I think the article’s point is still valid in regards to “AI datacenter megaprojects”. Is this new and unique for AI, or simply a continuation of the huge build-out for other demands, like video streaming? Is it “unfair” to target AI for that when video streaming apparently dwarfs AI in terms of energy usage?

I think AI replacing workers is great (in an ideal world). I’m coming at it from the Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communism angle, and saying “AI bad because it’s replacing workers” seems wrong to me, vs “Privatization of AI and economic inequality are bad”. The genie isn’t going back into the bottle, so let’s take on the fight that can be won.

Yeah, it’s similar to nuclear energy as well. For both, I’m not so much “pro-X” so much as I’m “anti-anti-X”. Renewable energy seems to have finally outpaced other options, but we also wasted decades fighting against people that meant well but helped destroy the environment. Likewise, simply rejecting AI completely just leaves more opportunity for unethical people just trying to make a buck.

In an ideal world, we’d work together as a species to distill our collective knowledge into a reliable source of truth, much like the promise of Wikipedia. We’d use this new technology to make that accessible to everyone, even if they lack context to understand some of the deeper subjects. It would be a rising tide that lifted everyone. It doesn’t have to be controlled by tech bros, and IMO the lack of a popular utopian vision coming from leftist ideals has left a hole eagerly taken over by people trying to make a buck. Projects like AI Horde are much better than saying “AI bad, end of story” IMO.

It’s hard for me to really gauge the laziness aspect. Yeah, it encourages laziness in some ways, but it doesn’t have to be on the things that matter. If it takes care of grunt work like “generate a react app skeleton that does X”, that could be viewed as laziness, but it could also be viewed as the invention of the tractor eliminating a lot of unnecessary farm work or something. In other words, if you just want to “do the thing”, and it helps you get to that goal faster, is that lazy?

Regarding your edit, makes sense to take it with a grain of salt, but broken clocks and all that. The numbers are more important, and they seem reasonable. Taking a look at this article (written before the current crop of LLMs took off, but also just a random link I found so take it also with a grain of salt), we see a huge increase in data center workloads before any current AI workloads:

I think the article’s general point is likely valid, and that it’s a valid criticism to say “If you criticize AI for energy usage but not video streaming then you’re unfairly targeting AI”.

Some background on this comic:

Before I start work on any cartoon, I usually have a fairly good idea what the caption is going to say.

In this instance, and in the last few moments of my deadline, I uncharacteristically made a sweeping change of the entire thing. Originally, the caption read, “Look, but don’t touch―or the mother will throw it out.”

I still have no idea what came over me that made me suddenly see it another way, but when the cartoon was published it seemed to generate a favorable response from more than a few people. And I always found that to be sort of interesting. Does this mean we all have a latest desire to stuff worms into a baby―or is it just me?

My read is that it’s a low-effort “She’s so ugly even the predators don’t want to eat her”. Maybe it was a reference to some current event?

Sorry, removed for unflagged NSFW

Are you talking about this bit?

How concerned should you be about spending 0.8 Wh? 0.8 Wh is enough to: […] Drive a sedan at a consistent speed for 4 feet

Or this bit?

If your friend were about to drive their personal largest ever in history cruise ship solo for 60 miles, but decided to walk 1 mile to the dock instead of driving because they were “concerned about the climate impact of driving” how seriously would you take them?

I don’t think it’s saying “if you are talking to a chatbot you arent doing other things like driving!”, I think the point is that you probably do lots of other things every day that dwarf the energy consumption you could use on LLMs, and you don’t avoid doing those because of their energy usage. For example, nobody* is complaining about the energy usage of Netflix or Youtube, but they dwarf chatgpt:

*I’m sure it’s not actually nobody, but I’d bet it rounds to 0, and either way is far less than the number of people complaining about AI energy usage.

Better link for the author’s comment:

https://xcancel.com/Exocomics/status/359477242801315840

Dear Li, how do comics get on the internet?

Well I’m glad you asked

Thought this was an interesting look at an oft-repeated claim, that AI is bad for the environment. I think it’s assumed to be true, especially on Lemmy, but that might not actually be the case.

That was fun, thanks! Used all SoU on the RoW and it worked out great. I didn’t realize you could get +8/+9 drops, even with the RoW (some of that might also be from a lucky enchantment). Prison was a little difficult to start until I got a usable weapon, and then it was smooth sailing. I was even able to get back up to the top without killing any mobs (though some died to my mirror image, so wouldn’t have gotten the achievement, even if I could get that with a custom seed)

In the first panel, the reindeer is noticing that one of the elves looks different from the other two. In the second panel, it has either a disapproving face, or a pondering face. In the third panel, we see it looking at Santa, and notice that Santa has the same face as the middle elf, implying that he’s related to Santa and the other two aren’t (notice that it’s pinker than the other two, like Santa is, and also has the same squint as Santa). Notice also that Santa’s belt is only partially buckled and his coat isn’t buttoned, implying that he’s in the middle of putting them back on.

The reindeer has noticed that one of the elves was fathered by Santa, and the first two panels help provide that context, as we piece it together from the reindeer’s POV.

Thanks for posting, hope everyone has a great Christmas and rest of the holidays! 🎄

Dogs are great at parties! Especially ones that come over and demand pets

In the HTML it’s titled “turnback”, but I think you’re right that that isn’t intentional, so I edited to add the space

Some background on this comic:

Transcript:

After completing this cartoon in the “deer” version, it just didn’t click with me, humorwise. I tried it again with bears, and I suppose, because of their ability to stand on their hind legs, they more closely approximate a group of guys standing around doing the same thing―and, to my eye, making it more effective.

Some background on this comic:

Transcript:

The submitted version of this cartoon is seen here on the left. My editor, however, believed something more was needed to clarify why this guy coming out of the house is so mad―so he changed the caption to the version on the right. I acquiesced on this one, but always felt like it was redundant and too leading. I later restored my preferred version for inclusion in a book.

That’s a great site! Posted over to !internetisbeautiful@piefed.social:

https://discuss.online/post/32591126

Noted as “The first atypical size Garfield comic strip” over here: https://garfield.fandom.com/wiki/Garfield,_December_1980_comic_strips

No explanation though. Tried searching online, and Google’s AI was once again unhelpful:

There’s no specific “atypical size” Garfield strip for December 21, 1980; that date marked the famous John Lennon murder, so any special Garfield strip would likely be a tribute, but most online mentions focus on Garfield’s usual antics, with no physical size anomaly reported for that day, just the news context around it

Yeah sorry, should’ve made that clear. The picture is just an excerpt from a book called The Gashlycrumb Tinies by Edward Gorey. The picture in my comment above is from Edward Gorey, the picture for the main post is by the PBF author, in the style of Edward Gorey.

Thanks for the transcription! I think this one isn’t supposed to be as thoughtful as much as his usual ones. It’s hard to see but on the side it says “apologies, Edward Gorey”, and I think this comic was more about wanting to do a tribute to that author than his normal PBF style (though there’s a lot of overlap between the two). Gorey wrote very macabre short stories, like an alphabet book with these entries: