Neural Simulation
At the turn of the century, most of the laws of physics that govern the natural world had been established.
However, our ability to simulate the full complexity of these physical systems has remained elusive. Neural Network based simulation methods have the potential for fast simulation of physics of complex systems. The ability to simulate large, complex environments requires two key components:
- Neural scene representations
- Efficient generative training and inference
"Holy Grail": The ability to simulate a single human cell at ~2Å resolution
Neural Reasoning
Deep learning methods can now solve IMO/Putnam problems with considerable accuracy.
Computer-assisted proofs are an integral part of the mathematician's toolbox.
However, there appears to be no reason why neural methods need humans at all.
Can problems in pure biology, chemistry, mathematics and theoretical physics be solved completely using neural reasoning methods with no human 'hints'? I strongly suspect the answer is yes. Initially, machine learning methods will require significant inductive bias to solve difficult problems. However, as both algorithms and methods scale up, it may be possible to train a single model that can solve problems that have confounded humans since the dawn of history (e.g., the distribution of prime numbers, small molecule cures for pancreatic cancer, a quantum theory of gravity) completely from scratch.
"Holy Grail": A human-verifiable proof of the Riemann Hypothesis, generated via a neural network.
"Holy Grail": Fully autonomous drug design. Fully autonomous means all lab work is done with robotics and all candidate selection and research decisions are completely done with LLMs.
Diversions
Books
I read mostly about politics and history.
- Human Action by Ludwig von Mises. Written in 1940, this book is a classic in Austrian economics. It is probably the best argument for the free market system ever written.
- America Against America by Wang Huning. This book is a classic in understanding modern Chinese politics. Since the late 1990s, Wang is one of the main idealogical leaders of the Chinese Communist Party.
- A History of Religious Ideas by Mircea Eliade
- From Third World to First by Lee Kuan Yew. Lee Kuan Yew is the founder of Singapore. Under his leadership, Singapore went from a third world country to a first world country in a matter of decades. There is a (actually apocryphal, he never said it) quote attributed to Lee Kuan Yew that I really like: "The history of civilization is a perpetual challenge on each side by fascism and socialism/communism, the same way that Odysseus found himself between between Scylla and Charybdis" - Politics is not a game of cards...
- Progress and Decline by Hans-Hermann Hoppe. Hoppe was a libertarian philosopher who was heavily influenced by the work of Ludwig von Mises.
- World Order by Henry Kissinger. This book lays out what many viewed as the role of the United States during the Cold War.
- Park Chung Hee and Modern Korea. This book is, in my opinion, the best background for understanding modern South Korean politics. I hope that US-South Korean diplomatic relations can be strengthened in the future.
- The Sickness unto Death by Søren Kierkegaard. This book is one of the founding texts of Christian existentialism. Kierkegaard is one of my favorite authors.
Music
I listen to death metal, classical, ambient, and city pop.
Classical
- Symphony No.5 and Symphony No 3 by Mahler (Abbado, Lucerne Festival Orchestra 2004; Leonard Bernstein, 1972). Symphony No.5 is my favorite symphony.
Death Metal
Ambient
City Pop
City pop is a loosely defined form of Japanese pop music that emerged in the mid-1970s and peaked in popularity during the 1980s. City pop was characterized by an optimism, probably influenced by the post-war boom of the Japanese tech and culture economy.
Speeches
Lectures
Films
Other
Techno-optimism
I am a techno-optimist, meaning that I believe that technology, combined with free market principles and level-headed government, will lead to an age of prosperity for the United States of America. I am excited about superintelligence, cybernetics, robotics, biohacking, next generation manufacturing, commercial space travel, seasteading and green/clean/nuclear energy! I am fundamentally opposed to (and, like every patriotic American, willing to die to prevent) the spread of the parasite known as democratic socialism.
Techno-optimism
