5 ms·

... Yes. As a self-taught programmer, I believe university is important. It gives quite a lot of advantages (mostly social ones, which are the most important)

... Yes. As a self-taught programmer, I believe university is important. It gives quite a lot of advantages (mostly social ones, which are the most important). And undergrad universities select primarily based on school performance, so kicking him out definitely would've sabotaged his higher education. To piggyback on this comment in hopes of finding some assistance: I've been trying to figure out some long-term strategy of how to get into a top-tier university. I have the ACT scores for it, but I dropped out of highschool to go work in software. The decade of dev experience is certainly nice, and I've studied core CS theory on my own (xv6 and paxos for example), but I'd really like to attend a top uni in order to do graphics research. I wonder if it's even possible for a 25 year old highschool dropout to achieve this? I was thinking I could do well for a couple years at some local university, then apply to transfer to Penn, Stanford, etc. I've heard transfer students are more likely to be accepted. But I wonder what else I could do to increase my chances.

cinquemb 13y ago
As someone who dropped out from Brown (and transferred credits from State universities I attended while in HS) and been engaging with newer educational things like project breaker[0], there are plenty of social advantages out there with "non-traditional" organizations that give more freedom and open just as many doors… Though yes, if you are trying do research, uni might be good, but there's plenty of university politics/culture involved that might make you want to drop out again (esp with research and such), despite it all… Besides, who's to say you can't do research outside of uni? [0] http://www.projectbreaker.org/ http://www.projectbreaker.org/
- sillysaurus2 13y ago
  Well, I've been doing my best to research on my own, but at this point I need access to a high quality spectrophotometer in order to perform measurements of various materials' absorption spectrums under various lighting conditions. They can run ~$5k, so uni seems like my best bet. I figured I couldn't really just show up and ask to borrow their spectrophotometer... they'd probably want me to have a degree or some kind of credentials before trusting me at all. Project Breaker looks quite interesting. Thanks for letting me know!
  - hga 13y ago
    No, no. Show up knowing what you're about, vs. someone with theories "no one else understands" (from watching this once, I wouldn't be surprised if MIT professors get a bit of training in how to handle the crazies), you've got a hypothesis that's interesting and you need to do specific tests, and, oh, yeah, you'll be happy to let them share credit. You might be surprised at how far you can get. Do some networking. If you don't have any contacts, start showing up for seminars at a target university. Listen, start contributing a bit to the community, then ease into "By the way, I have a [fill in the blank] I'd like to test...."
    - sillysaurus2 13y ago
      Yeah, worrying about being thought of as a crazy person is precisely what's prevented me from trying to contact any professors, because I'd imagine they have to deal with that sort of thing pretty often: outsiders bothering them with unscientific pet theories. That's why it's frustrating not having credentials. Attending seminars is a good idea. Thank you. I wonder if I should call up universities and ask for info regarding any computer graphics related seminars / events. It seems like those would be very uncommon, but it's probably my only chance. I have no contacts because I was mercilessly harassed throughout highschool and leaped at the opportunity to drop out and write software for a living. So I have no idea how to network. Showing up and saying, "Hey, would you be interested in chatting about computer graphics theory?" seems like it'd earn me strange looks. I just moved to Chicago, so I was hoping University of Chicago has some sort of computer graphics program, and that I can figure out some way of becoming involved with it.
      - sanskritabelt 13y ago
        "I wonder if I should call up universities and ask for info regarding any computer graphics related seminars / events" That shit's on the website, dogg.
        sillysaurus2 13y ago
        Hmm... Is it? Searching their events for "graphics" produced no results, and searching for "computer" (in hopes of anything CS related) wasn't very helpful. http://event.uchicago.edu/maincampus/search.php http://event.uchicago.edu/maincampus/search.php EDIT: The CS research interests page is interesting... http://www.cs.uchicago.edu/research/interests http://www.cs.uchicago.edu/research/interests though nothing specifically graphics-related. EDIT2: The closest thing to graphics research I can find is http://www.mcs.anl.gov/research/fl/research/index.php?p=proj_detail&id=28 http://www.mcs.anl.gov/research/fl/research/index.php?p=proj... ... though I don't really understand what its goals are based on its description: "Integration of Access Grid and ParaView to enable remote participants to interact with their visualizations in a coordinated manner across all sites, to improve information flow and expedite visualization development and scientific results. This will remove a significant bottleneck in achieving visualization results and understanding, by allowing participants to exchange data interactively while exploring their data visually. In this first development, specific areas of ParaView functionality will be targeted for inclusion in the shared interaction, based on feedback from the domain scientists as to the areas of highest relevance and impact." So I guess that's something graphics-theory-related, which I suppose is worth looking into...
walshemj 13y ago
And Glasgow is a top 10 University in the UK so trying to sabotage someone because they dont fit in at school is disgusting.

cinquemb 13y ago

As someone who dropped out from Brown (and transferred credits from State universities I attended while in HS) and been engaging with newer educational things like project breaker[0], there are plenty of social advantages out there with "non-traditional" organizations that give more freedom and open just as many doors… Though yes, if you are trying do research, uni might be good, but there's plenty of university politics/culture involved that might make you want to drop out again (esp with research and such), despite it all… Besides, who's to say you can't do research outside of uni? [0] http://www.projectbreaker.org/ http://www.projectbreaker.org/

sillysaurus2 13y ago
Well, I've been doing my best to research on my own, but at this point I need access to a high quality spectrophotometer in order to perform measurements of various materials' absorption spectrums under various lighting conditions. They can run ~$5k, so uni seems like my best bet. I figured I couldn't really just show up and ask to borrow their spectrophotometer... they'd probably want me to have a degree or some kind of credentials before trusting me at all. Project Breaker looks quite interesting. Thanks for letting me know!
- hga 13y ago
  No, no. Show up knowing what you're about, vs. someone with theories "no one else understands" (from watching this once, I wouldn't be surprised if MIT professors get a bit of training in how to handle the crazies), you've got a hypothesis that's interesting and you need to do specific tests, and, oh, yeah, you'll be happy to let them share credit. You might be surprised at how far you can get. Do some networking. If you don't have any contacts, start showing up for seminars at a target university. Listen, start contributing a bit to the community, then ease into "By the way, I have a [fill in the blank] I'd like to test...."
  - sillysaurus2 13y ago
    Yeah, worrying about being thought of as a crazy person is precisely what's prevented me from trying to contact any professors, because I'd imagine they have to deal with that sort of thing pretty often: outsiders bothering them with unscientific pet theories. That's why it's frustrating not having credentials. Attending seminars is a good idea. Thank you. I wonder if I should call up universities and ask for info regarding any computer graphics related seminars / events. It seems like those would be very uncommon, but it's probably my only chance. I have no contacts because I was mercilessly harassed throughout highschool and leaped at the opportunity to drop out and write software for a living. So I have no idea how to network. Showing up and saying, "Hey, would you be interested in chatting about computer graphics theory?" seems like it'd earn me strange looks. I just moved to Chicago, so I was hoping University of Chicago has some sort of computer graphics program, and that I can figure out some way of becoming involved with it.
    - sanskritabelt 13y ago
      "I wonder if I should call up universities and ask for info regarding any computer graphics related seminars / events" That shit's on the website, dogg.
      - sillysaurus2 13y ago
        Hmm... Is it? Searching their events for "graphics" produced no results, and searching for "computer" (in hopes of anything CS related) wasn't very helpful. http://event.uchicago.edu/maincampus/search.php http://event.uchicago.edu/maincampus/search.php EDIT: The CS research interests page is interesting... http://www.cs.uchicago.edu/research/interests http://www.cs.uchicago.edu/research/interests though nothing specifically graphics-related. EDIT2: The closest thing to graphics research I can find is http://www.mcs.anl.gov/research/fl/research/index.php?p=proj_detail&id=28 http://www.mcs.anl.gov/research/fl/research/index.php?p=proj... ... though I don't really understand what its goals are based on its description: "Integration of Access Grid and ParaView to enable remote participants to interact with their visualizations in a coordinated manner across all sites, to improve information flow and expedite visualization development and scientific results. This will remove a significant bottleneck in achieving visualization results and understanding, by allowing participants to exchange data interactively while exploring their data visually. In this first development, specific areas of ParaView functionality will be targeted for inclusion in the shared interaction, based on feedback from the domain scientists as to the areas of highest relevance and impact." So I guess that's something graphics-theory-related, which I suppose is worth looking into...

walshemj 13y ago

And Glasgow is a top 10 University in the UK so trying to sabotage someone because they dont fit in at school is disgusting.