Since 2019, I have been rigorously and auto-didactically studying philosophy. I couple this with group facilitation on Meetup.com.

I have read in close detail about 83 books and listened to about 190 audio books. Most are on the topics of philosophy or psychology but others too. I spend about 10 hours a week reading. Some of the most impactful works I have read include Plato's complete works, which we studied for about one year, with Timaeus my favorite work from Plato. Nietzsche's works over two or so years, with my favorites being The Genealogy of Morals and the Gay Science. The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir was very impactful which I studied for about a year. Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason which I studied for a year was challenging and thought provoking. Confucius’ Analects, the Tao Te Ching, The Bhagavad Gita and The Dhammapada were also very impactful. I am into my second year of studying the King James Bible which is very interesting. With his work Either / Or, Kierkegaard had a significant impact on me, as did The Will to Change by Bell Hooks; Baudrillard's Simulacra and Simulation had a significant impact, and Darwin's On the Origin of Species.

I’ve been running book clubs since 2019. By now I’ve hosted several hundred book club events. Each event has around 3-10 people attend, and lasts for usually 1-2 hours. So I’ve been discussing philosophy, psychology and related topics with thousands of attendees for probably over a thousand hours now.

I see myself as a generally curious and thoughtful person. I enjoy reading and the conversations and the insights that come from it. I am very spiritual but am not affiliated with any official religion and I enjoy all modes of spirituality.

I was raised without any religious education in a culturally Christian country, Australia. I don't identify as Christian or any other kind of religion. I do have respect for all religions and for members of them. I do have a transcendental meditation practice which is very important to me. My partner was raised Catholic so I’ve been to a few of her services these days, yet as stated, I am not religious.

I believe in God, if “God” is a metaphysical regulating concept (as Kant describes) and the object of said concept as something I get to define and that is flexible to change. Unlike Kant, I am not sure if we have free will, nor do I necessarily agree with Kant’s moral categorical imperative, so I am less of a deontologist, although I do see value in rules and I do uphold them dutifully, I dont find them to be ultimate truths. I may believe practically, morality is more Nietzschean. I strive to have a mix of virtue ethics and (aspiring to live by certain virtues), care ethics (using empathy and flexibility to give care in any given moment), and social contract theory (deriving ethical actions from agreement between stakeholders).

I consider myself closer to being a constructivist than a logical positivist, so I roughly believe truths are subjective. Even science to me is really a tentative knowledge claim, not fact. This does not mean I am not supportive of evidence based methods, in fact, scientific evidence I believe is maybe one of the best ways we have to get closer to truth.

Politically I do not consider myself a member of any one party and I have flip-flopped my views in the past. I try to decide things in the moment, through discussion, information collection and reflection, without having predetermined fixed beliefs. I only recently became an American Citizen and for my first opportunity to vote in 2024 I did an AI-assisted mixed method analysis (using qual and quant techniques) on my belief system against party offerings and ended up voting Libertarian as the analysis suggested their party offerings were best suited (although far from perfect) at that time. I am excited for reform to enable an efficient, transparent and smaller federal government. I currently prefer empowerment of state and local governments over federal ones where possible. I want to push decision making as close to the problem as possible and use technology to remove bureaucracy or anything inhibiting locally empowered decision making.

I would prefer to help people based on subjective individualized assessment (via mental health counseling), rather than categorizing them by objective features. For example recognizing systemic oppression such as racism and sexism as forms of trauma alongside many other forms of trauma found in PTSD and C-PTSD formed by war, child abuse, physical or mental disability, beauty standards oppression or religious or cultural oppression, just to name a few. By grouping all major forms of suffering under a common umbrella of trauma, I hope we can unify disparate causes and work together. I want to help all those who have been hurt by trauma. Categorizing people by race and sex (or any superficial objective metric) without delving deeper into their personal story or trauma history seems dangerous for me and a form of harmful objectification.

I desire a world where every human has access to healthcare, education, housing and has their basic human needs met. I want to move the world to a place where more people are safe, healthy and thriving. I’m just not sure more government is the way to achieve this, potentially there are innovative new solutions we can find if we all work together. I am not dismissive of the value of government, I just imagine a new way of doing things, that leverages advanced technologies or techniques to allow for greater efficiencies and greater citizen support. I support individuals' rights to freely choose their sexuality and gender expression, and really any other personal freedom so long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else. I am in a monogamous relationship and not seeking additional partners. I think in the future we will have technologies to enable humans to be robotically and biologically enhanced, so strict gender roles and traditional relational models will be less relevant. If we have different breeding functions as a robot humans or a biologically modified humans, then I think neutral pronouns like they/them or other will become commonplace.

In my opinion, personal freedom should be balanced with responsibilities, in an ideal world we each get to choose the responsibilities we take on. In an ideal world we would each use empathy to foster healthy interdependence. I believe in life one should get their own head screwed on right and build a secure base of resources, skills and connections, then work to help others. Yet I do not believe we should ever force someone to help another person, we each should each freely choose, this is why I’m against doctrines that force people to help others.

I try and be very open to change in my belief system and I welcome conversations and information that can help develop or change my views. These are my personal reflections and do not reflect my professional practice, in my professional endeavors I support and adhere to required ethical and legal frameworks of governments, organizations and communities that I am responsible to. My opinions also do not reflect those of others I associate with. The others I associate often have very different opinions than me. So long as an opinion is well thought out and isn’t forced down my throat then then I am usually very excited by dialogue with others with differing points of view.