>>100113532
>Why is calculus a required course for computer science?
It's required for most STEM majors. Engineering, Physics, Chemistry (sometimes) etc. Why should CS be any different?

Is it just some kind of humiliation ritual that faggot college professors like to force on everybody because they were forced to go through it too?
Not really, sure it's how it's been done classically and perhaps one could argue that something like just take discrete math or basic combinatorics would be a viable alternative, but you would still bitch about that too.

What does memorizing all the different specific intricacies of how to integrate functions by hand possibly have to do with writing software?
It doesn't necessarily, but it opens your mind to a different way of thinking. You could also write software to do those things yourself.

>I honestly don't understand it and I've never seen anyone offer a rational explanation for it.

I'm a math professor. We don't even really want to teach calculus ourselves, it's just part of how the curriculum is structured. If anything I'd rather be paid to do my research and be left alone, but we have to eat somehow and this is how the system is. Just because you hate or dislike mathematics doesn't make it irrelevant to learn or to at least have some basic exposure to. I'd argue that mathematical thinking is valuable and if you're able to do it, quite honestly, you'll probably intellectually mog most of your peers. I only studied mathematics throughout my entire career B.S, M.A, Ph.D math but I always had a passing interest and CS and learned a lot of it in my spare time. In fact, a lot of my research interests have close ties to theoretical CS. You never know, I used to feel that way about courses when I was an undergrad but come to appreciate them as I get older or learning certain things helped improve my personal studies.

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Why is calculus a required course for computer science? Is it just some kind of humiliation ritual that faggot college professors like to force on…