Is CS not real science? or just in its infancy?

[andyman7]

couple of notes on tkotitan2's last post

not all engineers are studying to go into the industry!!!!
i know several engineers who do not plan on getting an engineering job once they finish college
they will either go to grad school for engineering or go to law or medical school

also, while biology and geology dont have engineering specific disciplines doesnt mean they arent used in engineering!
biomedical engineers use biology a lot and geology is very important to civil engineers

 

[f95toli]

I have a M.Sc in engineering (or at least the equivalent of an M.Sc) and am about a year away from a Ph.D in physics. At least this is what it sais on the english versions of my diplomas.

However, my M.Sc is actually in "engineering physics" which I do not think exist in the US, and the title Ph.D is just a rough translation, since my M.Sc is in engineering my diploma will actually say something like "doctor in technology" (in physics), the only way for me to get a "real" Ph.D. would have been to first get a M.Sc in physics (which you get by studying at a "normal" university, not of a technical university as I did). Some of the other Ph.D. students in my reseach group have a M.Sc in physics and they will get a "real" Ph.D so there is no difference in the actual work you do.

Confusing isn't it?

My point is that there is no clear border between engineering and science, from my point of view engineering is just applied science and sometimes it is very difficult to tell the difference (often science is "just" engineering, but done at a university by people with Ph.Ds); and the rather confusing system we have where I live is just a consequence of that.

My point is that CS is BOTH science AND engineering, it depends on what you are doing with the knowledge.

 

[andyman7]

my school has engineering physics and its in america

 

[sao123]

It seems to me that....

Science is the process of discovering new behaviors by way of the scientific method...IE theory, experiment, results.

Engineering is the act of refining science to a useful end.

Computer science which is mostly about algorithms, and improving efficiency of a search, or etc...seems more like an engineering philosophy than anyhting(refining for speed and efficiency). Yet it must be distinguished from software engineering, which is geared toward bringing products to light.

Math could be considered a tool useful for serving all such purposes both as a science and as an engineering tool, but there is a side of math being useful for discovering behaviors in mathematic which could be considered as a science itself.

 

[f95toli]

I am not sure I agree. A good example is reversible computing which has been around for quite some time but AFAIK was not really useful until the advent of quantum computing.l.
When quantum computing started to become "mature" a few years ago (it became possible to try some algorithms) there was already a rather comprehensive theory on how do descrirbe algoriths and circuits, various gates etc including a bunch of whery usefull theorems that could be used in QC,

Today there are a number of CS guys working on quantum algorithms and if you pick up a book on quantum computing (e.f. Nielsen&Chuang) you will notice that more than 50% is actually CS, not physics.