this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2025
169 points (100.0% liked)

technology

23858 readers
68 users here now

On the road to fully automated luxury gay space communism.

Spreading Linux propaganda since 2020

Rules:

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 1 points 12 hours ago
[–] [email protected] 55 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Okay not just AI but in general most business uses should be lowest on the electricity priority list

Before telling people to raise their AC to relieve pressure on the power grid, AI data centers should be shut down, most offices should be closed and powered down, etc.

The very last electric appliances to be turned off should be residential AC units. Basically everything else should go before those.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (5 children)

The very last electric appliances to be turned off should be residential AC units

I don't think a mostly for-comfort utility should be the last to shut down. There is a lot of significantly more important shit, like hospitals, water treatment plants and pumping stations, coolers and freezers which are storing food, public transit, etc.

After all, our species has survived without AC for hundreds of thousands of years, but surviving without running water or safe food is much more difficult.

Even some datacenters can be more important, e.g. those predicting the weather or handling communications.

And if AC is necessary for survival in a place, then maybe we shouldn't fuckin' settle there (or at least shouldn't cover the entire place with asphalt and concrete). What happens during a real blackout? Does everyone just die?

[–] [email protected] 47 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (4 children)

After all, our species has survived without AC for hundreds of thousands of years

survivorship

Other things our species survived without for hundreds of thousands of years include water purification, cancer treatment, obstetrics, antibiotics, sterile medical instruments, and agriculture.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

No, actually this one is okay. The main reason we need so much AC is our buildings are poorly insulated and not designed for heat management. They have old Arabic buildings from before writing that have complicated design features for heat abatement and people didn't even stay in side as much as we do now.

Capitlaism won't let us have nice insulation. Like, good insulation is my number one pet peeve in home design. Everything else you can work around but there really is no replacing quality insulation.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Sorry if it's unrelated, I understand the meme but what's the background of it?

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It's an image from a study of Allied bombers during World War 2. The red dots are places where the plane was shot, yet still managed to return home. A knee-jerk reaction would be to add armor to these places, but the real solution was to add armor to the places where the suvivors hadn't been shot (cockpit, engines, tail), resulting in more planes surviving their bombing runs.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 day ago

Oooh thank you. I thought the background was about a plane crash and where survivors would need to be to survive

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 day ago

Survivorship bias

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

My point is that way more humans can survive a couple weeks without AC than a couple weeks without water or food.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

I can survive years without AI though

[–] [email protected] 1 points 18 hours ago

Oh yeah, AI in its current form can fuck right off.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah ok but most households probably don't absolutely need an AC, there's definitely people that would be put at risk if they didn't have one but on average in the west I don't think it's the case.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 day ago

In large parts of the US it’s absolutely the case, and even in Europe every time they have a heatwave (which is every summer now) a ton of old people die

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (14 children)

I don't think a mostly for-comfort utility should be the last to shut down.

at-risk people die without A/C when it's 100F and 95% humidity.

And if AC is necessary for survival in a place, then maybe we shouldn't fuckin' settle there (or at least shouldn't cover the entire place with asphalt and concrete).

People settled there because A/C became available. You can't just shut off the A/C and cackle while the elderly and infirm die of heat stroke.

What happens during a real blackout? Does everyone just die?

people do pretty much every time it happens due to hurricanes in Texas, yes.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 day ago (6 children)

People settled there because A/C became available.

I don't disagree with your broader point, but even hellish places like Phoenix predate A/C.

load more comments (6 replies)
load more comments (13 replies)
[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 day ago (1 children)

After all, our species has survived without AC for hundreds of thousands of years,

What's climate change

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

The human species has lived through an era when the average temperature on Earth was about the same as it is now. It's true that (very) soon it won't be the case (it looks like the climate is truly fucked and we'll get the hottest year since humans evolved in a decade or so, and then shoot right past that and into real hell on earth territory).

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Yeah, I also wanted to mention that AC in critical workplaces, schools and kindergartens should also be given priority over residential AC, but the comment was already too long.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

Obviously I’m oversimplifying to an extent. There are obviously essential services that should be prioritized over residential areas, but my point is that most business uses should be lower priority than residential.

Also AC saves lives. Every time there’s a big blackout during a heatwave people die. Especially the elderly.

I agree that we shouldn’t have people living in those places, Texas and Florida should be permanently evacuated. But currently people do live there and I’d rather they not die.

[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

One of the more underreported topics regarding 'AI' is the massive amount of power they consume.

I work for an electric utility that a few years ago was in talks of having another merger, just a couple years after the last, to give an idea of how thin things were.

Now? Said company will be adding gigawatts of additional generation over the next 5-10 years, multiple new large plants, almost solely because of this phenomena. Population growth has been static in this region, and no major plants have been shuttered, the growth is almost solely due to this crap.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 day ago

But see, that's just the market forces building the infrastructure like they're supposed to. anakin-padme-1

And in a couple years when someone drives a truck full of ANFO into the datacenter and turns it into a crater the size of Rhode Island, that'll just be the market forces correcting themselves and then we just won't need to have rolling brownouts, right? anakin-padme-2

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 day ago

Nobody wants 5 tits

I-was-saying

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 day ago (1 children)

why can't I have no tits and 5 environment?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 day ago

I'll settle for 2 (two) small tits and many environment. Actually, I already have the tits so I really just need the environment.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 day ago

uh actually i do want quintuple-breasted uncanny valley waifus and ecological devastation tyvm

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 day ago

frothingfash "I assumed this meant more racist deportations! Now I can't power my gooncave with 18 monitors showing an endless stream of AI hallucinations of five-breasted women!"

[–] [email protected] 1 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago)

before Total Recall there was Eccentrica Gallumbits! The far famed triple breasted whore of Eroticon 6! had to draw the pics myself though

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago

So is this still going off the vague estimate given my a google exec regarding AI power usage compared to a search engine that was reported on and then cited over and over again? I’m no fan of AI slop but the power usage of industrial shit is massive compared to a bank of GPUs roleplaying as waifus.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago
load more comments
view more: next β€Ί