- sometimes i really remember that image of a the evolution of man and at the last step it says we need to turn back
- some of the recent inventions genuinely feel like "oops this is a bad idea, lets go back one step"
- a non deterministic system that actively atrophies skills and people actively signing up for it left and right has to be one of the wildest things i have seen in my lifetime so far
The planet is going to be just fine. We as a species might not.
Burning gas for AI slop. Great. Also not sustainable, as a business or otherwise. Ten years ago it was cryptocurrencies, now it's AI. Just new ways to burn electricity for dubious gains. Our future sucks and no amount of green bills is gonna fix it.
Yeah trillions of investment into development and paying millions to researchers to say they solved a bunch of math problems and it can write mediocre code
This is a senseless comment. Worlds progress also stands behind the emissions it produces. In fact there are almost no examples of high gdp low energy use countries at all.
High energy use is exactly how prosperity happens. If anything, you should see physical infrastructure and go “yeah that’s great for economy and people”.
There is clean(er) and safer renewable energy. The human race doesn't have to pollute and climate change itself into near extinction to greedily chase prosperity at the expense of its children's future.
There’s no evidence of near extinction. You are doing a disservice by promoting conspiracy theories like this while the last 50 years pulled billions out of poverty by using more energy.
I would love to verify that the consensus is that humanity would get extinct if we don’t do anything about emissions.
> The Holocene or Anthropocene extinction[3][4] is an ongoing extinction event caused by human activity during the current geological epoch,[5][6] impacting diverse families of plants[7][8][9] and animals, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians,[10] fish, and invertebrates, as well as both terrestrial and marine species.[11] It is sometimes also called the sixth extinction
Would there be so many billions if we didn't figure out how to convert petroleum into fertilizer and so many other useful things?
My point is that, just because we now have billions, it feels wrong to justify maintaining those billions of people at the luxury levels so many of us enjoy. We differ from other animals only by degrees, not by kind. From watching so many nature documentaries over the years, and reading nonfiction books about animals, I understand many mammal newborns don't make it into childhood. I'm not convinced that a high human infant-mortality rate is bad. It just feels bad, and with our pathological focus on feeling happy and suppressing sadness, a consequence seems to be we make decisions out of momentary selfishness rather than care for future generations long after we individuals are dead.
Why? We basically broke evolution and purposefully make the specie more dysgenic. At that point we need life long drug treatments to keep people from overeating because they have less self control than pigs and literal cattle. Surely there is a middle ground
> High energy use is exactly how prosperity happens
Yeah I guess if you don't account for any of the side effects and externalities sure... We might as well start using asbestos, leaded gas and other magic prosperity products again.
We're so focused on short term numbers that we forget about the past 3b years and anything that will happen after the next 10 years. Don't conflate prosperity and brain dead productivism/consumerism
- sometimes i really remember that image of a the evolution of man and at the last step it says we need to turn back
- some of the recent inventions genuinely feel like "oops this is a bad idea, lets go back one step"
- a non deterministic system that actively atrophies skills and people actively signing up for it left and right has to be one of the wildest things i have seen in my lifetime so far
We can't rewind; we've gone too far.
Genre of hn comment where you lump criticisms that have not much together “we need to go back bro”
Can we stop ourselves from irreversible harm to the planet, though? Not necessarily turning back, but imposing reasonable constraints to growth?
I have less faith every day that this is possible. We are already going to clear 2 degrees C.
The planet is going to be just fine. We as a species might not.
Burning gas for AI slop. Great. Also not sustainable, as a business or otherwise. Ten years ago it was cryptocurrencies, now it's AI. Just new ways to burn electricity for dubious gains. Our future sucks and no amount of green bills is gonna fix it.
Source blog post: https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2026/07/09/respons...
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Because all this fancy tech requires concrete and iron (smelted by burning fossil fuels), we're still in the Iron Age: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2024/03/how-to-escape-from...
It also feels much less magical when you see what people actually waste it on.
Images of hyperrealistic big booby waifus -or- A habitable planet.
Which way, western man?
As if there wasn't already pretty much endless big booby waifus online before AI, too
You don’t consider surveillance magical!?!?
Unfortunately, this report doesn’t tell us about resource usage per model call. It only tells us the numerator and we also need the denominator.
Yeah trillions of investment into development and paying millions to researchers to say they solved a bunch of math problems and it can write mediocre code
This is a senseless comment. Worlds progress also stands behind the emissions it produces. In fact there are almost no examples of high gdp low energy use countries at all.
High energy use is exactly how prosperity happens. If anything, you should see physical infrastructure and go “yeah that’s great for economy and people”.
There is clean(er) and safer renewable energy. The human race doesn't have to pollute and climate change itself into near extinction to greedily chase prosperity at the expense of its children's future.
There’s no evidence of near extinction. You are doing a disservice by promoting conspiracy theories like this while the last 50 years pulled billions out of poverty by using more energy.
I would love to verify that the consensus is that humanity would get extinct if we don’t do anything about emissions.
Humans idk, but wildlife in general is getting fucked
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction
> The Holocene or Anthropocene extinction[3][4] is an ongoing extinction event caused by human activity during the current geological epoch,[5][6] impacting diverse families of plants[7][8][9] and animals, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians,[10] fish, and invertebrates, as well as both terrestrial and marine species.[11] It is sometimes also called the sixth extinction
Would there be so many billions if we didn't figure out how to convert petroleum into fertilizer and so many other useful things? My point is that, just because we now have billions, it feels wrong to justify maintaining those billions of people at the luxury levels so many of us enjoy. We differ from other animals only by degrees, not by kind. From watching so many nature documentaries over the years, and reading nonfiction books about animals, I understand many mammal newborns don't make it into childhood. I'm not convinced that a high human infant-mortality rate is bad. It just feels bad, and with our pathological focus on feeling happy and suppressing sadness, a consequence seems to be we make decisions out of momentary selfishness rather than care for future generations long after we individuals are dead.
> I'm not convinced that a high human infant-mortality rate is bad
Sigh.
Why? We basically broke evolution and purposefully make the specie more dysgenic. At that point we need life long drug treatments to keep people from overeating because they have less self control than pigs and literal cattle. Surely there is a middle ground
> High energy use is exactly how prosperity happens
Yeah I guess if you don't account for any of the side effects and externalities sure... We might as well start using asbestos, leaded gas and other magic prosperity products again.
We're so focused on short term numbers that we forget about the past 3b years and anything that will happen after the next 10 years. Don't conflate prosperity and brain dead productivism/consumerism