Of Biology, Physics and Chemistry which one did you find to be the hardest/easiest?

[CrazCo]

in High School!

[Oracle]

It's very much personal preference. For me from easiest to hardest... Biology, Chemistry, Physics. This is mainly because maths is my weakness, other people could have opposite order..

[ajb]

To me I would say Physics, Chemistry, Biology.

 

Why?

 

Well physics is based up on mathematical rules and principles form which you should be able to derive what you want to know (in principle). Chemistry, is also a bit like that, but full of names you need to remember and then Biology is just remembering lots of facts and names.

 

Maybe it is just that I am bias, lol.

[PhDP]

If by hard you mean hard to understand, then it's certainly (from the hardest to the easiest);

 

mathematics / physics / (chemistry & biology) / [insert any social science here]

 

However, if you have a good math intuition, then it's the exact opposite. I bet many scientists here would do better in a physics course than in an 'easy' area like history.

 

Well physics is based up on mathematical rules and principles form which you should be able to derive what you want to know (in principle). Chemistry, is also a bit like that, but full of names you need to remember and then Biology is just remembering lots of facts and names.

 

It's both very true and not accurate at all. First of all, biology is just so vast, it's hard to make any generalization. Also, I think it's important to make a distinction between how biology is taught, and biology as a science. Too often, it's true, biology is reduced to memorizing details about morphology, names, molecules, et cetera...

 

But it's not always the case (and it should never be the case). A good example is evolution. Evolution was founded on a much stronger basis than any field of physics; mendelian genetics, and our understanding of evolution was derived from these simple basic rules to create a coherent mathematical structure.

[ydoaPs]

I think physics is the easiest. It's like calculus; once you understand a few concepts you can make up a lot of the rest.

[foodchain]

To me I would say Physics, Chemistry, Biology.

 

Why?

 

Well physics is based up on mathematical rules and principles form which you should be able to derive what you want to know (in principle). Chemistry, is also a bit like that, but full of names you need to remember and then Biology is just remembering lots of facts and names.

 

Maybe it is just that I am bias, lol.

 

Its not remembering lots of facts and names. For instance with taxonomy the reason you need to know when a certain trait appears in a arthropod, which would relate to a molecular basis, an ecological basis, and many other aspects. So you need to know this stuff so you can look at life from the scientific point of view, which basically leads into evolution. I would agree that the terminology alone typically should be enough to make the ink fall through the paper but its not pointless by any means.

 

Of Biology, Physics and Chemistry which one did you find to be the hardest/easiest?

in High School!

 

I never liked math because they worked it from a memorization angle, I like to know exactly how things work and in many cases would have to do this by myself as I could ask to many questions.

 

Physics and chemistry are both fun, simply because they can show you things. Like taking some chemical and mixing them and getting something radically different, such as state and color or other properties from the original, plus many times you can simple watch this occur. The physics aspect is cool because its so universal, you can study say why a rock happens to be a rock or why a solar system happens to be a solar system.

 

Overall though I would have to say its pretty much an individual thing, and why you may not be good at something now, it does not mean you cant “learn” it and become good at it, in which case your entire appreciation of things could change.

[CrazCo]

Thank you. I just wanted to know because I took biology this year and am taking physics/chemistry next year. Considering math is my strongest subject I hope that my order will go (from easiest to hardest) Physics, Chemistry and Bio.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

Easiest to hardest:

 

Physics, biology, chemistry.

 

I'm a mathematical type, so physics was a breeze. Chemistry, on the other hand, involves remembering all sorts of rules and junk that I don't like.

[CrazCo]

Thank you for your input sir.

[CDarwin]

At my high school, biology involved coloring and I hate coloring. Physics involves math, so chuck it out the window. So from easiest to hardest it was probably chemistry, biology, physics. As a subject I find biology easier, however, so reverse that with chemistry as you see fit. But I'm not a math guy and you seem to be, CrazyCo, so I suppose this is the inverse of what you should want.

 

If I might make an off the wall and probably irrelevant comment, it seems like the better a math or physics class the easier it should be (to those who try), while the better a biology or history or social science class is the harder it should be (because it makes you think). It's easy to make a hard Calculus class or an easy American History, but the inverse seems somewhat rarer. But perhaps that's just me.

[cjohnso0]

Easy to Hard: Physics, Chemistry, Biology.

 

Although my grade was the lowest in Chem, but that was due to girls, not the coursework. In college chem was a breeze.

 

As posted above, physics is derived from math, since I like mathematics, that makes is easy. Chemistry isn't really too bad, it's mostly balancing those equations and memorizing the table of elements. Biology on the other hand... Not my cuppa tea

[Ti]

I hate memorizing stuffs. I rather like to understand it. I asked alot of why in high school. It's pissed alot of teachers. One teacher gave up and give me a book so I can study from it. I barely touch it until college. Badabing badaboom, it was the calculus course. I think I excelled in it. Then there my sister hs physics book which she found or thought it was lost and have to buy it. I was in loved with it and used it through college. The course didn't even used that book, so I have to read both. Hahaha.

That's remind me, my sister let her friend borrow that physics book and now I don't have any good reference. Do you know any good college physics book? I preferred classical to modernism.

[dessum]

In high school, i only did chemistry and physics, and i would rate them from easiest to hardest would be chem first then physics, Although being pretty good at maths, i found physics a little bit harder to grasp, maybe it was due to lack of study and possibly teacher if that's an excuse. teacher was hardly there at all to teach us anything.

 

Now in uni, and did chem and bio, i would now rate the three as chem being the easiest, the physics then biology. Biology is full of theory, and looking at microscopes, i have bad memory and look at plants, pfft, not my thing.

 

So now im doing a 2nd year chemistry major, i enjoy it even though most of the time i dont know what the lecturer is on about, but i seem to grasp things quicker if it is related to chemistry. biology is still part of my course unfortunately, and i struggle just reading a sentence let alone a book. and physics, offered at uni, but being horrified at what i got during high school, it'll be far away as possible.

[CrazCo]

Thanks! Seems I'm in luck. I'm with you dessum, biology is just not my thang.

[Paralith]

In high school classes, biology was definitely the easiest, then chemistry, then physics.

 

But high school is not representative of the reality of these field. A high school biology class that attempts to cover everything from molecules to macroevolution (which is what my senior year advanced bio class did) will of necessity barely skim the surface of the many, many fields classified within biological study. The sheer complexity of a biological system makes the task of unraveling it and/or its history every bit as difficult as trying to formulate a complex theorem in physics.

 

As you can probably tell, I have a great dislike for how biology is taught in high schools.

[Reaper]

From hardest to easiest for me:

 

Physics/Math/Engineering/Chem/Bio/Psychology/[insert social science here]

 

The hardest part for me is knowing when and how to apply formulas; I can memorize a great deal of stuff really easily otherwise. Physics definetely has the steepest learning curve out of the bunch, though once I get it and understand it I find it really easy. And certainly, some topics in physics are easier to learn then others (for some reason I find modern physics and optics much easier to learn then classical ones)....

 

 

In high school, however, all you are really doing is memorizing. Gets quite boring actually, as you don't really learn anything.

[Oracle]

I hate memorizing stuffs. I rather like to understand it.

 

Exactly! it is unnecessary to memorise everything but rather understand how and why things happen for a reason.

 

Edit - Re: biology

[Riogho]

Well, the problem here is High School Chemistry is basically physics concepts, and some acid-base problems.

 

High School physics is plugging numbers into equatons.

 

High School biology is hell on earth.

[abskebabs]

Though I like physics the most, chemistry was the one I found easiest at "high school". I think if I want to, I can be really good at memorising things, which is what it mostly involved, apart from really basic calculations. Biology.... I just never realy seemed to produce the "right answers" with, even though I don't think it was too bad conceptually, I think I just got very annoyed by the darn mark schemes!

 

Finally physics, I think is possibly the one I found the hardest, but it's by far the most beautiful and motivating to study in my biased opinion;). I think by now it's not so bad, after coming to finish the 2nd year of my undergrad:-)

[ian23]

the easiest? its biology... the hardest? PHYSICS... i hate problem solving in physics

[Lalachicki]

Biology- All the classes were easy. I got an A in all of my Biology classes

Physics - I got a B+ in Physics I and an A- in Physics II

Chemistry- ha ha ha ...bad numbers ..lol...unspeakable... retaking it in the fall

 

 

lol

Edited July 3, 2008 by Dak
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[Gilded]

Back in high school I felt that biology to be really tedious (didn't take more than the obligatory courses), got something like 8/10. I was very interested in physics at the start (got a 10 for the first course) but then I got a bit bored, ending up skipping electromagnetics and most of relativity/theoretical physics, I think in the end I got a 8/10 too. In chemistry everything just fell into place, even though I didn't get a very good grade in the high school final exam I still had a course average of 9.8 or something which was rounded up to 10. (Too bad the course average doesn't really matter at all, the final exam, Abitur, is more important.)

[DJBruce]

I found them all to be fairly easy but if I had to rank them on there difficulty I would say:

Chemistry

Physics

Biology

 

This is going from hardest to easiest and as I said before they are all fairly easy.

 

PS: This was just a prediction because I have physics this year but I am sure it will be harder than Biology because Biology was the easiest class I have ever take in.

[ecoli]

it depends what school, depends what major.

 

Some of my intro to bio classes were easy, others are ridiculously hard. My intro to chem courses were harder than my organic chem courses. My physics classes were pretty easy, especially the labs.

 

Definitely don't fall into the trap of thinking biology is the easiest of the sciences. Just wait until you get into upper division bio classes, like biochem, cell bio or cell signaling.

[D H]

It depends on your skills and your interests.

 

If you are fascinated by living things much more so than by machinery you will find biology much easier than physics, and vice versa. Finding mathematics boring or difficult will hurt you more in physics than in biology or chemistry because physics is more math-intensive than chemistry, which in turn is more math-intensive than is biology. Being a slow reader will hurt you more in biology than in physics because biology requires a lot more reading than chemistry, which in turn requires a lot more reading than physics. Physics papers are so dense that it takes quite some time to read a 5 page journal paper. Some physicists are naturally slow readers; the rest have to train themselves to be slow readers.