Walking outside with a well-known local blogger:
WKLB: I never did take a chemistry course.
Me: Why not?
WKLB: I'm not good at memorizing stuff, and there's that whole big periodic table ...
Me: Hey, my memorization skills are pretty worthless, too. But in chemistry, you don't need them as much as you do in a field like biology.
WKLB: Really? You don't ever have to, like, write out the periodic table from memory?
Me: Hell no! The idea is to learn how to turn the periodic table into a device for predicting stuff about the different elements -- like a secret decoder ring. They always give you a periodic table. There's usually a big one hanging right there in the classroom.
WKLB: Oh.
Me: Seriously, my memory can only be trusted with Simpsons dialog and song lyrics.
WKLB: Hmm. I guess, then, that I could have learned chemistry.
Me: You totally could. In fact, there's still time!
I don't think I'm that well-known, if I had to click the link to see who you were talking about...and I was even THERE for the conversation. See what I mean? No. Memory.
And I'm not taking chemistry.
besides, it's *fun*.;-)
Dr. Free Ride,
I wish you had taught my second year inorganic chem course. One of the term projects was to memorize the periodic table. In the final exam you were presented with a blank periodic table with specific locations marked with letters. The questions on the exam referred to element A, group B etc... As someone who appears to be genetically incapable of carrying out simple memorization, I had to resort to complicated mnemonic techniques to survive the course. The first thing I did once I started to write the exam was to quickly fill in the blank table before I forgot something critical. As a joke the Chem society sold T-shirts with an upside down (for looking down) periodic table on the front and a right-side-up (for the person sitting behind you) periodic table on the back with the line "Honesty and Integrity" on the top.
That being said, I had a harder time in my second year biology course called "The Diversity of Life" (which I nicknamed "the naming of names"). It was a survey course that ranged from microbes to flowering plants, from protozoa to mammals. It was supposed to be about classification of organisms and the relationships of taxonomic groups but as far as I remember (in my nightmares) the main feature involved memorizing (or failing to memorize in my case) the names of virtually every plant, animal, and/or invertebrate that inhabited the earth.
On the whole the dependence on memorization in biology made me appreciate chemistry even if I did have to memorize the periodic table (and struggle with all those named reactions in organic chemistry). As a benefit, I have some memorable (and extremely off-colour) mnemonics which I intend to take with me to my grave. :)
I didn't have to memorize the periodic table, but for organic chem I had to memorize a 2" thick stack of index cards with reactions on them. Then, in theory, be able to use those reactions to solve synthesis problems. Synthesis and mechanism problems were the bane of my existance.
But I agree: biology is much much worse on the memorizing front. I distinctly remember a cell biology exam question asking us to draw, in detail, the steps involved in translating an integral membrane protein, with all enzymes and molecules properly labeled.
Let the record reflect that all the memorization in first semester organic (at least as taught by the old-school visiting professor I had, cheered on by the chorus of memorization-mad pre-meds) kicked my butt and nearly put me off chemistry altogether. It was physical chemistry (where you could derive nearly all the equations you'd need from a few basic ones) that brought me back to the fold. Also, subsequent instruction by physical-organic chemists and physically oriented biochemists leaned much more on basic chemical principles than memorization.
I'm betting that past a certain level, biology's basic principles make memorization a lot less important, too. And as for lame-o tasks like having to memorize the values of physical constants to n decimal places, as my mom was wont to say, "In real life, you'd look 'em up rather than taking a chance on misremembering them."
You must have had a different first semester O Chem teacher than I...
Chemistry - or at least, introductory chemistry, is actually quite easy, and probably the most fun I've had in just about any science class overall.
For me, Chemistry was the happy middle ground between what to me was the obnoxiously idealized ("I started by assuming a spherical horse..."), formula-fondling, wildly-improbable "math puzzles" of introductory physics and the interesting but vague "memorize some terms and hey, look, if you mix this stuff together something grows out of it" fluff of introductory biology. In chemistry you get to play with Real Stuff (unlike physics with its bizarrely contrived contraptions and do-nothing electrical circuits) but with a great deal of control and precision (unlike introductory biology) - not to mention [for me] the first real chance to apply mathematics beyond remedial addition/subtraction/multiplication/division to any kind of practical process[1].
The fact that you can start doing useful chemistry with only a few basic principles is nice, too. One of these days I need to write up my inane blatherings about how chemical bonds can be heteroelectrical and homoelectrical.
I was lucky in first semester Organic Chemistry - our instructor was bucking the "memorize a bunch of reactions" trend (commenting that the first thing medical schools do with students is teach them organic chemistry all over again, since they memorized it for the test and forgot it in pre-med) and strongly emphasized how and why reactions occurred. I'm lousy at "memorizing", but I'm pretty good at "learning", so I did okay.
[1] I don't count Physics here either - in my experience, all of the mathematics got applied to bizarrely-contrived puzzles and never really addressed the sorts of situations one might actually encounter in the "real world", unless one desperately needs to build a circuit that drains batteries without producing anything but heat. And last time I checked, Wal-Mart was out of Carnot Engines...