Ask HN: Anybody left software program to review non-STEM topics?

Phil Tadros · February 14, 2024

2024-02-13 17:55:11

Not yet, but I can’t see my life behind a computer forever so I’m leaning into car maintenance or agriculture.

But those are all FIRE-like activities, I don’t see any realistic way to maintain my income in another field unless I go into extremes.

I’m a data scientist, but it’s becoming more uninteresting to me – not ml itself, but ml in companies. I’ve been thinking about studying cognitive psychology or cognitive neuroscience, but most classes are in person. :/

If I ever win the lottery I’m dropping software engineering to do music somehow. I play guitar and learn music theory as a hobby, but only at a beginner/intermediate level with not enough time to practice and get to the next level.

You can get to the next level without needing to change careers. I just hit a new plateau on the guitar last month and I’ve got a full time job that sometimes requires weekend work, two young kids, and a wife getter her PhD. The trick is that I don’t do anything much other than play guitar in the 2-3 hours a week that I have to myself!

It is also very focused and goal oriented practice as I don’t have the time to otherwise mess around.

I went for a Master’s in Education and became a teacher. Teaching computer science and math so still STEM adjacent. I’m still teaching a decade later and I’ve moved abroad to teach at international schools, currently in Bangkok.

Love to hear you’re still teaching a decade later – I’m starting my Masters of Teaching next week to become a math teacher!!

What do you think the biggest mistake that people who don’t last as a teacher make?

I did not leave SE (yet), but I’m currently studying sustainability / waste management / etc. It’s going great so far, I can recommend going a different or additional route, if you are able to.

Several years back I left software for about 3 years to achieve required professional military education for an officer and two military deployments. Being deployed in the middle of the Covid lockdowns was not fun and the combination of these events were too much time away from the family.

I have already abandoned a software development career for data science and enterprise API management, which is much better. I still super enjoy writing JavaScript, but not for work. In the corporate world of JavaScript your leadership is often shit and your peers are entitled children drowning in insecurity looking out for themselves on a sinking raft. After my next my next military promotion my children will be out of the house and I will make just as much in the military as I do as a senior developer. Something to think about.

I studied psychology, almost did a double degree. Then some post-grad work in psychotherapy. After a couple of years of STEM maths, rats and stats was easy. The biggest gain was that I was better equipped to handle negotiations, etc in my tech / business work.

I left CS for a non tech degree and then ended up back in software development years later as a career pivot. I don’t regret anything and the timing worked out.

I think this question pops up every few months and there’s always many ex-software folks in the comments with interesting stories.

I wish I could do something similar. I’ll probably pursue Cosmology and Occult study — they look pretty similar 🙂

But the money in software is pretty good and I need it. So maybe when I’m 50 years old after 10 years.

I bought a farm and quit tech, but I was management scum, not a SWE (though I did have some under me a couple jobs ago). There’s a lot to learn. I’m not really doing this for the money, rather as my contribution to the community and environment, but it would be chill to make some anyway as a further validation of my process.

Yeah; I went to law school. Big mistake. Luckily, I was able to switch back, and I now work at a legal tech startup as a software engineer 😀

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