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Can you explain what is happening in this thread?

OP:
“Most People are Energy Blind When it Comes to Singularity Predictions

Speculations on AI continuing to develop infinitely are interesting, but they are energy blind. There is a 0.99 R squared correlation between GDP and energy consumption. As energy consumption increases, the economy grows, and even with the advent of renewables, total energy consumption has increased every year (with the exception of global economic recessions in 2008 and 2020). Energy is the economy.

AI requires massive amounts of energy (mostly generated through finite fuels like natural gas and uranium) to work. It also requires massive amounts of mostly finite materials, like copper, lithium, oil-derived plastics, and other rare earth metals for the datacenters. Technology without energy is just a sculpture.

Once we reach the peak production of these finite energy/material supplies, the economy (as measured by GDP) will start to degrow, and AI will become less viable.

Remember, the only reason that 90% of the population no longer works in farming is because of heavy diesel-powered farming equipment. Global oil production likely peaked in Q4 of 2018 (see here: https://www.resilience.org/stories/2023-01-18/arthur-berman-peak-oil-the-hedonic-adjustment/). As less and less oil is available each year, more people will slowly have to return to farming. As less and less natural gas is available each year, a smaller amount will be left over for electrical generation (AI) because a fixed amount of natural gas must be set aside for fertilizer production (Haber-Bosch process).

Also, further complicating this is the fact that the bulk of AI is developed in the USA right now, but a huge portion of remaining fossil fuels/rare earth metals are in countries that are antagonistic to the USA (like Russia and Iran).

You could say that renewables would solve this, but wind and solar rely heavily on fossil fuels for their creation. Wind turbines require 80 gallons of oil a year for lubrication, and the wind blades themselves are made from oil derivatives. Solar panels require coal to smelt quartz for their production. They also rely on concrete which is derived from fossil fuels. Furthermore, they are intermittent, or they can only produce energy when the sun is shining/wind is strong.

Even if batteries become more efficient, our energy consumption will only increase due to Jevons Paradox (see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox), hastening the depletion of finite energy stores.

No one is thinking about the physical side of the AI story because they’ve grown accustomed to thinking about software as a non-physical entity. I think many people are in for a rude awakening when the realities of biophysical limits clash with the myth of infinite economic growth.”

ArcticWinterZzZ:
“1. AGI can tap into significantly more advanced energy production sources via novel physics and increased industrial capacity. It could perfect fusion energy or launch solar power satellites to beam energy to Earth.

2. Microsoft is currently exploring the possibility of using SMR nuclear reactors to power its datacenters.

3. As AI develops we will find ways to make it more efficient and faster.

I don’t think this is going to be a problem in the long run.”

MassiveWasabi:
“I’m pretty sure AGI/ASI will be able to solve all the challenges you listed, before energy would’ve become a constraint. Once these issues are solved, there’s no longer this energy constraint you speak of.

I know people get upset when the answer is “The AGI will figure it out” but it will be so much smarter than us so it’s a pretty good answer. And I can’t really explain what an AGI would do because I’m not an AGI”

aalluubbaa:
“Energy. Really? Are you on the wrong sub? Are we talking about reaching this limitation BEFORE we have AGIs? Or you think that AGI is not possible before we hit the limit.

I can respect you if you think that we would hit that limit soon while our current progress stalls. It’s unlikely but I mean things could go wrong.

However, if I understand this correctly, you are talking about when we have AGIs but this energy constraint is still a bottleneck.

There is something called Sun out there which we utilize maybe 0.001% of the total energy output.

There is also some tech called fusion.

I would say that if we have AGI and cannot use it to make advancements in energy production, I’m not sure if we can call it an AGI.”

mrb1585357890:
“This misses quite a few other factors that are in play. I remember watching a lecture about the singularity which was very technical but very interesting.

Hardware improvements mean more can be done.

AI research means algorithms are more efficient.

And as AI improves we will become more efficient at researching new technologies, including things like Nuclear Fusion and beyond.

Imagine discovering a new energy source combined with a breakthrough in Quantum Computing. That’s what the singularity is all about.”

GlobalRevolution:
“OP, unfortunately a lot of the comments here are quite uneducated and view AI like a religion that has all the answers they don’t. You gave a well reasoned argument based in physics and I respect that but I do believe you’re making an error by being too constrained in your assumptions. I do think you’re right to talk about energy in the future because there’s a lot to say with or without AGI. A couple counter points though:

The idea that coal is a requirement for smelting is simply not true. Electric furnaces powered by solar/nuclear are possible. We don’t do this today because of how much electrical energy is required. The assumption is we can increase our output such that we can afford to use electricity for smelting.

Synthetic oils for lubrication are already a thing but require more energy to make. With abundant renewables we can overcome this too.

While I agree with you that growth is the assumption I’m confused why you didn’t even assume a bit of modest productivity improvement. AI will require more power but it will also become more energy efficient over time. We can not simply extrapolate todays AI energy consumption and it’s not clear how these two forces will counter balance. The human brain is very power efficient so with the help of an ASI we probably can improve efficiency a lot.

I agree with you that our energy consumption is our biggest problem with/without AGI. If you haven’t seen this article it’s along similar lines of reasoning by a physicist that you might like. Assuming the typical 3% growth in energy consumption per year we can extrapolate that the Earth will reach boiling temperatures in 400 years just based on the laws of thermodynamics. That means it doesn’t matter if we discover fusion or AI finds a new method of generating energy - our waste heat will boil the oceans. This throws a wrench in the assumption of infinite growth in our economy unless we leave Earth and cap energy usage on our planet.

https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/04/economist-meets-physicist/”

r2k-in-the-vortex:
“Ugh… there is so much wrong with this argument.

First of all, Moores law and algorithmic optimization are both things. AI today has reached the point it has because we can finally compute efficiently enough. Improvements in energy efficiency of computation will not stop here.

Secondly, renewables have no reasonable upper bound to what they can generate, we are not about to exhausts room for more panels and more windmills any time soon if ever. Nor are we going to seriously slow down in solar or wind deployments any time soon, we are only going to get more of those. The limit if any is the grid, our ability to get the energy from where it’s produced to where it will be used. That is of course a solvable limit.

Thirdly, with enough renewable energy available, there is no need to rely on fossil fuels. Haber-bosch process only needs hydrogen from natural gas, of course that hydrogen can be supplied from renewable sources just the same. All other needs for hydrocarbons can also be replaced with synthetic sources, it’s just a question of having cheap energy which renewables can provide.

Fourthly, yes rapidly falling battery prices and improvements in performance will greatly increase their utilization all over the economy and enable us to use more of that energy that renewable sources generate, what of it?”

chlebseby:
“Resources and energy use will go down significally while keeping life quality, if late stage capitalism become abolished. So far trend is to produce more and more short living stuff. If humans designed fridges working 50 years, imagine what AI will do.

Also oil use will also go down if people won’t need to drive to job everyday, extending time for finding solution.”

StarOfDavidEnjoyer69:
“this post is braindead”

lovelasy:
“This post is fire, what’s braindead is you my friend. No enough neurons firing to even make an argument.”

aendaris1975:
“People have countered every single claim the OP made with information to back it up and the only response from OP has been “nuh uh”.”

low_orbit_sheep:
“And a good half of the counters have been “ASI will figure it out shut up””