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On London

markxu.com · 203 words · saved by 1 readers

I recently had the occasion to wander around London with no particular goal. As I was walking, I found myself composing a profile of the town, as one might see in a travel guide. I enjoyed the act of composition, so I continued. Here it is, written down. The first thing I noticed about the city was its absurd verticality. Everywhere you look, every building is three, four, five, six, or seven stories tall. I’m sure this type of construction is familiar to people who live in denser cities (maybe New York?), but for me, being surrounded by walls on all sides was interestingly oppressive. The verticality even extended below the surface. I walked into what I thought was a donut shop, only to realize that there was an entire grocery store and restaurant in the basement (I bought some ramen). Coupled with the verticality was a pervading sense of narrowness. Soda bottles were the same height but contained half as much volume. Same with the milk. Even the toilet paper looked like it was narrow

Mark Xu I am working to improve global coordination. I was previously the first employee at the Alignment Research Center , where I worked on aligning AI systems with human interests. Before that, I was a student at Caltech. I have a blog with my partner Sidney at markandsid.com . Find me on Google Scholar and iNaturalist . Writing View all Favorites How to do theoretical research, a personal perspective On London Strong evidence is common Recent A model of commitments Preference utilitarians should care about the preferences of past people Facts from Essential Cell Biology CH5: DNA and chromo

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