I sometimes reflect on how an evil version of me would be so successful. I’m actually rather good at a lot of the capitalism type skills, and especially in recent years, I’ve reflected on how those skills combined with my genuine expertise in machine learning would make me exceptionally good at making bank off of the dumbasses who have wholeheartedly drank the koolaid. I went to a university with a lot of effective altruists, and man, they’re easy to scam, and I could be so much more comfortable if I just sacrificed everything I value in life.

It turns out that I’m not actually sad that I have a moral compass, but rather that people with strong values are so often forced to consider compromising on those values because they’re desperate to not live in precarity. It’s grim.

Something significant that has just occurred to me is that the compulsory banking internship I had to do after my first year of university as part of a scholarship might’ve been more useful than I had previously realised. It was a soul killing experience and I reached some extremely low periods that Summer because of it, but I’m realising that it was a useful learning experience. Prior to that, I would’ve been far more likely to consider selling my soul for a comfortable life, but if nothing else, that internship taught me I physically couldn’t live a life like that. Good thing I learned that on a low stakes internship, rather than something more committed.