5 ms·

Why are we still talking about this? Computers are INCREDIBLY efficient and still become orders of magnitude more efficient. Computation is really negligible in

Why are we still talking about this? Computers are INCREDIBLY efficient and still become orders of magnitude more efficient. Computation is really negligible in the grand scheme of things. In the 80s some people also said that our whole world energy would go to computations in the future. And look today. It’s less than 1%. We do orders of magnitude more computations, but the computers have become orders of magnitude more efficient too. As another way to look at this, where does this questioning of energy use end? Should I turn off my laptop when I go to the supermarket? When I go to the toilet? Should I turn off my lights when I go to the toilet? My point is, we do a lot of inefficient things and there is certainly something to being more efficient. But asking “is it efficient” immediately when something new is presented is completely backwards if you ask me. It focusses our attention on new things even though many old things are WAY more inefficient.

magic_smoke_ee 2y ago
> Computers are INCREDIBLY efficient and still become orders of magnitude more efficient. That's what a software engineer would say who views resources as unlimited and free.
- baal80spam 2y ago
  Do you not pay for the energy you use?
  - magic_smoke_ee 2y ago
    > don't cross-examine https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - jodrellblank 2y ago
      > That's what a software engineer would say who views resources as unlimited and free. from the same guidelines: don't be snarky; don't post thoughtless insubstantive comments; reply to the argument instead of calling names; don't sneer; respond to the strongest interpretation - assume good faith; eschew flamebait; don't trample curiosity.
      - magic_smoke_ee 2y ago
        > from the same guidelines: don't be snarky; don't post thoughtless insubstantive comments; reply to the argument instead of calling names; don't sneer; respond to the strongest interpretation - assume good faith; eschew flamebait; don't trample curiosity. You're making a litany of unsolicited accusations while subtracting value in a conversation you're not a part of. Please stop with the self-appointed fixation on microaggression policing because it just creates pointless drama. Thanks.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        jodrellblank 2y ago
        ... who would "solicit accusations"? How am I "not a part of" it? How can I stop self-appointing what I comment about? Why are you knowingly posting microaggressions at all? Why do you think it creates drama, and why do you think said drama is pointless? And why aren't you responding to the strongest good-faith interpretation of my comment?
simgt 2y ago
> In the 80s some people also said that our whole world energy would go to computations in the future. And look today. Today we consume twice as much energy as we did in the 80s (and that's mostly coming from an increase in fossil fuels consumption). Datacenters alone consume more than 1% of global energy production, that doesn't include the network, the terminals, and the energy necessary to produce all of the hardware.
- huijzer 2y ago
  > Datacenters alone consume more than 1% of global energy production Energy-use or electricity-use? Only about 20% of total energy use is electricity [1]. I went through the math for EUV machines in more detail at https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=huijzer#42600790 https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=huijzer#42600790. [1]: https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/united-states https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/united-states
- xnx 2y ago
  > Today we consume twice as much energy as we did in the 80s Who's "we"? Worldwide we've gone from 4.4 tons/person to 4.7 tons/person (7% increase) from 1980 to 2023: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-capita?tab=chart&country=~OWID_WRL https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-capita?t...
  - simgt 2y ago
    Energy consumption, not CO2 emissions, 90TWh in 1980 to 180TWh now: https://ourworldindata.org/energy-production-consumption https://ourworldindata.org/energy-production-consumption
Mashimo 2y ago
> Should I turn off my laptop when I go to the supermarket? Yes.
lxgr 2y ago
> Why are we still talking about this? Computers are INCREDIBLY efficient and still become orders of magnitude more efficient. Because today is today, and if we can project that the energy consumption of doing a task n times on the client side outweighs the complexity of doing it once and then distributing the result somehow to all n clients, we should arguably still do it. Sometimes it's better to wait; sometimes it's better to ship the improved version now. > Computation is really negligible in the grand scheme of things. Tell that to my phone burning my hand and running through a quarter of its battery for some local ML task every once in a while.

magic_smoke_ee 2y ago

> Computers are INCREDIBLY efficient and still become orders of magnitude more efficient. That's what a software engineer would say who views resources as unlimited and free.

baal80spam 2y ago
Do you not pay for the energy you use?
- magic_smoke_ee 2y ago
  > don't cross-examine https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - jodrellblank 2y ago
    > That's what a software engineer would say who views resources as unlimited and free. from the same guidelines: don't be snarky; don't post thoughtless insubstantive comments; reply to the argument instead of calling names; don't sneer; respond to the strongest interpretation - assume good faith; eschew flamebait; don't trample curiosity.
    - magic_smoke_ee 2y ago
      > from the same guidelines: don't be snarky; don't post thoughtless insubstantive comments; reply to the argument instead of calling names; don't sneer; respond to the strongest interpretation - assume good faith; eschew flamebait; don't trample curiosity. You're making a litany of unsolicited accusations while subtracting value in a conversation you're not a part of. Please stop with the self-appointed fixation on microaggression policing because it just creates pointless drama. Thanks.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - jodrellblank 2y ago
        ... who would "solicit accusations"? How am I "not a part of" it? How can I stop self-appointing what I comment about? Why are you knowingly posting microaggressions at all? Why do you think it creates drama, and why do you think said drama is pointless? And why aren't you responding to the strongest good-faith interpretation of my comment?

simgt 2y ago

> In the 80s some people also said that our whole world energy would go to computations in the future. And look today. Today we consume twice as much energy as we did in the 80s (and that's mostly coming from an increase in fossil fuels consumption). Datacenters alone consume more than 1% of global energy production, that doesn't include the network, the terminals, and the energy necessary to produce all of the hardware.

huijzer 2y ago
> Datacenters alone consume more than 1% of global energy production Energy-use or electricity-use? Only about 20% of total energy use is electricity [1]. I went through the math for EUV machines in more detail at https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=huijzer#42600790 https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=huijzer#42600790. [1]: https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/united-states https://ourworldindata.org/energy/country/united-states
xnx 2y ago
> Today we consume twice as much energy as we did in the 80s Who's "we"? Worldwide we've gone from 4.4 tons/person to 4.7 tons/person (7% increase) from 1980 to 2023: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-capita?tab=chart&country=~OWID_WRL https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-capita?t...
- simgt 2y ago
  Energy consumption, not CO2 emissions, 90TWh in 1980 to 180TWh now: https://ourworldindata.org/energy-production-consumption https://ourworldindata.org/energy-production-consumption

Mashimo 2y ago

> Should I turn off my laptop when I go to the supermarket? Yes.

lxgr 2y ago

> Why are we still talking about this? Computers are INCREDIBLY efficient and still become orders of magnitude more efficient. Because today is today, and if we can project that the energy consumption of doing a task n times on the client side outweighs the complexity of doing it once and then distributing the result somehow to all n clients, we should arguably still do it. Sometimes it's better to wait; sometimes it's better to ship the improved version now. > Computation is really negligible in the grand scheme of things. Tell that to my phone burning my hand and running through a quarter of its battery for some local ML task every once in a while.