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I sometimes jokingly compare my life to an intelligence explosion. I honestly believe that if there was a contest for most improved person in the world, I'd be in the running for it. When I was a kid I was a screaming, incoherent moron and lunatic. When I got to college I was still a screaming, incoherent moron and lunatic, but significantly less so. The older I've gotten, the more quickly I've improved. Most people, even other rationalists, would probably be shocked by how much I've improved myself within the past couple years, let alone the past four or five years or even the last ten.
Very cool! Have you written about this in more detail? (I'm interested in hearing more.)
To some extent, but not all in one place. One of the main characters of the novelette series I'm writing, Bertie is a self insert at first, and some of his history plays into the plot. I've also posted about some of it on my blog.
SPOILER: Earthlings: People of the Dawn part 6 -- the Ancestor's Legacy version 2 is a depiction of a genuine utopian future, and at one point one of the characters finds out about Bertie's past psych problems in "Ancient Earth: the MMORPG" and there's a very stark contrast between the game's depiction of pre-rationalist Bertie and th rationalist Bertie that the reader gets to know throughout the series.
PSA: the way to write good self inserts is to have them diverge from you over the course of the story, and make them realistically imperfect human beings.
Greetings! I am Sailor Vulcan, champion of justice and reason! In the name of the Moon--uh, I mean...
Hi, I'm Harry. I'm a reader, writer and gamer with a passion for rationality and existential risk prevention.
I sometimes jokingly compare my life to an intelligence explosion. I honestly believe that if there was a contest for most improved person in the world, I'd be in the running for it. When I was a kid I was a screaming, incoherent moron and lunatic. When I got to college I was still a screaming, incoherent moron and lunatic, but significantly less so. The older I've gotten, the more quickly I've improved. Most people, even other rationalists, would probably be shocked by how much I've improved myself within the past couple years, let alone the past four or five years or even the last ten.
I read HPMOR and started reading the sequences towards the end of my sophomore year in college in Spring 2015, and very shortly after that I helped solve a criminal case that had stumped a licensed private investigator, despite having zero experience with detection.
I love reading and writing, and I especially love rational fiction. I'm currently writing an original rational/scifi novelette series called "Earthlings: People of the Dawn", to help promote rationality education, effective altruism and existential risk prevention.
I also have written a bunch of stuff on my blog too, including a rationalist children's story, a second-person rationalist/science fiction monologue, another second-person rationalist monologue, and some rationalist poems among other things.
I've also written quite a few rationalist/transhumanist songs. But since the only instrument I know how to play is my own voice and I don't know standard music notation I end up having to memorize all the tunes and lyrics I write and sing them a Capella style, unfortunately. I've heard a lot of people say things along the lines of that they don't think it's possible to write good rationalist music because they expect it to be super wordy and complicated and cringey, but most of my rationalist/transhumanist songs aren't like that.
Also, I have a communication learning disability, so if I ever say or do anything to make you feel upset or uncomfortable feel free to let me know (although you don't have to, but it would be super helpful).
I used to be on here under a different username, but that was a long time ago and I barely posted anything and what I did post was not very good quality, and I wanted a different less terrible username. So here I am.
Pleased to meet you all!