Alex Pickering: A Digital Imprint of Consciousness

!! Caution: this page is still under construction. Please watch your step !!

Introduction

My name is Alex Pickering

I'm a student looking for opportunities to transition into a computer science career. As a practiced writer with a Bachelor's degree in English, and a practiced thinker with a minor in Philosophy, I have a unique take on the field.

A Series of Grandiose Claims

I was brought to computer science by technology’s promise for our future. Namely, that computing machines can, in theory, solve any solvable problem. This claim, while relying heavily on the notion that any problem can be imported into the rather concrete and formalized realm of computer science, is shocking for its potential implications. As a secular humanist invested in the maturation of civilizations and the collective flourishing of minds on a global scale, the best ladder for extricating ourselves from the mess of impulse and violence of our past and elevating us further toward more utopian skies is one constructed rung by rung from the dedicated work of computer scientists (and scientists broadly, though I clearly have romanticized the potential of one branch above the rest). This arduous journey proves to be worth all of the time and energy I can provide it.

On motivation by way of interest, as someone who has always appreciated the beauty of language as a method to convey approximate meaning,¹ I’ve found the idea of code as a formalization of logical thought to be enticing, (even, on rare occasion, poetic).

Places I’ve been

Quick! The Escape Pods!!!

Commit testing, commit testing, 1, 2, 3.

fin

Footnotes

1. as far as I can tell, language is always a compromise of meaning, the bridge between otherwise entirely disparate consciousnesses, although I’d love to hear a convincing argument to the contrary. ↩