It’s a race to create an AI good enough to solve the e-waste problem before the e-waste problem becomes such a large problem that it prevents AI advancement.
These “generates e-waste” articles are <i>political hit pieces</i>. I hope we’re all intelligent enough to recognise the absurdity of the statement.<p>In case it is unclear, a similar article was going around the Internet a few years ago complaining about the “tons of e-waste created by Apple Airpods”.<p>Yes, that’s true in the sense that Apple was producing “tons” of e-waste annually… two of them. One ton wouldn’t be “tons”, you see, so the article was technically correct in the dumbest and most nakedly deceptive way possible.<p>Waste is about inefficiency. It implies no or negative utility. There’s a hint of huge landfills and truck after truck of bulky stuff filling that up.<p>AirPods and AI chips are the <i>opposite</i> of inefficient! They’re some of the smallest, densest, <i>most concentrated</i> and space-efficient products ever made by man.<p>To invoke the word “waste” in juxtaposition to these things is so absurd, so contrary to their essential nature that it’s clearly a deliberate falsehood, signalling membership in a group by its absurdity. It’s like the official statements on RT that yet another oligarch “fell out” of a window. Everyone <i>knows</i> what really happened there. The claim of defenestration is a coded signal telling the listeners a very different message to the verbatim text.<p>Someone who is scared of AI wrote this article or had it written on their behalf. It’s the product of a Luddite, or someone whose job is about to be replaced.<p>“Stop the efficiencies! My career as a copy editor is at risk! I mean… it’s surely <i>wasteful</i> to optimise my job away with a chip that’s a mere square inch in size and weighs a gram!”
The current AI craze doesn’t feel like it’s really about AI. It’s Silicon Valley being desperate for (growing) growth and shareholder value.<p>Another obvious aspect it that it may help do work that could be done by people, thus helping to keep the worker class - that’s you! - subdued, fighting amongst yourselves.<p>Meanwhile the ‘good stuff’ can only be offered by those large companies, who have the power to make them ‘good enough’ thus making the rest more dependent.<p>It’s been a while since 2007, all the incentives are there to keep the ball rolling, but it will stop at some point.<p>Then we IT people with six figure salaries will learn that we should have listened more to David Graeber.