About Me

A super cool, abstract image that makes it seem I am highly intelligent. (Kidding.)

Hi! I'm Andrew. I also go by Exton (it sounds cooler). Sometimes A. Exton Lawrence if I want to invoke literary genius.

I won't waste my time repeating information you can easily find on my LinkedIn, instead I want to explain why – why this site; why these issues; why now?

Why This Site?

Because I want to practice writing. I won't claim to be the most credible source on any issue here, but it's important that we all hone whatever opinions we hold and arguments we make. My goal is to do exactly that.

I invite critique and feedback. To that aim, every one of my posts will be a "live document" that I revise and refine. I may make mistakes, switch positions taken, etc.

Why These Issues?

Why do I write on AI (safety), surveillance, privacy, politics, philosophy, and the like?

First, my background is policy and computer science. So whatever claim I put forward towards my real motivation below, I'm heavily biased towards these fields in the first place.

Second, the "real" motivation: technology and its study have always intersected with people and policy. The original sin, the Gutenberg printing press, caused a religious revolution in the form of Lutheranism and forever changed how information spread; advances in the steam engine and textile machinery enabled division of labor during the industrial revolution; the atomic bomb brought on the Nuclear Age; etcetera, etcetera.

I don't think I need to expand further; you get the point. But why these issues in particular?

Well, even when you go beyond the hype, AI is still a powerful tool. Forget the narrative on its economic impact for a moment. Don't consider Stargate or the "race to AGI." Just look at the underlying paradigm of generative AI: probabilistic analysis can produce coherent generation. There are a few crucial implications of this. I'll note the following:

  1. The more accurate your predicted tokens, the better your model. Because model accuracy relies in some way on data availability, there's now a primitive drive for more data. And not just any data, but data created by people (i.e. surveillance).
  2. If probabilistic analysis can lead to generation, or creation, does that say anything for consciousness? For novelty with respect to GenAI? A whole host of questions arise when we consider the ability for artificial intelligence to actually act "intelligently".

There's more to it, but that provides an initial preview of my motivation within scope.

Why Now?

Well, why not? Everyone's always saying things are getting worse so now's a better time than any.

What To Expect

I'm not too sure. My goal for this site is to publish frequently and with rigor. Could it go extinct like so many other blogs? Absolutely! Will it? Who knows.

Either way, I hope you get something out of this site.

Everything written here is without the use of AI. The poor tone of my work is unfortunately my fault, not AI's. If you'd like to get in contact with me, you can reach me via 'andrew [dot] e [dot] lawrence [at] gmail [dot] com'.