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81 replies

We should invent some sort of entity to watch out for our collective interest to govern, if you will.

2
lemmy.world

I’m sick of pretending these men aren’t mentally ill. Every last one of them should be in Arkham Asylum

16

There's evidence that extreme amounts of wealth and power do drive one mad. One study had people play monopoly with one player (chosen at random) starting in a privileged position (e.g. extra starting money, and twice the income passing go). They became assholes really quick, and believed their victory in the game was due to superior playing.

But it gets crazy when you're so rich that no one will disagree with you about anything. Surrounded by sycophants, it becomes easy to assume you're the smartest person in the room and expert of everything.

Some world cultures see it as an illness just to hoard massive amounts of wealth, but here in the states we nurtured a culture in which superlative wealth became a common ambition. Especially after the California gold rush, and get-rich-quick schemes became the norm.

8

Oh god, billionaires have been experiencing AI psychosis before AI, that's why they don't see any issue with it.

7

What we need is a French Revolution. Off with their heads. Nothing of value would be lost if the genAI tech bros all became a head lighter... or a body lighter if you prefer.

12

Years ago in my hometown there was a developer that wanted to expand the parking lot of the stripmall he owned into a wooded lotone of his major reasons he gave was that "it was just trees" so there was no real loss.... For some people if there isn't a profit being derived from the land then its worthless.

26
feddit.org

For Nuremberg trials we would have to win the war first.

12

I read it as Nuremberg laws at first. Not what I would call it.

4
lemmy.world

I consider any post mentioning 'prediction market' names like this to be advertisements. They are not news sources, they are gambling sites.

100

Agreed, but society is going to drive off a bridge before they acknowledge it, let alone do something.

26

Exactly, if you think about it for a second, what exactly is going to power these data centers if Patagonia is so remote and undeveloped?

Oh look its mostly natural gas, which is threatened by all the mess in Hormuz. And hydropower, but the country has been in economic chaos for decades so there's no centralized efforts to get those up and going.

Basically dead on arrival as far as ideas go.

2
lemmy.world

Well betting does work for what it's meant to do. If you wanna know who is favoured in a football match your best option is looking at the betting sites.

Agreed that these "articles" are purely advertisment.

2

I'm quite against prediction markets for many reasons, but I will say they have been more accurate than most political polls because people are actually putting money where their mouth is.

1
anarchist.nexus

In my opinion they are building the infrastructure for a fully automated surveillance society, for automated media manipulation, and to remove humans out of the kill chain in the military, while dismantling the rest of what remains of the middle class. We are going straight into high-tech dark ages / feudalism. Shadowrun and Cyberpunk, here we come. (Edit: the only thing i am not sure about here is if we will have corporations with more power than nation states, or nation states having absolute control over corporations and using them in proxy wars. Time will tell.)

Russia with its limited AI development seems to already have deployed fully automated killing machines (Powered by NVidias Jetson Orin module). The US aim for the same, and everyone else who doesn't want to become a vassal state will have to follow suite.

When i think of this future, the only picture my mind can produce is Black Mirror - Metalhead.

Edit: If used for these tasks, it's also not important if inference is something you can make money with. OpenAI, Anthropic and the Neoclouds are a grave for billions of dollars - but that doesn't matter if the rewards are non-monetary.

22
paranoiareply
feddit.dk

Broadly agree, but I think that there is about a 1% chance of working out with the billionaires in control. They will just get their assets expropriated when a war occurs, or the AI will just take over once given the tools.

2

1% is generous, in my opinion.

That's assuming they clear several hurdles and their little nightmare system works out to be the dream they want for them.

It won't. It'll be a dystopian nightmare for them too.

They always fuck up their goals and only end up closer by the sheer inertia and risk insulation that controlling our economic output gives them.

Then some bright and talented person who dreams of doing the right thing provides the missing links in their machinations and they either steal or buy them.

They made sure that wouldn't happen this time by preemptively trying to rob all of the brightness until those who can won't give them anymore, and those who will are slowly being cognitively robbed of the capability itself.

The AI taking over is both (as currently deployed) impossible and probably amongst the best outcomes, compared to the deathly wave of fucking ineptitude these chuds are unleashing and will continue to unleash.

5

The billionaires are the ones footing the bill and thinking they will be the "new gods" in their restructured society. In reality, nation states will use this technology to make sure that they can't be touched, regardless of how brutal and inhumane their regime is.

In some way, the billionaires are just some stooges getting scammed into developing the chains that will bind us all.

3

any mechanisms for returning to coherent government model must include non-deteriorating beyond not beying able to extradite from south america. we need friends and allies there

3
lemmy.world

Good luck with that. After the center left governments got removed all initiatives to develop internet infrastructure in the region stopped expanding.

The internet service down there is expensive compared to the rest of the country.

6
village604reply
adultswim.fan

I'm sure they'd deploy their own fiber backbone.

Not to mention that Patagonia spans multiple countries.

4

In my experience, the rich almost never get richer by spending their own cash. Even the local ISPs are operating on the government deployed backbone in that region. Sole exception might be Movistar but I'm not sure about that. And convincing the current government or the next one to prioritize spending cash on this will be extremely hard.

2
lemmy.world

I don't understand what the data centers are for? Why do they need so many and what are they even doing? It doesn't make sense to me, especially for something I feel like is in a stock market bubble on the verge of financial collapse as soon as these big corporations realize it isn't as viable as they hoped, which has been coming incrementally.

18
hayvanreply
piefed.world

Practically, the only use of them right now is to inflate stock prices. No business benefits from this much compute other than hardware suppliers and construction companies.

18
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

As someone in the field, I can assure you that a great many businesses are realizing significant benefits. Our PR sucks though.

-5
mander.xyz

Are they? The fact that we aren't seeing more completed projects on github tells me its not useful for coding beyond peer-review and generating boilerplate. I've met 2 non-tech people who managed to get a MVP they have no way to maintain. Who is realizing significant benefits?

12
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

Github is not the real world. My information is based on our clients. A basic search produced the following...

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

High-end, frontier AI models are driving major breakthroughs across crucial domains: Healthcare & Biomedicine Drug Discovery & Protein Folding: Models like AlphaFold predict protein structures in seconds, accelerating candidate target identification for complex diseases like Alzheimer's and cancer. Early Diagnostics: Advanced computer vision analyzes complex scans (MRIs, mammograms, pathology slides) to detect early-stage tumors and rare systemic abnormalities faster than manual screening. Genomic Medicine: Processing petabytes of multi-omic data helps design targeted therapies tailored to individual patient genetic profiles. Climate, Sustainability & Agriculture Precision Climate Modeling: Advanced neural networks simulate localized weather extremes, helping cities anticipate floods, severe storms, and wildfire trajectories weeks in advance. Grid & Fusion Energy Optimization: Machine learning manages real-time load balancing for renewable power grids and stabilizes plasma containment configurations in nuclear fusion reactors. Precision Agriculture: Satellite and drone computer vision algorithms analyze soil health, crop diseases, and yield forecasts to optimize water and fertilizer deployment. Scientific Research & Discovery Materials Science: Autonomous lab platforms test millions of theoretical chemical combinations to invent better battery chemistry, carbon-capture materials, and superconductors. Astrophysics & Deep Space: High-throughput processing identifies exoplanets, maps dark matter distribution, and filters noise from radio telescope signals. Accessibility & Public Safety Assistive Technologies: Multimodal models enable real-time scene description for visual impairments, instant speech-to-sign translation, and adaptive interface controls for mobility challenges. Disaster Response & Search Operations: Satellite analysis models process post-disaster maps instantaneously to route first responders and locate trapped survivors.

-8
Wildmimicreply
anarchist.nexus

The thing is: The amount of compute being planned (it's often not getting built) can only have one true goal: automated mass surveillance, media manipulation and dismantling of what remains of the middle class, in addition of fully automated warfare. No other task than rolling out Flock 2.0 and the equivalent of Skynet needs that much compute. All the things you mentioned already work with the EXISTING compute. I agree that some additional datacenters will be needed, but for the things you mentioned a fraction of planned compute is already fine, it seems.

11

Infrastructure

Not sure what about this even is AI. Its a software development platform specialised in Infrastructure projects. I guess the reality capture/mapping API uses AI, but most features are independent from that.

Medical

A lot of could, maybe and potentially in an article written during the starting hype in 2024, great source. It would be great if it actually worked, but most studies ive seen so far came to the conclusion that the predictions the AI made were based on entirely wrong assumptions.

Environmental

Machine learning is a great tool and has been around way before the current hype. It also has very little in common with what people usually mean when they say AI.

Fusion

The only somewhat proper example you delivered. Sounds interesting.

Let's face it, the examples you've shown have very little in common with LLMs, Generative AI or Agentic AI. Most of it could be done with machine learning algorithms we've had before this started or are just nice gimmicks that didn't revolutionize anything unlike what you claimed. There definetly are a few interesting applications for specialized AI models, but the tradeoffs simply aren't worth it.

For every 5 years that AI brings us closer to Fusion power, it brings us 15 years closer to a cyberpunk esq dystopian future. Its great that I don't have to worry about power costs anymore once I'm locked up cause some predictive algorithm said my kids would be against the current regime.

Not to mention that most of the actually useful applications are developed by independent researchers and have little to do with the big AI Industries that build these datacenter. You know, the ones that get the actual hate

4

That's nice, but NOT the endgame. I do not contest that AI can be a positive thing too, but there are very powerful forces, concentrated mainly in California among the tech Billionaires, who want to use AI as a tool to ensure that their will cannot be denied.

The US was already using AI in the attack on Iran, minimizing human involvement in target selection and approving the strikes (thats how over 100 little girls died). Russia is experimenting with fully AI automated attack drones based on Nvidia hardware. Flock cameras are analyzing not only license plates, but data points like bumper stickers and what other devices are in the car, making every personal movement transparent even if you leave your smartphone at home. Home security cameras are using facial recognition (which they only pulled back because they were inept in messaging, but you can be sure this functionality will return, and with full access for the authorities). Laws preventing authorities from spying on citizens get bypassed by buying the required data from advertising companies. Social media is getting flooded with LLM-generated content designed to steer public opinion regardless of what the truth is. Entertainment hardware like Smart TVs is listening in on your conversations in your living room (and in many cases much further away), transcribing your words into text using AI and storing it - even if you keep your TV offline, your chats become company property - and therefore state property after a simple financial transaction - the moment your TV detects an open WIFI, or in the worst case just use technologies like LoRa to transmit the data home.

The people behind all of this are the same people financing far right parties all over the world, because a divided world is easier to dominate.

Society is under an AI-powered full scale assault. I hate it, because I know how much positive stuff this technology can enable, just as you documented. But giving up all our rights and living in an hyperscaled version of 1984 is not worth it.

4
lemmy.sdf.org

I ran your wall-o-text through bullshit.js and it made quite some good replacements!

6
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

So you do think that using compute power to distill wisdom from complex information is a useful function.

0

Of course, but that has nothing to do with your text. Nothing in it was "complex", or "information" (in the sense of being useful); it was just corporate mumbo jumbo, which I just happened to verify using the tool.

Just so you learn some nuance: there are degrees of magnitude in all aspects ranging from expenditure, availability or soundness, between something like using a scanner and OCR to recover information from a damaged book, and "using AI".

2
lemmy.world

No point in replying. Everyone here is convinced that AI is exclusively a scam to inflate stock prices and brings 0 benefits or productivity gains in any field ever nor is it going to anytime in the future.

This is not to say that there isn't a bubble or that AI will solve all problems in the world, but it does have plenty of use cases and many are already in place. For instance many 100s of likely rape/violence cases have been discovered at my local hospital by running the xrays and scans through AI, which hadn't been identified by the doctors by themselves.

-1
IIIreply
lemmy.world

Cool, you invaded the privacy of numerous people using AI... you must be proud.

The issue isn't that AI brings no value - it is the cost of that value. And many people aren't falling for the extremely overrated value that companies are claiming. Promised value coming from people who have a very long track record of not being truthful, lying for their own profit no matter who it harms. And then there are some who would rather not ruin the environment for those unfulfilled promises.

But sure, throw an anecdote out to prove everyone else wrong.

4

Altman and Musk are verified shit. This is common knowledge all across the industry.

Public companies don't set their value - shareholders do. Insiders know the value hasn't arrived yet. We build because customers pay us to build. The customer fronts the construction costs based on the signed contract. Investors buy or sell based on public knowledge.

1

Nobody's privacy was violated. Privacy laws are very strict in Italy and before any research is done on health data you have to sign and tick the box to specifically allow it. The data was also not handed to any company as the research was run by a local university.

How was anybody's privacy violated? Also I didn't do anything given that I just read this on a newspaper and am not in any way connected to the hospital.

You are judgmental and ignorant. You think, as many other people here on lemmy, that you are right about everything all the time. I don't deny that the AI industry has very big flaws. I fully agree and I believe that in the long term we will need public ownership of AI companies. I just disagree with the fact that AI is wholly bad and brings 0 positives.

-2
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

This discussion is not only for today's participants. I also speak to the lurkers. I believe that this fad of hating AI will pass. That over time the benefits will become obvious.

I also do not conflate AI with the capitalism surrounding it. Just like the industrial revolution brought forth great progress through greed and social malfeasance, this revolution is also a messy birth. But no one can dispute the benefits that came when horse power was replaced with horsepower. In the end, this will be the same.

In the meanwhile, we can hold the industry to high standards. Sound levels. Water usage. Energy consumption. My company supports setting standards on all these. That would produce a level field as we already do it volunterally. I'm all for suing bad actors into bankruptcy. Using on-site gas turbines for primary power is a crime against humanity. As is draining the water supply for cooling.

2

Great points.

Especially regarding the environmental aspects, I feel like the whole thing could just be solved by zoning datacentres as industrial and applying slightly stricted regulation.

AI doesn't kill the environment by itself, it just needs a lot of energy and there needs to be some planning put into providing clean energy for datacentres without spinning gas turbines or raising energy prices immensely for the average Joe.

2

The NDAs are Very strict. Fired and unemployable is the least of it.

This is a primary reason for all of the "trust me bro" vibes. Anyone with real info is gagged.

0

Do you manufacture guillotines? That's the only industry that is realizing actual, genuine benefits here.

Everyone else supposedly making money is in a circular ponzi scheme.

2
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

Pharma is very big. Those AIs "speak" only in terms of chemical structure. Genomic medicine is coming soon.

Financial companies create models that take the guesswork out of complex economic decisions.

Auto captioning and note-taking and grammar correction, etc - all AI.

Factory and mining operations are getting in big, too. Dangerous jobs will get much safer.

Material science is making great advances. Production will follow in a year or two. Other sciences, too.

Businesses are using AI to press their advantage in various fields - and seeing benefits fairly quickly. No one it throwing money away. It's a lot like the industrial revolution. A fast build out due to a change of every business model. And, like before, social disruption.

-10
Nalivaireply
lemmy.world

Ah, various fields. That's a convincing argument.
You're talking shit, I assume generated shit. None of what you said makes any sense, and everyone who had a misfortune of reading it is now dumber for it. I award you no points and god have mersy on your soul.

5
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

Your mind is set. I'm not here to change it. I'm here to present the truth of my personal experience to those reading along here. As you fall into personal attacks and memes, I feel my case only stands stronger.

-1

Buddy, you can't vomit nothingwords on a page and then go on all wounded and misunderstood. If that's your truth, I'm very saddened by emptiness of your inner self. At this point I just wish you're an llm.

1
DrSoapreply
lemmy.world

A lot of the stuff you listed existed before AI though? What is AI then? Anything related to computers?

4
Xaphanosreply
lemmy.world

Even Wikipedia struggles with a full definition. But is likely to be the one with consensus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ai

My opinion is:

A computing system that performs massively multi-variable parallel computation using non-CPU processors and architectures designed for the task.

You can tell I'm a hardware guy.

1

That's a bizzare definition, derived backwards from a marketing term that meant almost nothing to begin with. I don't know what hardware is you're into, but that can't be computer hardware.

1
DrSoapreply
lemmy.world

Maybe I don't understand it outside of my element then.

3

A reasonable view. That's OK. No one can keep up with everything. This business is also closely guarding its trade secrets.

-1
piefed.social

Isn’t Patagonia basically pristine and undeveloped because it is very remote and hard to develop. And from that highway documentary I remember also big parts are private property

13
skisnowreply
lemmy.ca

big parts are private property

Surely that makes them easier to buy and develop on than if they were publically owned? Or am I missing your point?

12

Big sales are easier with consolidated ownership vs disaggregated ownership.

If you need all 1000 acres to get from point a to point b to build something but requires 1000 different people to individually agree it may be next to impossible compared to needing 30 government officials to agree.

There is a reason eminent domain is used so much in the US vs private transactions for large projects. The Dakota access pipeline for example could be done through private purchases, but it's basically so impossible that not approving forced government sales through eminent domain was consider "blocking" it.

3
lemmy.world

It's a very hospitable climate. We should drop all the CEOs off down there.

🤣

7
piefed.social

Presumably they wouldn't want to build the data centers in the national park depicted in the photo, but rather in the larger desert part of Argentinian Patagonia which is basically vast stretches of nothing whatsoever.

It's maybe the least offensive place to put a data center in for that reason

11

Another least offensive spot is the Dakotas. Plentiful power and free cooling.

3

Nah skip it, line em up and give them "The Pianist" treatment.

11

Such moves were predictable long ago As people in the developed world protest against datacenters, while they use a lot of ai (oh, the hypocrisy...), giving pressure for more and more datacenters, the industry would move them to the developing world, so that the protesters would stop caring, while they make a marketing around here of generating many jobs and bringing economic development.

3
lemmy.world

I'm confused by how many reposts I see of Polymarket posts. Why is that a thing?

2