Posts

I plan to post things related to AI safety here now.

I’ve spent much of the past year and a half trying to figure out what kind of research I want to do. I still haven’t figured it out. Andrew Wiles once described Math as a process of bumbling around in a dark mansion.

One of the defining experiences of my intellectual development was the entirety of high school social studies, two years of which I spent with somebody who has shaped my thought the most critically.

I always struggle with the languages box on applications: what do I put for Cantonese and Mandarin? I’m sure that I don’t speak them fluently or even moderately well, but I’m not a beginner either.

My last daily chat with a stranger was several months ago. Last year, motivated mostly by the positive experiences of a friend who had done a similar challenge, I decided to find somebody new—usually a student on campus—to talk to every day.

When I was in junior high school, I had already grown a shell of isolation. When we feel lonely, especially after a prolonged period of time, it is more difficult to reach out, even accept, the social interaction we need to warm the frigidity in our hearts.

Disclaimers I use the word category quite loosely in this piece. I do not refer to the mathematical field of Category Theory, although there may be some interesting, unexplored connections there.

This piece is an imaginary dialogue between me and a friend about the process of reviewing for conferences. I’m currently working through my 6 NeurIPS reviews, and in the process have generated a lot of thoughts about my experiences.

Dear Alan, I’m sorry it’s been more than 10 years since we last spoke. I want to make sure I don’t say anything patronizing because I know how much you, and I still, despise that tone, especially from those who claim superior knowledge or experience.

Almost two decades through formal schooling ingrains a strict sense of progress in my mind. There were exams, essays, assignments, all with deadlines that were more or less immovable, some teachers that were more or less inflexible, and some material that was more or less unmotivated.