Stolen From The Wundernet
An example of the power of AI
“Truly groundbreaking_ a supercharged AI engine showing what Jack Dawson would look like today if he didn’t die on the Titanic.“
The New American Digest
For Followers of Gerard Van der Leun's Fine Work
amazing idn’t it?
what is truly heartbreaking is these people, who need to build those big plants to handle AI, look at our wide open spaces and plan to put those things there. In front of the mountains and near water. They also want to be close enough to airports or towns. That means these “farms” will be built, keep cool with our mountain water and used to attract small businesses to finish filling up those open spaces. How much open space is enough you ask. What we have left in Montana is a treasure found nowhere else in the lower 48.
I think there is a lot of scare mongering about AI, but I also think there is a lot to be concerned about. Most of what you read is about A.I. itself and its “transformative” potential but, as Anne notes, the collateral effects of the required infrastructure are enormous for all us everywhere.
There was an article yesterday on American Thinker written by James Anthony. I know little about him other than what I have indicated at the end of this post, but here is a quote, about AI, from his article entitled Democide in the Modern West:
“A.I. potential use by government people looms large. One platform, X, now offers freer diffusion of information that runs counter to government-supported narratives. But meanwhile, next-generation initiatives in artificial intelligence, with ambitions of developing artificial general intelligence and artificial superintelligence, are gaining considerable momentum.
The associated capital spending accounts for nearly all GDP growth. The associated equity growth accounts for the majority. Government people are becoming politically dependent on the A.I. companies because this GDP growth and equity growth are rare, supposedly good news.
Power generation sufficient to operate these A.I. facilities is not yet on the drawing board. A.I. hardware is being funded using long-term debt but is becoming obsolete quickly. The value being demonstrated is falling far short of generating sustainable revenues. Failure is likely.
And yet, because of the political ramifications of removing this GDP growth and equity growth, the A.I.-associated companies might nonetheless get treated by government people as too big to fail. On some A.I.-associated investments, governments are already taking minority stakes.
Some developing A.I. capabilities that government people have shown they might in essence monetize for their own purposes are the capabilities to model people’s thinking and actions increasingly well and to use this information to control people. Government people who have controlled people in the past, for instance throughout COVID, have committed massive undue deprivations of people’s life, liberty, and property.”
James Anthony is an experienced chemical engineer who applies process design, dynamics, and control to government processes. He is the author of The Constitution Needs a Good Party and rConstitution Papers, the publisher of rConstitution.us, and an author in Western Journal, Daily Caller, The Federalist, American Thinker, Lew Rockwell, American Greatness, Mises Institute, Foundation for Economic Education, and Free the People.
Over the past year DT has posted numerous examples of instances where entire communities sprung up out of dust in way off places because some found some precious metals, gold, silver, and copper. Almost over night many thousands of people flocked to the area to be part of the next new thing. Everybody partied like it was 1999 and then just like that it was all gone. Nothing left but a few crumbling buildings and some rusted machinery.
Over and over again. How many times?
IS AI the next new thing?
When Humpty AI Dumpty falls down will anyone be able to pick up the pieces or will all of it become abandoned copper mines?
Maybe one of DT’s great, grand children will tell everyone about it in the website http://www.newamericandigest2099.org.
And more abandoned places to come … I enjoy exploring them. Someday, people will track down the barely discernible routes of the Interstate highways …
I never had kids … so my grandchildren will probably not have kids. But that’s another story that may or may not be told.
AI will come – it’s here already. It will infest our lives. And in a very short time – even now perhaps, we won’t even notice it because we’re so dependent on it. Can we really live in today’s world without the internet and smart phones? Yet for many of us, the internet is a “recent” invention (how can 1996 be 30 years ago?). We may try but “life” pretty much requires it without paying great cost to avoid it. If nothing else, medical care? How many places do you go that don’t depend on an internet connection? How many places require the receipt of a text message to validate something or another? I have a “smart” phone because it is required of me to have one. Still can’t figure it out – but that’s because I don’t care enough about it to care to.
For all intents and purposes, the internet didn’t exist before 1993. CompuServe and America OnLine were big deals in the 90s and the dot-com bubble of the mid-late 90s was a result of the growth of the services. Then the infrastructure became functional and all those start-ups that were on the “wrong” path disappeared and the bubble burst. Are CompuServe or AOL around anymore? If so, neither are the powerhouses they once were.
I think we’re near the top of the AI bubble right now and when the shake-down is complete – soon, some form of AI will remain while the rest of us choke on the financial dust of the collapse.
Until the cycle repeats with the next “greatest” thing.
By the way, speaking of financial dust … the dot-com companies had become grossly over-valued in the 90s. The bubble burst in 2000 and by 2002, the NASDAQ had fallen by 77%. How are your retirement accounts doing? Consider the grossly over-valued and over-represented (in investment portfolios) companies such as Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and a few others. Nvidia alone is worth almost 4.5 TRILLION dollars yet they don’t make anything (it’s a design house. Someone else builds their stuff). Only The US, China, and Germany have GDPs greater than Nvidia. NVDA market cap at $4.4T is just a bit greater than Japan’s at $4.3T. Does that sound reasonable? Yet many if not most retirement funds are invested in these companies. Can your “portfolio” handle a 77% loss? Silver that you and I can get our hands on (difficult these days) is at $85/oz; gold at $5200/oz … and it’s likely those prices will go up as the dollar continues to be diluted.
We’re in financial trouble folks and the AI thing is causing much of it.
Looked at my silver supplier last night and yep, $85/oz, so I believe it’s safe to say I’ll not be buying more. When I was buying it was in the $30 area and I got a rule that prevents me from paying more than I should.
I use that rule for a lot of other things too, like at the grocery store for example. I go to Kroger of IGA or Walmart about every 6 weeks and the amount of different things I buy gets less and less each time I go.
I have not bought a solid piece of beef in about 3 years because I just can’t justify the cost. A 4 oz sirloin is about $6 and that’s a waste of time. Last week I saw a beef of some sort, just over a pound, and it cost….are you sitting down?….$38. For a pound!!!! Pleeze. It’s going to the septic tank just like the $7/lb ground beef.
Same with chicken breasts, $15 for about 6, bone in. I’ll not spend that kinda money.
For the past few years about 80% of the meat we consume is the canned variety from Keystone Meats. White meat chicken, white meat turkey, ground beef, beef, pork. All of it is chunky style except for the ground beef and all of it is cooked and can be eaten right out of the can. I make 1 meal a day here on the compound and most of the time the Keystone is on the menu. Precooked meats speeds up the prep time.
The Keystone stuff comes in 14oz and 28oz cans and through experience I have found that the 14oz cans are better for us. We don’t mind eating leftovers but come on, a 28oz can is just way too much for the 2 of us. Yes, the 14oz cans cost more but the trade off of not eating a week of leftovers is worth it. Not a big fan of freezing leftovers but I have done so.
Maxwell House coffee got dropped by the curb as it is no longer affordable and I drink the Great Value brand. Believe it or not store brands won’t kill you and In some cases are better the name brands.
I don’t complain much about prices because I, instead, figure out ways to do without and perhaps even, better.
I’m reminded of the time I sold off a bunch of my gold at $250/oz and didn’t buy silver at $6-7/oz because “it was too expensive”. At $30/oz, I wish I had bought more at $7.
I bought a bunch of paper silver (SLV) at $19/oz and when it went to $26, I held off because I thought it would come back down. I sold off the paper I had at $64/oz because I thought it had peaked. Now I can’t buy physical without paying a high premium (if I can find a dealer having some in stock) and wondering if I should buy paper silver at $75. A year from now, I have this idea I’ll be wishing I had bought it at $75.
Silver’s an industrial metal with heavy use in high-speed electrical connections (silver is about 10% more conductive than copper – and these days, speed and power loss are more important than cost). All these data centers are sucking up silver for industrial use. Add to that the on-going devaluation of the dollar and the metals are looking pretty good.
The dollar is made to look like its value is going up but that’s mostly because it’s compared to other currencies. – “our crap smells better than anybody else’s crap … but it’s still crap”. The stock market is going up because it takes more dollars to buy the same piece of junk than it did yesterday.
In 2018, Netflix had a series called “Flint Town”, which I watched and enjoyed. I just checked and if you have a Netflix subscription, it is still available for you.
Anyway, it’s an 8-part documentary on just how bad things are in Flint, Michigan. The problems were multi-dimensional. A water crisis brought them high lead-levels in their drinking water, which impacted the mental and physical health of their children and elderly. Their tax base had crumbled which meant that the budget wasn’t big enough to hire enough cops to keep the crime down.
At one point in the series, they had a scene which took place at a Bernie Sanders campaign rally (2016). One guy took the mike and made the point that during the 70’s, Flint had the highest per-capita income in the country. Of course, this was right in the middle of the Big Auto years, and they were making money hand-over-fist.
Roll the clock forward to the middle 2010’s and houses were vacant, the water is a literal health hazard and the city doesn’t have enough money to hire cops.
And I wondered then: Is anyone in Silicon Valley watching this series? Today, we’re kinda in-between the Big Tech/Social Media years and the upcoming AI years. But as you say “…just like that, it was all gone.“
I remember reading about that place.
“Their tax base had crumbled…”
The racial makeup of the city in 2020 was 34% White, 56% African American, 10% everything else.
An inversion occurred when certain people decided enough was enough and left. Parasites kill.
Used to go up to Flint in the late 60s/70s to watch the planes in and out of Bishop field. Easier to do then and Flint wasn’t what that place now with the same name is.