, supposedly because he had written a popular treatment of his subject.
-- Andy