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AI First: How the Federal Government Is Prioritizing AI over People and Planet

32 points by eatox 3mo ago

deleted 3mo ago
[deleted]
goatlover 3mo ago
And it's not the only thing being prioritized over people and planet, although it's related to ongoing promotion of fossil fuels and wars, along with increased political propaganda.
baq 3mo ago
The optimist in me sees AI as a path to fusion thus having the energy to undo at least some of the damage done via co2 sequestration etc. The pessimist in me sees every other outcome
- wrl 3mo ago
  How exactly is AI a "path to fusion"?
  - Marha01 3mo ago
    Advanced AI could be very useful for science and engineering tasks. AI-accelerated fusion R&D will achieve success sooner than without AI.
  - FloorEgg 3mo ago
    1. Containment requires realtime adjustments to control fields which benefit from very powerful specialized machine learning models. 2. Designs require advanced simulations which benefit from AI both in building the simulations and running them. 3. Material science benefits from models learning how particles interact and materials behave in certain conditions so we can predict which materials are worth producing. These are odd the top of my head and I'm not a fusion physicist. There's probably a lot more examples.
- sandeepkd 3mo ago
  There is a somewhat of organic path to it. Keeping the feelings of optimism or pessimism aside, destruction is a part of any cycle. The good thing is, there is this inherent self sustaining nature of the species and it would use the second opportunity better after such an event.
lacy_tinpot 3mo ago
"We believe that AI’s emergence shows the potential for state capacity to be oriented toward a different mission that centers the ambitious creation of socially useful green infrastructure like clean energy, healthy schools, libraries, social housing, and public transit." The basic problem that left leaning politics are refusing to address is that the above were radical propositions. Schools, libraries, social housing, public transit, were all things that were fundamentally subversive, technologically revolutionary, and disruptive. The failure here is that the technological revolutions since should have been a wake-up call for the progressive/liberal/left leaning politics to update priors, but instead there's a conservatism that has ingrained itself as a reaction to the technological revolutions since. The left leaning politics of today remains the same politics of the 19th and 20th century with the same rhetoric and discourse. It's frozen in time, and wants to conserve the politics of that era. What would a left liberal politics look like if it were updated with the technological fundamentals of today?
- Avicebron 3mo ago
  > "The basic problem that left leaning politics are refusing to address is that the above were radical propositions. Schools, libraries, social housing, public transit, were all things that were fundamentally subversive.." Subversive to what? A winner-take-all, might-makes-right feudal mindset?
  - lacy_tinpot 3mo ago
    It was subversive to the ruling class, and the politics of that time. Schools for example made books accessible to everyone, where only 'elites' had access to them before. Thereby leveling the playing field. A left leaning politics of today might actually ask for more compute or intelligence to be accessible to all. Nationalizing or demanding a democratized project for frontier level intelligence that's easily accessible to all Americans, for example might be an idea. This would be in direct competition with frontier labs that are all closed source and heavily funded. It would give access to people otherwise gated due to monetary reasons. And further give individual American an opportunity to participate in a coming social/technological transformation.
bpodgursky 3mo ago
The federal government believes that the US will be locked out of the future forever if we are not first, or at least at parity, on AI with adversaries. They believe it is not a normal technology, but a singularly important one which will define national capacity. The federal government believes that if China achieves AI dominance and we are not competitive on either the industrial or cognitive stacks, the people and planet will be at the whim of China and will not do better anyway (and come on — look at how China's fishing fleets treat the parts of the world they have unrestricted access to). You can disbelieve it, but that is a perfectly valid thesis.
- goatlover 3mo ago
  This is a narrative framing from the tech companies who started and continue the AI race. The current administration is following this framing because the tech billionaires helped them get elected, so they are getting their pay back. It's crony capitalism.
  - bpodgursky 3mo ago
    I do not work at an AI company. If you gave me a magic button, I would press it to halt all frontier AI development globally. But, I do not have that button, and I believe the thesis that for the US to thrive, or even survive, we have to win at AI. So, until we get a multinational pact to pause AI (which I would support), it needs to be all gas, all the time.
    - SiempreViernes 3mo ago
      > So, until we get a multinational pact to pause AI (which I would support), it needs to be all gas, all the time. In other words "If others give me exactly what I want, without me making any effort for it, I will stop doing this thing I regret having to do". Someone might object that it's possible, achievable, and useful to produce partial success on the road to a comprehensive solution. Still others think it's best to not have a ceasefire while you negotiate the peace.

32 points by eatox 3mo ago

deleted 3mo ago

[deleted]

And it's not the only thing being prioritized over people and planet, although it's related to ongoing promotion of fossil fuels and wars, along with increased political propaganda.

baq 3mo ago

The optimist in me sees AI as a path to fusion thus having the energy to undo at least some of the damage done via co2 sequestration etc. The pessimist in me sees every other outcome

wrl 3mo ago
How exactly is AI a "path to fusion"?
- Marha01 3mo ago
  Advanced AI could be very useful for science and engineering tasks. AI-accelerated fusion R&D will achieve success sooner than without AI.
- FloorEgg 3mo ago
  1. Containment requires realtime adjustments to control fields which benefit from very powerful specialized machine learning models. 2. Designs require advanced simulations which benefit from AI both in building the simulations and running them. 3. Material science benefits from models learning how particles interact and materials behave in certain conditions so we can predict which materials are worth producing. These are odd the top of my head and I'm not a fusion physicist. There's probably a lot more examples.
sandeepkd 3mo ago
There is a somewhat of organic path to it. Keeping the feelings of optimism or pessimism aside, destruction is a part of any cycle. The good thing is, there is this inherent self sustaining nature of the species and it would use the second opportunity better after such an event.

lacy_tinpot 3mo ago

"We believe that AI’s emergence shows the potential for state capacity to be oriented toward a different mission that centers the ambitious creation of socially useful green infrastructure like clean energy, healthy schools, libraries, social housing, and public transit." The basic problem that left leaning politics are refusing to address is that the above were radical propositions. Schools, libraries, social housing, public transit, were all things that were fundamentally subversive, technologically revolutionary, and disruptive. The failure here is that the technological revolutions since should have been a wake-up call for the progressive/liberal/left leaning politics to update priors, but instead there's a conservatism that has ingrained itself as a reaction to the technological revolutions since. The left leaning politics of today remains the same politics of the 19th and 20th century with the same rhetoric and discourse. It's frozen in time, and wants to conserve the politics of that era. What would a left liberal politics look like if it were updated with the technological fundamentals of today?

Avicebron 3mo ago
> "The basic problem that left leaning politics are refusing to address is that the above were radical propositions. Schools, libraries, social housing, public transit, were all things that were fundamentally subversive.." Subversive to what? A winner-take-all, might-makes-right feudal mindset?
- lacy_tinpot 3mo ago
  It was subversive to the ruling class, and the politics of that time. Schools for example made books accessible to everyone, where only 'elites' had access to them before. Thereby leveling the playing field. A left leaning politics of today might actually ask for more compute or intelligence to be accessible to all. Nationalizing or demanding a democratized project for frontier level intelligence that's easily accessible to all Americans, for example might be an idea. This would be in direct competition with frontier labs that are all closed source and heavily funded. It would give access to people otherwise gated due to monetary reasons. And further give individual American an opportunity to participate in a coming social/technological transformation.

bpodgursky 3mo ago

The federal government believes that the US will be locked out of the future forever if we are not first, or at least at parity, on AI with adversaries. They believe it is not a normal technology, but a singularly important one which will define national capacity. The federal government believes that if China achieves AI dominance and we are not competitive on either the industrial or cognitive stacks, the people and planet will be at the whim of China and will not do better anyway (and come on — look at how China's fishing fleets treat the parts of the world they have unrestricted access to). You can disbelieve it, but that is a perfectly valid thesis.

goatlover 3mo ago
This is a narrative framing from the tech companies who started and continue the AI race. The current administration is following this framing because the tech billionaires helped them get elected, so they are getting their pay back. It's crony capitalism.
- bpodgursky 3mo ago
  I do not work at an AI company. If you gave me a magic button, I would press it to halt all frontier AI development globally. But, I do not have that button, and I believe the thesis that for the US to thrive, or even survive, we have to win at AI. So, until we get a multinational pact to pause AI (which I would support), it needs to be all gas, all the time.
  - SiempreViernes 3mo ago
    > So, until we get a multinational pact to pause AI (which I would support), it needs to be all gas, all the time. In other words "If others give me exactly what I want, without me making any effort for it, I will stop doing this thing I regret having to do". Someone might object that it's possible, achievable, and useful to produce partial success on the road to a comprehensive solution. Still others think it's best to not have a ceasefire while you negotiate the peace.