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> demanding computational tasks such as face recognition that require megawatts of energy for computers to perform I'm not sure what computer this is but I'm p

by zmmmmm 4y ago

> demanding computational tasks such as face recognition that require megawatts of energy for computers to perform I'm not sure what computer this is but I'm pretty sure it's not using megawatts just to do some facial recognition (maybe she was fatigued by the time she got to the end of writing the article?).

samcheng 4y ago
Watts are a measure of power, not energy, anyway.
- oofbey 4y ago
  Plenty wrong with this statement but the units are fine. If you ask somebody “how much energy does that lightbulb use?” the most normal and correct answer would be something like “40 watts”. An answer like “you mean ‘how much power’ not energy because the first law of thermodynamics dictates that energy is never created nor destroyed so it can’t really be ‘used’ now can it?” would be obnoxiously pedantic and totally useless.
  - cstrahan 4y ago
    > An answer like “you mean ‘how much power’ not energy because the first law of thermodynamics dictates that energy is never created nor destroyed so it can’t really be ‘used’ now can it?” would be obnoxiously pedantic and totally useless. Whew — good thing no one is saying anything remotely like that! The point is that power is completely uninteresting (in the original context) without some notion of how long that power is sustained. It’s not really interesting if identifying a face is a done at a bazillion giga-watts if the maths works out (as a function of time) such that the total energy used was a bazillionth of a 1 percent of a calorie. The criticism is (apparently) conflating power with energy — nothing to do with upholding the laws of thermodynamics, or “using” (or not) energy, etc.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - oofbey 4y ago
      Since biology operates on video streams much more than still frames, I think the natural interpretation of the statement is “how much power would a computer draw when doing the same kind of (continuous) facial recognition that a brain does?” While I think the number is off by orders of magnitude with current algorithms, I think it’s a totally fair way to look at things.
oofbey 4y ago
Definitely a confused example. Unclear if it should be attributed to the article author or the quoted scientist. The fact that computers are still bad at something brains are good at has nothing to do with fatigue.
soco 4y ago
Maybe the article (or just the quote) was written in the 80s?

by zmmmmm 4y ago

samcheng 4y ago

Watts are a measure of power, not energy, anyway.

oofbey 4y ago
Plenty wrong with this statement but the units are fine. If you ask somebody “how much energy does that lightbulb use?” the most normal and correct answer would be something like “40 watts”. An answer like “you mean ‘how much power’ not energy because the first law of thermodynamics dictates that energy is never created nor destroyed so it can’t really be ‘used’ now can it?” would be obnoxiously pedantic and totally useless.
- cstrahan 4y ago
  > An answer like “you mean ‘how much power’ not energy because the first law of thermodynamics dictates that energy is never created nor destroyed so it can’t really be ‘used’ now can it?” would be obnoxiously pedantic and totally useless. Whew — good thing no one is saying anything remotely like that! The point is that power is completely uninteresting (in the original context) without some notion of how long that power is sustained. It’s not really interesting if identifying a face is a done at a bazillion giga-watts if the maths works out (as a function of time) such that the total energy used was a bazillionth of a 1 percent of a calorie. The criticism is (apparently) conflating power with energy — nothing to do with upholding the laws of thermodynamics, or “using” (or not) energy, etc.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - oofbey 4y ago
    Since biology operates on video streams much more than still frames, I think the natural interpretation of the statement is “how much power would a computer draw when doing the same kind of (continuous) facial recognition that a brain does?” While I think the number is off by orders of magnitude with current algorithms, I think it’s a totally fair way to look at things.

oofbey 4y ago

Definitely a confused example. Unclear if it should be attributed to the article author or the quoted scientist. The fact that computers are still bad at something brains are good at has nothing to do with fatigue.

soco 4y ago

Maybe the article (or just the quote) was written in the 80s?