Starting [Post #1, Day 0]

My goal is to become an AI software engineer. I don't know what that will entail exactly yet. For the moment I am focusing on learning more about the Transformer architecture, LLMs, and creating AI agents using the Eliza framework. I have been inspired by (or to use the crypto term, "pilled" by) Shaw, one of the founders of the Eliza framework. He is very motivational in his genuine care for the world of agentic AI to advance and for anyone who wants to be involved to join in the movement and to have a major positive impact on their life as a result. The concept of being financially independent and to have the time to pursue the things in life that are most meaningful to you without having to worry about financial concerns is something I have been thinking about for quite a while now. I want to attain financial independence, and I think pursuing AI software engineering is a step towards this. I like this definition of financial independence from Wikipedia:

Financial independence is a state where an individual or household has accumulated sufficient financial resources to cover its living expenses without having to depend on active employment or work to earn money in order to maintain its current lifestyle. These financial resources can be in the form of investment or personal use assets, passive income, income generated from side jobs, inheritance, pension and retirement income sources, and varied other sources.

The concept of financial independence goes beyond just having enough money or wealth. Achieving financial independence gives freedom to make the best use of time to pursue life's goals and dreams, or help the citizens of the community to lead a life with purpose. It is a state where one has come to terms with the fact of having accumulated enough, has been freed from the shackles of debt and the tendency to make poor financial decisions, and has transformed their relationship with money to make healthy financial choices. Gaining financial independence should not be confused with not having to work at all. Rather, financial independence gives the freedom to make choices at will, enabling individuals to achieve what matters the most while not having to worry about earning money.

My decision to pursue AI software engineering is not purely a financial decision, I am also genuinely interested in this field and I think it is the future, so it makes sense to me to learn as much as I can about it, with the hypothesis that it will also help me towards my goal of financial independence. I am not turning my back on civil engineering and all my previous work and education. That has all made me into the person I am today, and I believe it has given me the tools to pursue this current course.

This isn't really Day 0, I have been learning more about this field for a couple months now. I am really liking the interviews of those involved in AI by Lex Fridman. I enjoyed the discussion with Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Meta, and today just started listening to Lex's interview with Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, the company behind Claude. My interest originally was in cryptocurrency, which then lead me to discovering the AI agent Eliza framework, which has now put me on a path towards learning more about AI. I think this convergence of AI and crypto is exciting, there is certainly a lot of buzz about it now.

I am using Claude (3.5 Sonnet currently) to help me create an outline of a plan for becoming an AI software engineer, including seminal papers to read, courses to do, etc. I read Attention Is All You Need by Vaswani et al., 2017 yesterday. I estimated that I understood about ~10% of the paper but it was interesting and it's a place to start. I also plan to try Andrew Ng's Introduction to AI for Everyone (free on Coursera), which was recommended by ChatGPT. I am starting this blog now as the Claude plan suggested that I document my learning in a technical blog. I think it's a good idea and will help me document my progression.