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Should I quit my physics major?

Posted: Sat Mar 18, 2023 12:01 am
by MarchMan
I am in my second year of college. Although I initially planned to double major in math and physics, I am now sure that I want to get a phd in pure math and do not want to continue my physics study after undergraduate. Thing is, I only have four courses left for the major. Is there any reason that I might regret not getting a physics major in the future? Conversely, is there any reason that sticking to my physics would hurt my math studies, such as grad school chances?

Re: Should I quit my physics major?

Posted: Sat Mar 18, 2023 10:46 am
by KTheoryKid
It might take up your time from doing math research or math graduate courses, that’s the only thing I can think of. Otherwise it won’t hurt, and won’t help either.

That said I did a physics double and still managed the math research and core math grad courses, and found the later courses like GR and QFT pretty interesting. They’ve motivated some of my current math interests in gauge theory for example

Re: Should I quit my physics major?

Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2023 12:48 pm
by mathph
MarchMan wrote:
Sat Mar 18, 2023 12:01 am
I am in my second year of college. Although I initially planned to double major in math and physics, I am now sure that I want to get a phd in pure math and do not want to continue my physics study after undergraduate. Thing is, I only have four courses left for the major. Is there any reason that I might regret not getting a physics major in the future? Conversely, is there any reason that sticking to my physics would hurt my math studies, such as grad school chances?
Same here! I'm a junior majoring in math and physics. I thought about dropping physics major as well last year as well.

The upper level physics courses do take time but what I was more concerned about is the "required senior thesis" - which fortunately was optional at my school so I decided to go on with my physics major.