Comment by preg_match
1 month ago
Really only large language models require huge swaths of training data and extremely expensive training/inference. Other “AI”, like basic neural networks or something like path finding, is basically free. It’s just an algorithm, a small one that runs on computers.
The term AI is very overloaded. When people say AI, they really mean LLMs. AI like old Siri has basically no cost. It’s not environmentally damaging, as it runs on device. It’s not privacy gore, because it runs on device.
Or take, for example, lane keep assist systems on vehicles. This doesn’t require a huge data center or anything, it’s basic computer vision and a small on-vehicle model.
Yes AI has a “cost”, but for virtually all non-LLM AI the ecological cost is the same as any other application or algorithm. Siri doesn’t burn more energy than instagram.
> This doesn’t require a huge data center or anything, it’s basic computer vision and a small on-vehicle model.
Yes, but it still has a strong ecological impact, and for what benefit? I only ever hear people complaining about electronics/assist in cars, and recalls due to electronic faults is about 50% of car recalls nowadays.
The problem is not that this compute is overall so much compute, it's that it's used to replace "no compute", and that in the ecological lifecycle of electronics production is the biggest problem (not sustained use). A modern car has hundreds of microcontrollers and probably as many sensors… Although some of these features are technically not machine learning, i think it's part of the same problem.
I wish we could have better/safer/cheaper cars over time, that can be more easily maintained. Instead we have shitter and more expensive cars that are less rapairable than ever before.
Well that’s what I’m saying - a basic machine learning system is no more ecological cost than an algorithm. Because it just is an algorithm.
Computerization of cars is orthogonal, it’s not an AI problem. Things like engine control for fuel efficiency isn’t AI, it’s just an algorithm. Cruise control is just an algorithm. The cost is the same as any other software.
Now LLMs DO have a new cost. You really require super computers to run LLMs at scale, that much is true. But that’s very distinct from machine learning, it’s a different beast.
Nobody is complaining about, like, monster AI in The Binding of Isaac and how much ecological impact it has. Because it doesn’t. Well… that’s AI, and 10 years ago that’s the only AI people really talked about. Now AI really means LLMs. The ecological impact is from LLMs.