Computer Science Related Breadth Electives

Last Updated: September 2, 2023

The following page is a list of breadth elective suggestions for computer science students as well as the rational for how they are related.

CGSC 1001: Mysteries of the Mind

This course is frequently recommended by computer science students because it touches upon some computer science concepts at a high level. Jim Davies, a cross-disciplinary computer science and cognitive science professor frequently teaches this course and often incorporates high level explanations of computer science and artificial intelligence concepts.

In the past, the evaluations for this course consisted of one short essay (about a page or so) and a few online multiple choice tests. What people often find difficult about this course is the “trickiness” of these multiple choice questions. A lot of these questions are often worded in such a way that the lectures will explain, but the lecture slides will not.

CGSC 1001 also has a lot of shared material with PSYC 1001 & 1002. If you enjoyed those courses, you will probably enjoy this course as well.

PHIL 2001 & PHIL 2003

PHIL 2001 covers and expands on the logical operators and boolean logic sections of COMP 1805. If you have taken COMP 1805, you will have an easy time initially in this course and will later learn a bunch of new tips and tricks for solving the proposition questions from COMP 1805. PHIL 2003 also covers similar COMP 1805 concepts. Many students consider PHIL 2003 easier than PHIL 2001 and both of these courses do not require second year standing.

LING 1001 & LING 1100

Linguistics is a core part of natural language processing which is a subfield of artificial intelligence. These electives will likely be of interest to you if you are interested in those topics.