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Is it energy waste if it does something productive? For me, energy waste is energy which, if not used, wouldn't have any noticeable impact. For instance, most

Is it energy waste if it does something productive? For me, energy waste is energy which, if not used, wouldn't have any noticeable impact. For instance, most city lights are on even when nobody needs them (using smart activators would allow us not to waste energy. Energy truly wasted on manufacturing items which are never used, that's wasted. But generating images, text and code to allow people to make decisions, iterate on ideas, etc. That's not a waste in my opinion, that's actually using energy in one of the most interesting parts of our lives: being creative.

52-6F-62 2y ago
Using ai to generate digital artifacts is creative? To me it seems the opposite. It requires no skill, no intuition, no mastery, and contributes nothing to the human condition. Worse: it parasitically inserts itself where real creativity should alight in a person’s life and lead them to mastery of some domain in the real. (And inevitably, to a more profound philosophical relationship with their existence, and the loosening from what entraps them) Not saying it is all bad, but it is certainly not on the same footing as putting time and effort into understanding poetics or painting or music and the internal rewards practices like those build into a person’a life. Churning out digital images and generative music is not equivalent. And it takes so much more energy and resources to get to it! My god. Its the most joint physically and existentially wasteful thing we’ve ever involved ourselves with as a species! It is an extension of the same mind that churns out endless plastic crap for human “consumption” (read: garbage piles). Instead of fighting so hard for something so empty why don’t you pick up a book you haven’t read? There are worlds of understanding that are lying just beyond the arrogance of “tech people” everywhere. If I sound hostile, its because the tech bros fired the first shot. And, a famous line from a hard-learned poet (not an industrial rhyme machine): I will not go quietly into to that good night. Not when there is a new black magic priestclass spewing blasphemy against the human spirit. From a purely technical standpoint: what exactly productive has this thing done for us? I hear lots of fortune telling about it, but I haven’t seen results. Just more stupid memes. If its all the drug research and protein folding then millions of people probably don’t need access in order to skimp on their studies. (Side rant: the new Ai built into my phone’s keyboard makes me want to throw it more often than it helps me type the right words. The keyboards worked better in the former incsrnations)
- derektank 2y ago
  Decorating is a form of creativity. I might not have drawn any of the art in my house myself (it was made by other human beings in my case, most of whom I've never met) but the choices I made on which art to present, how to position each on my walls, and which room I placed them in were a form of self-expression. Am I going to claim it's a deeply meaningful form of self-expression? No, I'm not. But I think the snearing attitude towards the modern equivalent of teenagers cutting out pictures from magazines and sticking them on their walls is a bit misguided.
  - 52-6F-62 2y ago
    Bloody reductionist claptrap. The last defence of the arrogant. You must hang onto this wasteful device so much that you will twist the words of others to suit your agenda. I’m not sneering at play. The opposite. The black magicians as I’ve labelled them here have parasitically replaced real play with the task of training their machines of future control. (Doubt me? They shout this shit at bloody conferences and on podcasts) Take a big step back, man.
- visarga 2y ago
  > It requires no skill, no intuition, no mastery Next time you use generative AI try to use a prompt and iterate on it. We usually prompt generative AI, maybe you are using it without prompting. Who knows.
bumby 2y ago
>Is it energy waste if it does something productive? To the extent that it’s not a 100% efficient system, yes. A quick search says about 60%-80% of CPU energy is waste heat. On top of that, it’s usually required to be removed by air-conditioning, so there is considerable “waste” even if you value the end product. A manufacturer doesn’t get to claim all their scrap isn’t really waste because the rest was used to build something meaningful. So tracking waste is still important.
- ipdashc 2y ago
  > A quick search says about 60%-80% of CPU energy is waste heat. That's an odd metric. Doesn't effectively all input energy leave the CPU as heat (ignoring reactive power and stuff like that)? Is there a theoretical minimum energy-per-unit-computation that makes up that 20%-40%?
  - bumby 2y ago
    That’s a good point. I’m definitely biased by thinking about it in terms of mechanical work. Some work is getting done, even if it’s just electrons being pushed around in transistor junctions. Maybe sometime with a better background can clarify.

52-6F-62 2y ago

Using ai to generate digital artifacts is creative? To me it seems the opposite. It requires no skill, no intuition, no mastery, and contributes nothing to the human condition. Worse: it parasitically inserts itself where real creativity should alight in a person’s life and lead them to mastery of some domain in the real. (And inevitably, to a more profound philosophical relationship with their existence, and the loosening from what entraps them) Not saying it is all bad, but it is certainly not on the same footing as putting time and effort into understanding poetics or painting or music and the internal rewards practices like those build into a person’a life. Churning out digital images and generative music is not equivalent. And it takes so much more energy and resources to get to it! My god. Its the most joint physically and existentially wasteful thing we’ve ever involved ourselves with as a species! It is an extension of the same mind that churns out endless plastic crap for human “consumption” (read: garbage piles). Instead of fighting so hard for something so empty why don’t you pick up a book you haven’t read? There are worlds of understanding that are lying just beyond the arrogance of “tech people” everywhere. If I sound hostile, its because the tech bros fired the first shot. And, a famous line from a hard-learned poet (not an industrial rhyme machine): I will not go quietly into to that good night. Not when there is a new black magic priestclass spewing blasphemy against the human spirit. From a purely technical standpoint: what exactly productive has this thing done for us? I hear lots of fortune telling about it, but I haven’t seen results. Just more stupid memes. If its all the drug research and protein folding then millions of people probably don’t need access in order to skimp on their studies. (Side rant: the new Ai built into my phone’s keyboard makes me want to throw it more often than it helps me type the right words. The keyboards worked better in the former incsrnations)

derektank 2y ago
Decorating is a form of creativity. I might not have drawn any of the art in my house myself (it was made by other human beings in my case, most of whom I've never met) but the choices I made on which art to present, how to position each on my walls, and which room I placed them in were a form of self-expression. Am I going to claim it's a deeply meaningful form of self-expression? No, I'm not. But I think the snearing attitude towards the modern equivalent of teenagers cutting out pictures from magazines and sticking them on their walls is a bit misguided.
- 52-6F-62 2y ago
  Bloody reductionist claptrap. The last defence of the arrogant. You must hang onto this wasteful device so much that you will twist the words of others to suit your agenda. I’m not sneering at play. The opposite. The black magicians as I’ve labelled them here have parasitically replaced real play with the task of training their machines of future control. (Doubt me? They shout this shit at bloody conferences and on podcasts) Take a big step back, man.
visarga 2y ago
> It requires no skill, no intuition, no mastery Next time you use generative AI try to use a prompt and iterate on it. We usually prompt generative AI, maybe you are using it without prompting. Who knows.

bumby 2y ago

>Is it energy waste if it does something productive? To the extent that it’s not a 100% efficient system, yes. A quick search says about 60%-80% of CPU energy is waste heat. On top of that, it’s usually required to be removed by air-conditioning, so there is considerable “waste” even if you value the end product. A manufacturer doesn’t get to claim all their scrap isn’t really waste because the rest was used to build something meaningful. So tracking waste is still important.

ipdashc 2y ago
> A quick search says about 60%-80% of CPU energy is waste heat. That's an odd metric. Doesn't effectively all input energy leave the CPU as heat (ignoring reactive power and stuff like that)? Is there a theoretical minimum energy-per-unit-computation that makes up that 20%-40%?
- bumby 2y ago
  That’s a good point. I’m definitely biased by thinking about it in terms of mechanical work. Some work is getting done, even if it’s just electrons being pushed around in transistor junctions. Maybe sometime with a better background can clarify.