How I ended up graduating with three majors, two minors

If choosing a major is the first real hurdle of college, I've been failing for almost six years now.I usually just laugh when someone asks me what my major is: "Computer science, mathematics and philosophy, with minors in mass communication and physics." Sometimes, I will only name one or two of the majors so I can dodge the dumbfounded expressions and the logical follow-up question: "Why?"

Let me try to explain.

Growing up, I was home-schooled through the fifth grade. My interests were, as they are now, quite diverse. I remember being fascinated by history (particularly ancient history and World War II), paleontology and even economics, among other subjects.

By the time I completed high school, I thought I knew where my academic future lay: quantum computation, the intersection of subatomic physics with theoretical computer science.

Quantum computers seek to make calculations in literally no time by exploiting the underlying structure of the universe to send particles back and forth through time. If this could be achieved, it would make many previously intractable problems solvable and, practically speaking, would allow the decryption of almost every traditionally encrypted message.

The potential quantum computers could have to modern science drew my fascination, so I decided to apply to programs in computer science and physics. I was admitted to three universities: UNO, UNL and the University of California, Berkeley - one of the world's foremost research universities for physics. Initially, the decision where to go was a no-brainer.

Let's put it this way: Berkeley has parking stalls across campus labeled, "Reserved for NL." The "NL" stands for Nobel laureate. (By the way, the Nobel laureate annual parking permits are free - compared to $355 per semester for UC student parking.)

So, briefly, I had my academic future figured out. Then I received word from the Peter Kiewit Institute at UNO offering me the prestigious Walter Scott Jr. Scholarship - free tuition, room and board for four years in exchange for studying computers science, management information systems or engineering.

When I realized UC Berkeley would cost something like $100,000 for an out-of-state student, my plans immediately changed. UNO would be my home after high school and I would be studying computer science.

I was still interested in quantum computation, though, so I decided to take some physics classes while doing my general education and introductory programming courses. Two C's later, I was glad I wasn't majoring in one of the most difficult physics departments in the world. Nevertheless, I decided to finish out a minor in physics because science held a soft spot in my heart.

While coming to realize the hard sciences weren't for me, I discovered the joys of theoretical mathematics. Yeah, I'm serious: Math can be rewarding and fun when you have spent hours puzzling over a theorem only to finally see the light and understand how to write a proof, or when you complete pages of manual calculations, only to find an elegant, simple solution to a complex problem.

I decided I might as well pick up a second major in mathematics, taking a few theoretical mathematics courses along with my computer science program. For a while, my academic career was figured out again, as I explored different areas of mathematics and learned more than I wanted to know about the C/C++ programming languages.

Finally, I realized I didn't enjoy the different areas of mathematics as much as I enjoyed manipulating the underlying symbolic logic. Something about the simplicity of the handful of logical rules forming the basis of so much of our knowledge struck me as appealing, similar to how the potential revolutionary impact of quantum computing initially drew me to the Durham Science Center.

As simple as it seems on first blush, though, logic is arguably one of the most interdisciplinary areas in academics - with its two primary homes being in mathematics and philosophy. Accordingly, I decided I should check out a course in logic from the Department of Philosophy and enrolled in symbolic logic.

Pretty soon, I found myself hooked again. The general approach taken in philosophy, the Socratic method, struck me as common sense: ask questions. Philosophy questions the most fundamental features of our world: How do we obtain knowledge? Are theoretical entities like electrons real? What is justice?

By attempting to answer all of these questions, only one requirement holds constant: the rules of inference, which can be expressed by formal and informal logic, must be respected. Reasonable argumentation is the key tool of the philosopher.

While the humanities seduced my academic career, asking questions was also the central component of my extracurricular involvement with The Gateway.

I first picked up my reporter's notebook and pen in my second semester at UNO, after looking for a way to become more engaged on campus and finding political activism with the College Democrats dissatisfying. By the time I started taking philosophy classes, I was in charge of the paper's news section.

In a lot of ways, journalism and philosophy fit together and, as I grew as a reporter, I grew as a philosopher, and vice versa. Epistemology, for example, is the philosophical discipline addressing questions of how we come to know things - an everyday problem for journalists debating whether they need another source or another document before they feel comfortable asserting a claim as objective fact. Ethical dilemmas are also regular in reporting, and all the normative theories in the world won't necessarily help dissect a complex decision on whether to run a sensitive story. Experience is the most reliable guide in that situation.

Unsurprisingly, I decided to keep taking both philosophy and journalism classes, finding them increasingly more enjoyable than my tedious, albeit still interesting, computer science and mathematics classes. Philosophy became my third major, while I picked up mass communication as a minor.