Why I'm Majoring In Computer Science (and you should too)

What the author said for CS can easily be replaced by leadership, communication skills, analytical skills, integrative thinking, and many other things. Majoring in CS because of this? Hell no.

Yes, for centuries literacy has been crucial to individual success, but that did not mean everyone must major in literature. Instead, it simply meant those studying engineering, business, and etc had to take a class or two in communication. The business major going into management consulting has to have excellent communication skills, but at the core, it's his business, analytical, and business communication skills that really matter.

Perhaps in the future everyone will be required to code to some degree, but that does not mean completely going out of your way and spending endless hours for a CS degree "just because you will have to code". The fact that the author mentioned you are concentrating on the "hack aspect" of CS makes the argument even more ignorant. The argument might have been semi-valid had it been for the validity of studying machine learning, data mining and pattern recognition, and other more mathematical aspects.

But hacking? Hell no. Ask the financial analyst whom has to code. Is "hacking" more important, or his/her mathematical skills. Going back to the literature example: ask a senior executive: is his strong ability in literature what got him there?

As a CS major, you will learn a various amount of "theory" and "physics" (to reuse pg's terminology) depending on your university (for example, the university in France where I did my undergrad had a lot of mathematicians amongst professors, so we had a lot of math + cs theory classes, whereas some of my friends elsewhere had more EE-style courses). But no "hacking".

You will learn the hacking part by hanging out with the kids who like to code, grad students in the labs, by working on open source projects in your spare time, etc. — but one needs not be a CS major to participate in those.

If I had to start again, I would probably choose to study mathematics or philosophy. CS is a fascinating topic, but the way it is taught is antiquated, and it is one of the easiest topics to teach to oneself.

Of course, this is all based on my own personal experience, so it is a completely subjective opinion.

You're better off doing what you enjoy the most; you can find work related to pretty much any major if you look hard enough and you'll enjoy doing that work much more than you would anything else (especially something chosen for its earning potential or future usefulness). From a practical standpoint, if you do what gives you the most joy you'll naturally be more willing to put in the time necessary to become accomplished in your chosen field, making your chances at success and (more importantly) happiness far more likely.

CS ain't everything.