In-depth interview of Ethereum dev Loredana Cirstea: life, work, spirituality, psychedelics

I am a physics/neuroscience PhD (India/USA). I interviewed Ethereum dev Loredana Cirstea on my podcast, where I showcase people's lives and perspectives in conversations that often weave through science/tech, learning, spirituality and psychedelics.

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Part 1 · Life & Work · website · spotify · apple podcasts · google podcasts

“I was born in the midst of the gunshots of the Romanian revolution. It took me years to understand the repercussions of the communist mentality in society and in myself. I was born premature, and was in the neonatal ICU for two weeks with no contact with my mother, and spent a lot of my childhood alone. I think maybe that has had some effect on me.”

Romanian programmer Loredana Cirstea (github, twitter, youtube, blog, linkedin) has been developing for Ethereum and other blockchain projects for several years. Most crypto devs today are men working in emerging companies with big capital and marketing. But Loredana works mostly by herself to build great volumes of publicly available software for free.

We begin with the political and personal circumstances of her birth and childhood in Romania, and why she was motivated to cultivate self-reliance and independence from her parents, and direct access to truth. Then we talk about developing for Ethereum. She shares her philosophy for volunteer work, and her experience in contrast to the rest of the crypto space and culture. We talk about her work on the Laurel project: “a blockchain that tracks provable human effort (such as volunteering) as a non-transferable medal of merit, usable for governance, proof of effort, provable news etc.”

At the end, she shares her vision for the future of Ethereum, the internet, and technology and society in general, particularly in the context of fake news and deep fakes that can pose a great challenge to the truth.

00:00:00 - 00:12:47: Political & personal circumstances of birth & childhood in Romania

00:12:47 - 00:20:40: Cultivating independence from parents & direct access to truth

00:20:40 - 00:26:21: How she got into Ethereum

00:26:21 - 00:49:27: Volunteering philosophy vs. mainstream crypto culture

00:49:27 - 00:58:17: Working independently vs. in companies

00:58:17 - 01:02:31: Will Ethereum overcome its challenges?

01:02:31 - 01:06:36: Generations of tech are decentralizing power

01:06:36 - 01:12:37: Corporate attention war on the internet

01:12:37 - 01:23:00: Rewarding provable work through the Laurel project

01:23:00 - 01:35:25: Deepfakes & provable news

01:35:25 - 01:40:12: Future society: provable morality

Part 2 · Spirituality & Psychedelics · website · spotify · apple podcasts · google podcasts

“My spiritual journey started in childhood in a way, when I thought, ‘What even am I, and what is this existence?’

"My experience with iboga was an opening of selfless, non-static love that rewards you for wanting to evolve. On amanita, I was experiencing the life of a cell, then a fish, a human, and then a creator of worlds. These substances jolt you out of local minima, like in machine learning. But that is only half the task. Meditation must then guide you towards the true optimum.

"My spiritual and psychedelic experiences have inspired me to become a karma yogi. When I see injustice, I want to make things right, but it takes a lot of time to help people case by case. That’s why I am volunteering to build tools and decentralized technology. The Laurel project is the generalization of my spiritual path.”

In this second part of my conversation with Romanian programmer and Ethereum developer Loredana Cirstea (github, twitter, youtube, blog, linkedin), we talk about her experiences in spirituality and psychedelics. She shares her path into spirituality and Indian practices such as hatha yoga, fasting and meditation. Then she describes her visions on the iboga and the amanita mushroom, and I share how my psychedelic experiences exposed my deepest fears of losing my mind and dying. She then explains how her spiritual and psychedelic experiences inspired her towards karma yoga, the spiritual path of selfless work, and how she is trying to implement these ideas of provable volunteering on the blockchain, through her Laurel project.

00:00:00 - 00:07:00: Journey into Indian spirituality, hatha yoga, fasting

00:07:00 - 00:17:29: Psychedelics, & parallel to machine learning

00:17:29 - 00:28:33: Psychedelic experiences on iboga

00:28:33 - 00:31:47: Psychedelic experiences that exposed fears of death & losing my mind

00:31:47 - 00:38:00: Psychedelic experiences on amanita

00:38:00 - 00:41:13: How spirituality & psychedelics have inspired her towards karma yoga

00:41:13 - 00:52:53: Bringing provable human effort to the blockchain

Full video of this podcast is on Loredana's YouTube.