- #1
tommyburgey
- 32
- 0
About two years ago I started to love Physics, it was inspired by many things, but mainly the book Contact by Carl Sagan. I began lurking on this website - reading posts, reading books and expressing the odd childish theory as well
I then chose my A-levels. I chose Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Chemistry - originally thinking I would go into engineering. I enjoyed all of them except chemistry and achieved AAAB in my AS results. So I continued with my three best subjects; Maths, Further Maths and Physics.
Time for university choices. Luckily, I was one of the few in my school that would be pushed into the Oxbridge catergory, so I applied to my five universities fairly early, including Oxford for Physics. According to my UCAS 'helper', I'd written the best personal statement he'd ever seen - this got my hopes up. I was however, to be rudely awakened by an Oxford Admissions test, that would later inform me of my poor knowledge and bleak future in Physics.
I got rejected from Oxford But given offers from some prestigious universities too! UCL, Imperial, Manchester and Warwick. Good new right? Wrong. I visited the open days, I walked around the Physics departments in a palpaple solemness. Everyone did! Nobody in the whole room, of which there were about 50 seemed to talk. We occasionally spoke about waves and particles, people smiled occasionally and the odd nerd would make a maths joke. I would wince, or smirk if he was trying hard.
I have always done well in my school Physics tests, but I miss the days when everything was unknown to me, when I'd stay up at night and watch lectures on my laptop by Richard Feynman and various other 'famous physicists', and read various inspiring articles on the internet about crazy things like quantum theory and dark matter.
I concluded later that I am not interested in Physics, I am interested in mystery. When the mystery goes all that is left is numbers, the odd particle and maybe a standing wave.
I am no longer interested in anything, I'm going to withdraw my application, in full knowledge of my decent offers and take a gap year. I keep telling myself I'll do Philosophy at university after that. But who knows, I tend to drift from one subject to the next - kidding myself that I'll pursue it to a meaningful depth.
I then chose my A-levels. I chose Maths, Further Maths, Physics and Chemistry - originally thinking I would go into engineering. I enjoyed all of them except chemistry and achieved AAAB in my AS results. So I continued with my three best subjects; Maths, Further Maths and Physics.
Time for university choices. Luckily, I was one of the few in my school that would be pushed into the Oxbridge catergory, so I applied to my five universities fairly early, including Oxford for Physics. According to my UCAS 'helper', I'd written the best personal statement he'd ever seen - this got my hopes up. I was however, to be rudely awakened by an Oxford Admissions test, that would later inform me of my poor knowledge and bleak future in Physics.
I got rejected from Oxford But given offers from some prestigious universities too! UCL, Imperial, Manchester and Warwick. Good new right? Wrong. I visited the open days, I walked around the Physics departments in a palpaple solemness. Everyone did! Nobody in the whole room, of which there were about 50 seemed to talk. We occasionally spoke about waves and particles, people smiled occasionally and the odd nerd would make a maths joke. I would wince, or smirk if he was trying hard.
I have always done well in my school Physics tests, but I miss the days when everything was unknown to me, when I'd stay up at night and watch lectures on my laptop by Richard Feynman and various other 'famous physicists', and read various inspiring articles on the internet about crazy things like quantum theory and dark matter.
I concluded later that I am not interested in Physics, I am interested in mystery. When the mystery goes all that is left is numbers, the odd particle and maybe a standing wave.
I am no longer interested in anything, I'm going to withdraw my application, in full knowledge of my decent offers and take a gap year. I keep telling myself I'll do Philosophy at university after that. But who knows, I tend to drift from one subject to the next - kidding myself that I'll pursue it to a meaningful depth.