How does a data center harm me? I have seen how incredibly stupid the average (dem or republican both)'s reasons are. If not outright lizard brain radiation beams, more than once I have seen claims of it producing "toxic waste" which is absolutely absurd.
I will be honest, at this stage I have zero to negative opinion on what "community" says. The second one appears a research paper which is much better and I will read it.
I don't think incresed incentives to develop lagging energy infrastructure are a bad thing. Especially in times when solar is cheaper than everything else.
I was thinking of the emissions from 'temporary' gas-powered electric generators in the USA.
Improving the electrical production system would be fine, but it needs to be paid for upfront by the datacentre and ideally completed no later than the datacentre. Otherwise citizens end up paying for this on their electricity bills, as is happening in Ireland [1], and other electrical upgrades (factories etc) can't be done as there isn't the capacity. (I think the limit here is trained engineers to design and build the power plants and distribution networks.)
We have at least 4 new-ish hyperscale datacentres in Denmark, one each from Microsoft, Meta, Google and Apple. I think they're here for the renewable power, and at least the Meta and Microsoft ones are putting their waste heat into the local district heating systems. Some of them have indirectly financed construction of renewable power.
But the energy used is enormous! [3] says data centres were 10% of electricity generation in 2020, before the massive increase in GPUs.
They are built on the promise of high-paid jobs, but that turns out to be 20 technicians and a few security guards [2].
I haven't looked into it, but I assume there are no "profits" from big-tech datacentres leading to additional tax payments, unlike e.g. a factory.
I think physically owning compute is a benefit of its own beyond paper employment considerations. And I understand straining existing power infrastructure but I am afraid many of the people opposing data centers also oppose construction of new electrical construction on the same frivolous "noise" and "pollution" reasons which are not their actual reason they oppose it.
Electricity is sold on the market. If you live next to a data center you can choose not to use any services enabled by that center, but you cannot choose to pay non-datacenter prices for the electricity to charge your car or run your household
You will need immense evidence to go against the entire arc of history where all bets about supernatural or aphysical elements have failed. Until you do so, the brain is another not fully solved physical science problem.
And yes, turing equivalence is turing equivalence, I don't see why a system of pipes can't make an AI.
Its unprovable and a meaningless concept. There is no observable evidence that can distinguish so called "p zombies" or so called "real persons". Might as well call it a "unicorn in space" or anything else meaningless.
Notice how you describe a perfectly intelligible concept like 'unicorn in space' as meaningless, even though there's a clear picture you can form in your mind about it and you can imagine the exact evidence that would convince you of their existence.
We can meaningfully talk about 'unicorns in space' since it's analytically intelligible and merely syntetically unverified.
In this example the unicorn in space would be unverifiable, if it was verifiable then its an actual difference and not pertinent to the analogy. The way people define p-zombies, the literal definition states they are observationally equivalent to "normal" people. Then the question arises, what even is the point then? That means its literally equivalent. Its absurd to make up and impute random non-existent crap "inside" it.
I thought it was quite clear. Religious people will whine and revolt and oppose against anything that somehow isn't phrased as consciousness requiring a soul. Humans are physical systems, there is no reason other physical systems can't be consciousness. But we know the obvious reactions of religious people to someone actually showing a "godless" means of creating consciousness.
Suppose there is an autocomplete that consistently produces correct factorizations of 2048 bit primes. Do you still think its "merely" autocomplete or has it found some deep mathematical understanding of number theory internally? Would you maintain the same belief if it begins breaking encryption? This autocomplete argument is so strange, it betrays a complete lack of understanding of information theoretic and probability considerations.
Any argument that doesn't begin with making clear one's position about belief in the supernatural must be dismissed. "AI is just math", so is physics and the human body which is a physical system of molecules and electrical signals. The argument that ai is "merely" math by itself is only a valid way to dismiss it being conscious only if one also clarifies belief in the supernatural. Otherwise so are humans. Humans are physical systems that are conscious.
Another common and ridiculous thing I see are accusations of it being merely autocomplete. I ask, suppose there is an autocomplete that regularly and consistently factors out 2048 bit primes from numbers? Would you still consider it merely autocomplete given the vast search space and how it always finds out the needle in this haystack? This betrays a lack of understanding of information theory and probability.
And again, in what way are humans not themselves autocomplete if you adhere to this definition?
If a religious text is cited in anything non-religious, the religion or religious text should be proven physically true first, otherwise dismissed from use.
That's all very well but prove it first. "Narratives" are perfectly fine stories but not physical truths. It is absurd to cite a "narrative" without proving it's physical truth first.
Electrons are not the question. The question is have we modeled it well enough. As of yet to my understanding there is no physical process that requires more power than a Turing machine.
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