Comment by mathgeek
5 hours ago
It does matter because of the side effects (pollution, etc.). The environment and how it affects humanity is a complex system with many variables. Both generation and consumption are in there.
5 hours ago
It does matter because of the side effects (pollution, etc.). The environment and how it affects humanity is a complex system with many variables. Both generation and consumption are in there.
We're talking about global warming specifically here, though. Cars and planes should be a much bigger worry than AI power usage.
Not when AI is directly resulting in increased greenhouse gas pollution. It's all of the above. Any source of greenhouse gas pollution is bad. Cars, planes, ships, AI data centers running on fossil fuel energy. It's all bad.
No. This is disingenuous. Something that consumes electricity doesn't care where the electricity comes from. Fix the power source, and you automatically fix every single consumer in existence at once.
2 replies →
There's an easy 19th century solution to cars and planes - public transport. It could reduce the usage significantly, save people lots of time, reduce pollution, make people healthier through making the environment more walkable, reduce crime. We don't do it not because the technology isn't there, but because it's more profitable for people to induce consumption by planning our cities and suburbs around cars.
There's lots of rotting low hanging fruits ignored for decades because politicians are paid by the ladder-sellers.
> save people lots of time
Public transit is rarely a time saver for people who give up their cars in favor of public transit.
> reduce crime
In what way? Car break-ins presumably go down when there when fewer cars, but does overall crime drop? Doubtful.