A physics degree, for fun

People ask why I'm doing a Physics and Chemistry degree. The honest answer is that I wanted something that couldn't be finished in a sprint.

Software is wonderful at rewarding speed. You can learn a framework in a weekend and ship with it on Monday. That's a real superpower, and it's also why the work can start to feel like a series of very fast, very shallow loops. Physics is the opposite: you cannot skim your way to an understanding of thermodynamics. The material waits for you.

What part-time actually means

I do it at the Open University, a few courses at a time. That means:

• Studying in the gaps — evenings, trains, the twenty minutes before a call.
• Accepting a slower pace than my classmates and a slower pace than I'd like.
• Being fine with taking several years for something other people do in three.

It also means the degree can't be my identity. It's a hobby with exams.

The part that helps at work

Two things transfer more than I expected.

Estimation before proof. A physics problem usually starts with "roughly how big is this?" before any algebra. I do the same thing now when triaging a vulnerability: what's the plausible blast radius, what's the cheapest way to check, is this worth three hours or three days.

Unit discipline. Dimensional analysis is a cheap way to catch nonsense. So is asking what units a number is in when reading someone else's financial code — wei, gwei, tokens, shares, scaled-by-1e18 shares. Half of the bugs I've read live in that conversion.

Studying something with no immediate payoff is a good way to remember that not everything has to compound this quarter.

Would I recommend it

If you want the credential, there are faster routes. If you want the thing the credential is supposed to represent — a slower, more patient way of thinking — then yes. The lab report that says "unexpected reaction" instead of "experiment failed" is a healthy attitude to bring back to security work.