Hello World

This is my start into writing, I have been thinking for the last year or so that I need a creative outlet to help me push out some of my thoughts. I am nervous as I am typing these words right now, but I hope that my audience (eventual audience) can find value in some of my reflections about the technical world, AI, machine learning, biology, life as a software engineer, etc.

I think humanity has never been more connected and disconnected at the same time, at the group and individual level. Loneliness levels are skyrocketing even if communication with everyone we know is at the reach of our pockets. Building communities is an inherently human aspiration. This is my attempt at doing this. I hope you can step out of your echo chambers with me.

About me

I am Juan, a software/AI engineer from Guatemala. I have a bit of a diverse background. I studied to become a medical doctor as an undergrad, then I decided to do a Masters degree on Data Science, which I finished back in 2022. On the work side, I never really worked as a medical doctor, right after med school (and a short job that I had as an administrator at a sleep clinic), I decided to switch my life directly to tech.

I started working as a Data Analyst, then transitioned to a Data Engineer role, and finally moved on to work on software/AI engineering primarily. I was a team lead for some time, but ultimately decided that my biggest source of enjoyment is in building new things that can help people, which is why I decided to switch back to an IC (individual contributor) role. I am thinking of this blog as one of these things that I enjoy building little by little, so I intend to keep up with it.

About this blog

I am primarily interested in scientific/tech/software engineering/AI related topics. I enjoy leveraging my unorthodox background to connect the dots between different spaces of knowledge. I might also have versions of my posts both in English and in Spanish, so that might also be part of it.

I will try to write about complex topics in simple terms, which I hope will ultimately also consolidate my own understanding about them. Though, there might be times in which things get more nuanced. I don’t want to restrict myself, but you will find a tag at the post if I consider it to be too technical.

The percentage of AI generated content on the internet is increasing more and more. If you feel that you are already drowning in AI generated content (AI Slop as it is called now) on social media, it is bound to only get worse in the upcoming years. I am not anti-AI by any means, I use it every single day in my day to day work. Nonetheless, I think of it as a way to enhance my skills, learn new things, and explore areas that would be out of reach otherwise.

Even with all of the above being true; I do find relief when I read texts that don’t sound artificial, have grammar mistakes, or sound like english is someone’s second language (that would be me hehe). I guess this is also why I am deciding to start this blog, to have a voice and hopefully show that there is still a special spark in human made words.

I intend to be transparent, so I will let you know in the footnotes whether there was any AI involved on the writing process of any specific post in this blog.

Why curiosity coder?

I have always enjoyed any topics related to astronomy/physics. There is a Mars Rover that has been exploring Mars since 2012, called Curiosity. Curiosity Coder sounds like Curiosity Rover. That’s it, nothing fancy.

So, hello world. Join me in exploring my mind through this space.