Eric Schmidt says we’re not going to meet our climate targets, so we must put all our energy into improving AI and hope it solves the problem for us.
He’s part of a growing chorus of tech billionaires openly admitting they’ll sacrifice the climate on the altar of their AI ambitions.
https://disconnect.blog/silicon-valley-is-sacrificing-the-climate-for-ai/
#tech #ai #genai #generativeai #climate #climatechange #ericschmidt
It makes no sense at all.
We already know the solution to the climate crisis: use less energy and convert current energy sources to renewables. It's not a question of solving it, it's a question of carrying out known solutions.
Whatever AI/LLM he comes up with will say the same thing because that's how they work, they just repeat what the experts have already published. They don't come up with any new solutions.
Of course, using less energy also means avoiding the expansion of AI/LLM as it is so energy-hungry. That is perhaps his real agenda here, he is maybe scared that energy shortages will restrict his profits?
@FediThing @parismarx I agree with you and I'm wondering why using more energy is a problem if they pay fair market prices for it.
Meaning using energy per se is not the problem but using non-renewable energy generated by fossil fuels is.
We need to be reducing energy usage overall. The amount of renewable energy capacity at any one point is limited, it takes time and stability to build up renewable energy capacity and people use fossil fuel energy to fill the gaps.
If Apple, Google etc hog renewables in the short term so they can run AI/LLM stuff now, others will find it more difficult and expensive to switch to renewables and fossil fuel emissions will rise. Apple etc will claim it's nothing to do with them even though it's their fault.
We need to be reducing energy now, not in the future but now. This is incompatible with AI/LLM tech.
@FediThing @djh @parismarx But isn't the amount of delivered renewable energy bound mostly by money? There already were ideas from AI companies to invest in nuclear energy to ensure they have enough energy for AI use. If they poured all that money into building up renewables, we'd see renewables grow even quicker. That would be ideal.
Unfortunately there is the risk of AI bros being discouraged from massive investments into renewables by their fossil fuel friends.
