MIT - not majoring in Math/Science?

Mikalye
Tue, 29 Mar 2011 05:53:12 +0000

A vast swathe of the campus is not majoring in engineering or the physical sciences. MIT has a renowned Architecture school, excellent Political Science, Linguistics and Economics departments, and a business school which provides one of the most common undergraduate majors. So you can go to MIT to major in Linguistics, or Urban Studies and Planning, or Music Composition, and there will be a lot of support for that.

That being said, the General Institute Requirements do require a year of Mathematics, a year of Physics, a semester of chemistry and one of biology, 2 Restricted Electives in Science and Technology (REST classes), and a Laboratory Science (which is usually in your major - There is for example 15.301, a management Lab). And of course, 8 subjects in the Humanities Arts and Social Sciences.

That’s quite a lot of math and science for someone who does not like math and science. And so, one thing that you find at MIT is that most of the students, even the Architecture majors like (or at least tolerate) math and the physical sciences. That has implications across the school. Unlike some university economics departments, economics at MIT can be quite quantitative, because the professors can assume that all of the students have the relevant math background. It also means that there is an audience for philosophy courses like Bioethics (24.06J), Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics (24.111), and Philosophy of Mathematics (23.253), as well as the usual philosophy courses on Metaphysics, Ethics, Moral Philosophy, Justice and the like.

The SB in Linguistics and Philosophy (course 24-2 [MIT Course Catalog: Course 24-2](<a href=“Welcome! < MIT”>Welcome! < MIT)) may be a combined degree, but if you look at the course program, if you do the Linguistics track, you really only have to take a single philosophy subject (24.09, 24.241, or 24.251).

Ultimately, it is up to you as to whether you would feel comfortable on campus. Last year some 9% of majors were in Architecture, Urban Planning, Humanities, Arts or Social Sciences. That is a minority on campus, but it also is not a small enough minority that you would be considered odd for studying these subjects.

The other advantage in majoring in such subjects is that they have few enough majors, that the majors that they do have get lots of individual professorial attention and support.