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But is the point of your course computer science, or computer engineering. I don't think I'm particularly special, but I have taken just the one computer archit

But is the point of your course computer science, or computer engineering. I don't think I'm particularly special, but I have taken just the one computer architecture course as an undergrad (and I don't remember much if any of what I learnt), and now I just completed the first sem of my PhD in computer science. I haven't used the information I learnt in that class yet, even though I'm in a partially applied field (security and cryptography). All I'm pushing back is on the idea that learning the intricacies of modern computing is necessary for being good at computer science. EDIT: And wrt complexity theory and computability: there is a subfield of mathematics called computability theory that concerns itself with various notions of what is and isn't computable. Complexity theory concerns itself instead with what is efficiently computable; the problems it considers are already computable.

gravypod 10y ago
Well you're not going to like when I say this. Cryptography isn't Computer Science. It uses some things that Computer Science developed but it isn't Computer Science. It's applied Math. If Cryptography is in CS then Nuclear Reactor Operations is in CS. NRO uses computers for monitoring systems and develops algorithms to detect certian... ahm... undesierable states. That doesn't mean we should move a reactor into the CS building at every college near you (although I'd love to work on one eventually, sounds like cool work). Academics may think that crypto is a CS field but the work involved has absolutly nothing to do with CS. For example, all cryptographic functions can be implemented in hardware. If you are building a cryptographic function in hardware, you're not part of the Electical Engineering department or the Mechanical Engineering department you are still in the Math department because all you're doing is implementing an abstract design. (Insert unintelegable "get off my lawn" statement)
- Ar-Curunir 10y ago
  ... what? I am not sure what your idea aof cryptography is, but crypto relates to the most basic of questions about computation: what is and isn't efficiently computable, that is, P ?= NP. You do realise that the origin of the field of Computer Science lies in mathematics, specifically Turing's work, right? By your argument, the entire field of Theoretical Computer Science is ... not a part of computer science. Some how, I think that that's not quite right.

gravypod 10y ago

Well you're not going to like when I say this. Cryptography isn't Computer Science. It uses some things that Computer Science developed but it isn't Computer Science. It's applied Math. If Cryptography is in CS then Nuclear Reactor Operations is in CS. NRO uses computers for monitoring systems and develops algorithms to detect certian... ahm... undesierable states. That doesn't mean we should move a reactor into the CS building at every college near you (although I'd love to work on one eventually, sounds like cool work). Academics may think that crypto is a CS field but the work involved has absolutly nothing to do with CS. For example, all cryptographic functions can be implemented in hardware. If you are building a cryptographic function in hardware, you're not part of the Electical Engineering department or the Mechanical Engineering department you are still in the Math department because all you're doing is implementing an abstract design. (Insert unintelegable "get off my lawn" statement)

Ar-Curunir 10y ago
... what? I am not sure what your idea aof cryptography is, but crypto relates to the most basic of questions about computation: what is and isn't efficiently computable, that is, P ?= NP. You do realise that the origin of the field of Computer Science lies in mathematics, specifically Turing's work, right? By your argument, the entire field of Theoretical Computer Science is ... not a part of computer science. Some how, I think that that's not quite right.