Welcome to my corner of the internet. I self-host this site from a laptop I have at home in Bellville, Cape Town. Here you'll find my blog posts and daily learnings. You can contact me through my email: [email protected]
I love Renae (you'll know her surname eventually), computer science, and running.
I will write blog posts that lay out the philosophies I hold, but here is a too brief summary.
Fundamentally, I buy Sam Harris's idea of the Moral Landscape (I've not read the book). I observe that I have eperience, that there are qualia. I observe that some qualia are pleasant and some are unpleasant. I assume that my experience is a result of the interaction of atoms (which I also assume exists yada yada ...) and more complex structures that emerge from how the atoms are arranged. I observe that there is one object that repeatedly appears in my observations, and I assume that that object is me, and that what happens to that object influences my experience. I observe that there are other objects that look and behave like me too - humans are the most obvious example, but dogs and shrimp also count. For multiple reasons (empathy, compassion, but ultimately because it is evolutionarily fit to do so), I assume these objects also have experience, and hence I don't want to cause them suffering and if I can help it, I want to bring them long-lasting wellbeing. Therefore, you should do what improves the wellbeing of conscious beings.
Another idea I strongly believe in is one Joscha Bach (roughly) stated on episode 101 of the Lex Fridman podcast: "Something exists to the degree that it is being implemented". You are nothing other than what you are doing in this very moment - what is it that you want to be?
I am training to become a competent software engineer, and try to spend my free time programming.
I am training for a sub 3-hour marathon.
Meditation is an important part of my life.