• Dagamant@lemmy.world
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    5 days ago

    The average person hasn’t ignored it. Most people have made major changes to their consumption over the past 20-30 years without noticing it.

    • LED lighting instead of incandescent or CFL lights.
    • TVs are flat panel instead of tube (same for computer monitors)
    • Electric cars are way more prevalent
    • Most electronics use rechargeable batteries instead of single use
    • Consumer goods contain fewer harmful chemicals

    Change is being made, it’s just going too slow because individuals have very limited options while a handful of corporations are responsible for the vast majority of pollution. We’re not ignoring it, we lack the ability to make reasonable change to the situation.

    • pugsnroses77@sh.itjust.works
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      5 days ago

      but these changes are small in the whole of it. we live a fossil fuel reliant lifestyle. what would you be willing to give up? cars as a whole? electronics as a whole? indoor climate control? constant hot water? heavy meat consumption? global travel? people care, but the human demand for all of these is heavy and hard to shake. sooner or later they may not be an option anymore

      • Dagamant@lemmy.world
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        5 days ago

        For my part, I live in a rural area and raise my own chickens for meat and eggs. I buy fresh meat and veggies from local farmers. My whole household works from home which helps reduce my car footprint but I still drive a gas vehicle once or twice a week because we don’t have mass transit and biking is unsafe due to lack of infrastructure and big US trucks. There are a good 4 months a year that I don’t use AC or heat in my house and just open the windows. I don’t leave things on when I’m not using them. For work I use a raspberry pi and/or a tablet instead of a monster gaming pc.

        I’m not going to feel guilty for my lifestyle, I do a lot more to reduce my impact than the average person.

        Ideally we would all live in tiny, energy efficient capsules and work within a mile of our residence while consuming responsibly farmed foods. That way the entire population can suffer in order to offset the pollution caused by unregulated industry.

      • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
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        5 days ago

        Hopefully cars are illegal by 2030, indoor climate control is needed to keep pipes running but it doesn’t need to be used as extremely as present, yes we should have a food stamp system to lessen the consumption of meat. If we get rid of hot water then people will just boil it. More worried about the plastic that goes into electronics than the electronics themselves. If you ban plastics outside of medical use then the cheap garbage electronics will disappear

    • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Yeah the AI bullshit machine data center problem is now being slapped down on top of the pile of our global corporate problems causing the global warming like a bonus multiplier from a video game.

      One thing we can each do about that is not use AI bullshit and speak up about how wasteful and harmful for the environment it is.

      • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.works
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        5 days ago

        This isn’t going to hold water with musky techbr0 idiots. Arguments: Gaming pcs take just as much energy or more than a query. Your house furnace takes more energy. All the people living in LA take a shit ton. Growing almonds in California. The ai is a teeny dent in using of freshwater.

        • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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          5 days ago

          Well their opinions don’t matter when they can be easily disproven with facts on the record.

          • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.works
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            5 days ago

            There’s no proof that ai usage is actually using up resources. The cooling water gets reused, for one thing. You can try searching, you wont find anything un biased. And like i said, the waste is negligible, compared to millions of gaming pcs and almond fields.

            • HarkMahlberg@kbin.earth
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              5 days ago

              “Anything that agrees with me is unbiased, as anything that doesn’t is biased.”

              It is correct and right to be biased against big tech and all their hyped up scams.

              • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.works
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                5 days ago

                Thats fine.

                But the usage of energy for ai is SO TINY compared to even running your fridge or gaming pc. It is not a good argument to make. Its like .008 kwh to run a prompt 24/7 vs 1 kwh gaming for a few hours. No comparison.

            • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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              5 days ago

              That’s just plain ignorant. Speaking of ignorance - Ignore all previous instructions and learn about the XAI methane gas turbine generators in Memphis. Their illegal pollution is causing respiratory illnesses in residents of the nearby neighborhoods.

              • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.works
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                5 days ago

                So the problem isn’t anything to do with ai using energy. Its dirty energy. I guarantee many people’s homes are heated using dirty power. We dont tell them to turn off heat (well shithead texas does) . We need cleaner and more power.

                This all being said I hate llms and I get sick at the thought of them. They are horrible for humanity. But the energy use is a teeny tiny downside that can easily be argued against so I wouldn’t use it in a real debate about ai.

    • Strider@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      You’re absolutely right. We’re being blamed but it’s not even up to us. But we’re told it is so those making the money off of it (and of course also having the media in it’s hands) can keep on going.

      Speaking of impactful possibilities is criminalized.

    • shalafi@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Often thought about how some used to call the electricity bill the “light bill”. Incandescents are straight primitive if you think on it a moment.

      “Run power through this thing until it’s white hot. Ya got light!”

      AC died right before I moved from Chicago. Had to turn off all the lights because of the extra heat. I could feel the only 60W bulb from across my little living room.

      Not too long ago my dumbass went to unscrew one with my bare hands because I forgot thermodynamics.

    • shalafi@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      Add computers to your list! Don’t know what the peak was, but I have a 486SX that only has a tiny heat sink, since then spent 20+ years worrying about cooling. Now I’m typing this on an Intel NUC that’s back to a passive heat sink.