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OpenAI researchers warned of AI breakthrough before CEO ouster according to Reuters. It seems that, disappointingly, there's more to the Sama exit than just petty politics.
I had found myself greatly reassured by the thought that, actually, this whole debacle was just (human) politics as usual - and not the eerie dawn of some new era.
Have other motizens noticed a substantial disconnect between their foremost worry the past while, and that of the normies in their life? Everyone else is chanting for Palestine, and I'm chanting sotto voce for a decade or two more of human supremacy before the singularity. And anytime I could comfort myself by the thought that, well, Serious People are not yet concerned, I see some preposterous headline from selfsame Serious People about how hillwalking is white supremacy, or equivalent bullshit. The illusion is bollocked.
Yes. But I word it differently. Russia acts like 17th century imperialist (or a whole timeline when people were afraid of Mongols and needed broad borders); Hamas acts like Bronze Age raiders; then you have the semi-normie rich neolib crowd that’s atleast modern; then there is this wtf is going on in the AI labs. I feel like on one timeline I’m seeing every civilization scale at the same time. Probably throw in some trads too. It’s like playing Civilization in the Bronze Age, the age of conquest, probably some renaissance, some modern, a little Cold War Taiwan shit and whatever comes after happening all at once. Does any of the rest of it even matter besides what happens at some 1000 person lab in Silicon Valley.
Well Putin can put an end to Silicon Valley in half an hour, he has that power. Taiwan is critical to the H100 production line. Neolib normies buying the latest Iphones are soaking up a great deal of top-tier silicon.
Many of the storylines are connected!
Though we've also got climate change as a red herring, a lot of strangeness is circulating on that front:
Lethal humidity? Really?
It's a real thing. When temperature and relative humidity get high enough at the same time, homeostasis breaks down. Sweating can no longer bring your body temperature low enough to prevent heat stroke, you brain starts to cook, your kidneys stop working, etc.
Eg, when the wet bulb temp. is above homeostasis and you have 100% relative humidity, you physically can't cool down even in the shade and you are guaranteed to die pretty quickly if you can't get inside or in a cave or something.
This is an unusual condition in the modern history of the planet and even in the BAD climate change timeline will be seasonal and local, but it has already started to happened in short bursts in eg. pakistan and the punjab region of india; where you get just extraordinarily shitty weather even in good times.
Wet bulb only guarantees mass casualties if all power fails because there’s no electricity. Energy is becoming more plentiful and may well become significantly cheaper in the coming years and decades.
True, but ehhhhhhh.
This assumes a level of robustness to the power grid that is not present, and will never be present under market conditions.
I mean, one kinda bad but not unknown or unknowable snow storm knocked out the grid for one of the richest areas in the richest country in the world.
Re. cheap energy: again, yes but. The only source of energy I know of that is dropping price is renewables, which I would not stake my life or even my extreme discomfort on.
Again, this could be solved easily with sufficient investment. I just don't believe that investment will ever come from any market driven source.
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Do you believe renewables will be improved sufficiently and in time to offset the declining EROEI of oil and gas?
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