Hi, I'm Willie Loftie-Eaton

A bit about me

I love Renae (you'll know her surname eventually), computer science, and running.

Interests

I aspire to bridge the worlds of Computer Science, Software Engineer, and Machine Learning Engineering. I'm currently (Oct 2026) devoting my time to studying machine learning and places to work in 2027.

I am recovering from an ankle injury but hope to return to training for a sub 3-hour marathon.

Meditation is an important part of my life.

Philosophy

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 experience, 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 126 of the Clearer Thinking podcast: “Something exists to the degree that it's implemented”. You are nothing other than what you are doing in this very moment - what is it that you want to be?