• AnonomousWolf@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    If you ever take a flight for holiday, or even drive long distance and cry about AI being bad for the environment then you’re a hypocrite.

    Same goes for if you eat beef, or having a really powerful gaming rig that you use a lot.

    There are plenty of valid reasons AI is bad, but the argument for the environment seems weak, and most people using it are probably hypocrites. It’s barely a drop in the bucket compared to other things

    • Jankatarch@lemmy.world
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      17 hours ago

      Texas has just asked residents to take less showers while datacenters made specifically for LLM training continue operating.

      This is more like feeling bad for not using a paper straw while local factory dumps all their oil change into the community river.

      • AnonomousWolf@lemmy.world
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        3 hours ago

        Maybe they should cut down on Beef first, it uses exponentially more water than AI and CO2

        • 1 kg Beef = 60kg CO2 - source
        • 1000km Return flight = 314kg CO2 - source
        • 1 Bitcoin transaction = 645kg of CO2 - source
        • 1000 AI prompts = 3kg of CO2 - source
    • BroBot9000@lemmy.world
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      22 hours ago

      Ahh so are you going to acknowledge the privacy invasion and brain rotting cause by Ai or are you just going to focus on dismissing the environmental concerns? Cause I linked more than just the environmental impacts.

      • Draces@lemmy.world
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        21 hours ago

        Uh dismissing that concern seems like valid point? Do people have to comprehensively discredit the whole list to reply?

    • Sl00k@programming.dev
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      17 hours ago

      This echo chamber isn’t ready for this logical discussion yet unfortunately lol

      • CXORA@aussie.zone
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        14 hours ago

        When someone disagrees with me - echo chamber.

        When someone agrees with me - logical discussion.

    • Randomgal@lemmy.ca
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      20 hours ago

      You’re getting downvoted for speaking the truth to an echo chamber my guy.

      • Barrymore@sh.itjust.works
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        20 hours ago

        But he isn’t speaking the truth. AI itself is a massive strain on the environment, without any true benefit. You are being fed hype and lies by con men. Data centers being built to supply AIs are using water and electricity at alarming rates, taking away the resources from actual people living nearby, and raising the cost of those utilities at the same time.

        https://www.realtor.com/advice/finance/ai-data-centers-homeowner-electric-bills-link/

        • Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world
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          10 hours ago

          AI itself is a massive strain on the environment, without any true benefit

          Rockstar games developing GTA5: 6k employees 20 kwatt hours per square foot https://esource.bizenergyadvisor.com/article/large-offices 150 square feet per employee https://unspot.com/blog/how-much-office-space-do-we-need-per-employee/#%3A~%3Atext=The+needed+workspace+may+vary+in+accordance

          18,000,000,000 watt hours

          vs

          10,000,000,000 watt hours for ChatGPT training

          https://www.washington.edu/news/2023/07/27/how-much-energy-does-chatgpt-use/

          There are more 3d games developed each year than companies releasing new AI models.

        • Ek-Hou-Van-Braai@piefed.socialOP
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          16 hours ago

          The same can be said for taking flights to go on holiday.

          Flying emits way exponentially more CO2 and supports the oil industry

        • Sl00k@programming.dev
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          17 hours ago

          This is valid to all data centers serving all websites. Your take is a criticism of unregulated capitalism, not AI.

          Beef farming is a far far far more impactful discussion, yet here we are.

          • CXORA@aussie.zone
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            14 hours ago

            Ai takes far more power to serve a single request than a website does though.

            And remember, AI requires those websites too, for training data.

            So it’s not just more power hungry, it also has thw initial power consumption added on top

        • Draces@lemmy.world
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          18 hours ago

          And your car or flight is a massive strain on the environment. I think you’re missing the point. There’s a way to use tools responsibly. We’ve taken the chains off and that’s obviously a problem but the AI hate here is irrational

        • absentbird@lemmy.world
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          19 hours ago

          The problem is the companies building the data centers; they would be just as happy to waste the water and resources mining crypto or hosting cloud gaming, if not for AI it would be something else.

          In China they’re able to run DeepSeek without any water waste, because they cool the data centers with the ocean. DeepSeek also uses a fraction of the energy per query and is investing in solar and other renewables for energy.

          AI is certainly an environmental issue, but it’s only the most recent head of the big tech hydra.

        • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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          19 hours ago

          AI uses 1/1000 the power of a microwave.

          Are you really sure you aren’t the one being fed lies by con men?

          • jimjam5@lemmy.world
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            13 hours ago

            What? Elon Musk’s xAI data center in Tennessee (when fully expanded & operational) will need 2 GW of energy. That’s as much as some entire cities use in a year.

          • Ace T'Ken@lemmy.ca
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            17 hours ago

            Hi. I’m in charge of an IT firm that is been contracted to carry out one of these data centers somewhat unwillingly in our city. We are currently in the groundbreaking phase but I am looking at papers and power requirements. You are absolutely wrong on the power requirements unless you mean per query on a light load on an easy plan, but these will be handling millions if not billions of queries per day. Keeping in mind that a single user query can also be dozens, hundreds, or thousands of separate queries… Generating a single image is dramatically more than you are stating.

            Edit: I don’t think your statement addresses the amount of water it requires as well. There are serious concerns that our massive water reservoir and lake near where I live will not even be close to enough.

            Edit 2: Also, we were told to spec for at least 10x growth within the next 5 years which, unless there are massive gains in efficiency, I don’t think there are any places on the planet capable of meeting the needs of, even if the models become substantially more efficient.

        • Randomgal@lemmy.ca
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          20 hours ago

          Do you really think those data centers wouldn’t have been built if AI didn’t exist? Do you really think those municipalities would have turned down the same amount of money if it was for something else but equally destructive?

          What I’m hearing is you’re sick of municipal governance being in bed with big business. That you’re sick of big business being allowed to skirt environmental regulations.

          But sure. Keep screaming at AI. I’m sure the inanimate machine will feel really bad about it.

    • SugarCatDestroyer@lemmy.world
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      22 hours ago

      Hypocrisy can be called the primitive nature of man who chooses what is easier because he is designed that way. Human is like a cancerous tumor for the planet.