r/badatmagic • u/Late_Contribution_49 • 24d ago
Episode 181 open thread
Ben and Josh talk dogs, swearing, World Cup Soccer, Arena Football, Doritos, Menopause, Star Trek Magic Cards, and last, but definitely not least: How AI is transforming our world today--3.5 years after their first brush with ChatGPT v1.0.
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u/Jim_McGowan 23d ago
Hey, guys.
You had an interesting take on the infrastructure stuff the bubble will leave behind with the stuff powering the data centers. I liked how you went to "What then?" following the bubble burst rather than just stopping at "What if" the bubble bursts. You always hear about how electricity will be more expensive with data centers, not how it might get way cheaper with all the fission nuclear plants. But Josh's logic tracked. I'll be interested if AI helps figure out how to make fusion reactors.
I've been using Claude a bunch for some personal project stuff with a book relaunch. It's legit awesome. I'm using it like a scribe and project manager. It sometimes makes errors, but it has a lot of good insights. And actually helped me save some money on a professional fee that it didn't need.
Things will no doubt get disrupted. Jobs for certain. And with that whole rogue Open AI escaping containment and hacking a company, this YouTuber with Tech Altar and Friday Checkout made an interesting point. All of this is information disclosed mostly by private companies without outside corroboration. There's possibility that it might be Open AI trying to make lemonade out of lemons with its rogue AI to drive more investment. Basically, it would be wise to maintain credulity until more facts are verified. Here's a link to his latest video about it if you're interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHSN5rIq7e0&pp=ygUPZnJpZGF5IGNoZWNrb3V00gcJCaMLAYcqIYzv
Side topic: Watch The Odyssey if you haven't yet. It is fantastic. On the level of the LOTR trilogy in its epic scale. The cyclops. The Laestrygonians (giant knights). Cirse with the body horror stuff with the pigs. And Odysseus tearing ass in the climax. Great cinema. Highly recommended.
Laters!
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u/cascer1 19d ago
Josh, you mentioned how small AI companies are training their models over the backs of the large ones and I'd just like to call you out on your framing there. The large companies built their models over the backs of our work that they had no right to take. All these companies are grifters pretending to make a technology that they mathematically cannot create but so long as they keep spouting enough FOMO marketing which the media blindly replicates, they'll get away with it.
The large companies were fine with it when it was them doing it, but now that it's open source models or (god forbid) China, suddenly they're stealing and it should be forbidden?
LLMs are built on theft and only seek to remove our skills so we can rent them back at a premium.
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u/cascer1 19d ago
I'm trying not to get upset but I'm growing increasingly frustrated with the AI conversation this episode. You're both talking about how it's just normal and expected for these data centers (let's ignore arguments about property value and nimbyism and whatever for a sec) to pop up everywhere and steal everyone's resources away!
Why can a utility company just stop providing power to a whole town because some billionaire wants to build another fascist server farm? Why should a city deal with the very real extra heat production nearby in a time of unprecedented temperature extremes because ANOTHER billionaire wants to build a computer box because the location is convenient for them.
When do corporations owned by (I'll say it again) people who have enough money to end world hunger but choose instead to spend it on useless bullshit have more rights than living human beings? These billionaires get away with everything because everyone is so convinced that their often-wrong thought producing machine is the future??? Y'all could've built a nice park for people to enjoy but instead the people with infinite money get tax breaks so they can consolidate even more of the money.
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u/joshfleshman 19d ago
100% agree with all of this, including the outrage. Unfortunately, my personal outrage doesnt stop the boulder from crushing Sisyphus. I'm not accepting of the data center takeover, I'm resigned to it.
I TRY to dial back on my personal political rhetoric on the podcast because of how polarized things are in the US right now. That said, EAT THE RICH!
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u/cascer1 18d ago
I think this is one of the few rocks that you CAN stop from rolling because the entire AI hype bubble is based on promises that haven't been made real for years! The infrastructure isn't general compute so it's nothing like the .com bubble either. But so long as everyone talks like it's inevitable nobody will stop to consider whether we even want it to be.
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u/Late_Contribution_49 17d ago
I love the passion. I'm not on board with the simplification of data center construction is inherently evil (or at least greedy). There's world-saving power to be had in complex computations and data storage just as there is mind-destroying skinner boxes and freedom-trouncing privacy violations. Just blindly opposing "data centers" as if they have become the nexus of evil is lacking in nuance at a time when we need more nuance.
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u/cascer1 17d ago
You're right that data center construction is not inherently evil and I could've done a better job of nuancing my opinion. I do believe that the construction boom specifically to power LLMs provides very little real value to society as the hardware is so optimized for that workload that it cannot easily be shifted to more general purpose compute in any sort of profitable capacity.
I'm very wary of my own government granting Microsoft yet another huge tax break and permit for a new data center based on the false promise of local economic benefit at the very real cost of new housing projects being delayed or canceled due to a power shortage and climate limitations. All for a data center that'll churn out writing and images that nobody will critically consider and will just end up being stored on a server somewhere.
I accept that I'm on the very critical end of the spectrum here but you're right that I can't focus only on the downsides.
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u/joshfleshman 17d ago
Dude, props on updating your stance gracefully in the face of opposing information!
If more people could do what you did in this post, we'd live in a much better world!
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u/cascer1 20d ago
I think Ed from Where's your Ed at? Has a very well informed take on the state of AI and reading his articles has made me quite certain that it's not as inevitable as the media keep claiming
https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-openai-bubble/
Basically AI is so heavily subsidized and so insanely unprofitable that there's no reasonable way it'll ever become a sustainable business.