Computers as tools for humans are so useful exactly *because* they can’t think and do tedious work like calculations or information storage and retrieval for humans in a *deterministic* way.
It took like nearly 90 years of digital computers to make them powerful enough to run a wasteful algorithm that pretends to think (but doesn’t) and to deliver bullshit non-deterministic results while using absurd amounts of computational and environmental resources.
There's something telling about how we've entered this weird phase in which the next Great Leap Forward -- first cryptocurrency, now this -- absolutely requires squandering resources. As if being preposterously computationally intensive was the actual point, and now they're just trying to find ways to sell it to us.
@Urban_Hermit @pieist @thomasfuchs As happens with most industries, decades ago, the computer industry had reached a level of production that exceeded any real utility, and has since been focusing on planned obsolescence and increasingly wasteful and absurd marketing schemes to continue increasing production.
@foolishowl @pieist @thomasfuchs I'm going to keep this in mind and think about how it applies to other industries. The car industry. Oil industry. Diamond industry. Pork industry.
So every industry eventually evolves into its own PR firm to encourage "growth" because supplying the basic demand is not enough for investment capitalism? Hmmm. There have got to be peak industries. Cattle? No new breeds, it is up to fast food to keep introducing new burgers.
@Urban_Hermit @pieist @thomasfuchs My attention was drawn to Ivan Illich's Tools for Conviviality, for addressing this sort of problem in general. Unfortunately, his primary example of overproduction and the manufacturing of problems to solve is medical care, and he essentially puts a leftist gloss on the fascist conspiracy theory of dysgenics. And as a thread pointed out today, there is a history of ableism in the anti-authoritarian left, so this is a significant weakness.
@pieist @thomasfuchs the real money is always in the shovels, not the gold
@pieist @thomasfuchs the stocks of server farms shot up after this. Maybe revitalizing the "all your computing belongs to us" industry was the point? The amount of confidential information typed into these things in order to find a use must be staggering. If China needed to steal any more IP (they don't, they've got their own geeks now) they should secretly own one of these. Maybe a second AI to parse and monetize everything the first AI is told.