DawnPaladin's recent activity

  1. Comment on How Bluesky, the rival of Elon Musk’s X, is seizing the moment in ~tech

  2. Comment on New York Times Tech Guild ends strike in ~tech

  4. Comment on Russian court fines Google $20,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 in ~society

    DawnPaladin
    Link
    "Compound interest" is multiplying your money by 1.08 every year. Doubling every week is the magic of exponential growth, which is compound interest's bigger badder brother.

    The court imposed a fine of 100 thousand rubles ($1,025) per day, with the total fine doubling every week. Owing to compound interest (Einstein's eighth wonder of the world), Google is now on the hook for an insane amount of money, or what the judge on Monday called “a case in which there are many, many zeros.”

    "Compound interest" is multiplying your money by 1.08 every year. Doubling every week is the magic of exponential growth, which is compound interest's bigger badder brother.

    4 votes

  5. Comment on I bought a bike. What next? in ~hobbies

    DawnPaladin
    Link
    Nice! Which model did you get? I'm suspicious of quality based on how cheap they are, but if they're actually good, that would be great news.

    Nice! Which model did you get? I'm suspicious of quality based on how cheap they are, but if they're actually good, that would be great news.

    3 votes

  6. Comment on What the hell is a Typescript or: Creation ideas above my skill level in ~tech

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    To make LLM-enabled programming easier, I highly recommend Cursor. Makes it much faster and easier to send the code you're working on to the LLM. Instead of Cursor's Pro plan, sign up for an API...

    To make LLM-enabled programming easier, I highly recommend Cursor. Makes it much faster and easier to send the code you're working on to the LLM.

    Instead of Cursor's Pro plan, sign up for an API key from OpenAI and/or Anthropic (depending on which you prefer; I go back and forth between them, with a slight preference for Anthropic) and put the keys into the Cursor Settings -> Models panel. If your usage level is similar to mine, you can get great performance and flexibility at ~$5/mo instead of $20/mo for ChatGPT Plus.

  7. Comment on What the hell is a Typescript or: Creation ideas above my skill level in ~tech

    DawnPaladin
    Link
    I know exactly what you mean. I have lots of project ideas I haven't executed because they're bigger than I can handle alone. I haven't found a solution. For ArtFight, can you post on their forums...

    I know exactly what you mean. I have lots of project ideas I haven't executed because they're bigger than I can handle alone. I haven't found a solution.

    For ArtFight, can you post on their forums looking for a backend developer? Post some UI design mockups to show you've put some work in. Frontend & UI design are valuable skills that not everyone has.

    3 votes

  8. Comment on Hiring in tech is harder than ever. AI isn’t helping. in ~tech

  9. Comment on AI will use a lot of energy. That's good for the climate. in ~enviro

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    100% agree.

    Honestly, the world would be a better place if Meta were just disappeared. Their minuscule investment in green power for everybody-but-them does not absolve them of all the other evil they do.

    100% agree.

    4 votes

  10. Comment on AI will use a lot of energy. That's good for the climate. in ~enviro

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    If tech companies are solely driven by price, then why is Meta buying up so much solar energy? Why is Microsoft paying for the reopening of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant? I'm not saying...

    If tech companies are solely driven by price, then why is Meta buying up so much solar energy? Why is Microsoft paying for the reopening of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant?

    I'm not saying these companies are virtuous—they're not. But they are motivated by image. They want to be thought of as leaders. They want people to think they're part of the future instead of the past, because that makes their stock price go up. If their selfish ambitions lead them to sometimes spend money in a way that's good for society, that's good news!

    A lot of people believe you can't do good deeds unless your motives are pure. I think that attitude is unhelpful. I think you have to praise good deeds where you find them, even when the doer is otherwise a bad person. (Maybe especially then.) It would be great if we had powerful, virtuous allies to fight climate change, but in this reality I'll take all the help I can get.

    1 vote

  11. Comment on AI will use a lot of energy. That's good for the climate. in ~enviro

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    Tech giants will (probably) not be selling electricity to the public. Sending electricity through the grid is expensive, and getting grid connections takes a long time. We're mainly talking about...

    Tech giants will (probably) not be selling electricity to the public. Sending electricity through the grid is expensive, and getting grid connections takes a long time. We're mainly talking about off-grid plants for the companies' own use. I am 100% in favor of taxing the big companies to fund public infrastructure, though.

    1 vote

  12. Comment on AI will use a lot of energy. That's good for the climate. in ~enviro

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    That is a possibility. But from an energy perspective, money spent to scale up green power cannot be unspent. Maybe in a few years, Microsoft resells all the green power plants they're buying at a...

    That is a possibility. But from an energy perspective, money spent to scale up green power cannot be unspent.

    Maybe in a few years, Microsoft resells all the green power plants they're buying at a big discount. That's still a good outcome for the climate.

  13. Comment on AI will use a lot of energy. That's good for the climate. in ~enviro

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    According to their spec sheet, an NVIDIA DGX A100 server produces 22,179 BTU/hr. We don't know how many of these servers tech companies have bought, so we can't get their heat output. But we can...

    According to their spec sheet, an NVIDIA DGX A100 server produces 22,179 BTU/hr.

    We don't know how many of these servers tech companies have bought, so we can't get their heat output. But we can estimate how many we would need for their output to significantly affect the temperature of the globe.

    I asked Claude and ChatGPT how many servers would be needed to increase global warming by .01 degrees Celsius. ChatGPT says you would need 249 billion servers running continuously for one year; Claude estimates 537 billion.

    Claude's math Let me approach this calculation step by step:
    1. First, let's consider Earth's thermal mass:
    • Atmosphere: ~5.1 × 10^21 kg
    • Oceans: ~1.4 × 10^21 kg
    • Land (surface layer): ~3 × 10^19 kg
    1. To raise temperature by 0.01°C we need:
    • Energy = mass × specific heat × temperature change
    • Different specific heats:
      • Air: ~1 kJ/kg·K
      • Water: 4.18 kJ/kg·K
      • Land average: ~0.8 kJ/kg·K
    1. Required energy:
    • Atmosphere: 5.1 × 10^21 × 1 × 0.01 = 5.1 × 10^19 kJ
    • Oceans: 1.4 × 10^21 × 4.18 × 0.01 = 5.85 × 10^19 kJ
    • Land: 3 × 10^19 × 0.8 × 0.01 = 2.4 × 10^17 kJ
      Total ≈ 1.1 × 10^20 kJ
    1. Converting NVIDIA output:
    • 22,179 BTU/hr = 6.5 kWh = 23,400 kJ/hr
    1. Number of servers needed:
      (1.1 × 10^20 kJ) ÷ (23,400 kJ/hr) = 4.7 × 10^15 server-hours

    This would need to offset Earth's cooling mechanisms which radiate heat into space. The actual number would need to be significantly higher to maintain a 0.01°C increase against natural cooling.

    Given the absurdly large number (in the quadrillions), this highlights why global temperature changes are typically driven by much more powerful forces like greenhouse gas effects rather than direct heat output.

    This is also a simplified calculation that doesn't account for many complex factors in Earth's climate system.

    Convert your server-hours calculation to the number of servers that would be required to accomplish the warming in one year, assuming the servers are running every hour of the year.

    Let me solve this step by step:

    1. We need 4.7 × 10^15 server-hours total

    2. Hours in a year:

    • 24 hours × 365 days = 8,760 hours per year
    1. Number of servers needed running continuously:
    • 4.7 × 10^15 ÷ 8,760 = 5.37 × 10^11 servers

    So about 537 billion NVIDIA DGX servers running continuously for a year would be needed.

    To put this in perspective:

    • Each DGX server is quite large (approximately rack-sized)
    • The total would be many times more servers than exist in the world
    • The power requirements would be astronomical - each DGX server uses around 6.5kW
    • Total power needed would be around 3.5 × 10^12 kW or 3,500 terawatts
    • For comparison, total world electricity production capacity is only about 27 terawatts

    This further illustrates why direct heating effects from computing, while noteworthy locally, are tiny compared to greenhouse gas effects on global temperature.

    Claude also points out that these servers would use 500x more power than the entire world uses today. AI datacenters are many orders of magnitude below making significant contributions to global warming through their heat output.

    I don't think this line of reasoning affects the article's central premise, which is that tech companies are investing heavily in green energy production, which helps green energy scale up and become more affordable for everyone.

    2 votes

  14. Comment on AI will use a lot of energy. That's good for the climate. in ~enviro

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    Did you read the part where Microsoft is spending $16 billion dollars to extend the life of a nuclear plant?

    Did you read the part where Microsoft is spending $16 billion dollars to extend the life of a nuclear plant?

    9 votes

  16. Comment on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds | Season 3 NYCC exclusive clip in ~tv

    DawnPaladin
    Link
    Pike is such a good captain. Kirk would have tried to come up with the whole solution himself.

    Pike is such a good captain. Kirk would have tried to come up with the whole solution himself.

    4 votes

  17. Comment on Using AI generated code will make you a bad programmer in ~tech

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    Agreed. When I was learning to code, the most frustrating part was hitting an unhelpful error message, not understanding why, and not being able to find an answer on Google or StackOverflow. In...

    Agreed. When I was learning to code, the most frustrating part was hitting an unhelpful error message, not understanding why, and not being able to find an answer on Google or StackOverflow. In situations like that, the best fix is an experienced tutor who can recognize the real problem and get you unstuck.

    But good tutors are hard to find. Theoretically StackOverflow could help, but they usually won't. Coding bootcamps have paid tutors, but bootcamps have their own problems. LLMs are maybe 80% as good as an experienced tutor, always on call, and much more affordable.

    1 vote

  18. Comment on Using AI generated code will make you a bad programmer in ~tech

    DawnPaladin
    Link
    I agree with some of this. I am picky about code formatting, readability, and variable names, which is why on the rare occasion I do generate code, I'll typically rewrite it before committing...

    I agree with some of this. I am picky about code formatting, readability, and variable names, which is why on the rare occasion I do generate code, I'll typically rewrite it before committing (same as I do with StackOverflow). Here it's primarily used for helping me get the syntax right, as a replacement for usually-inadequate documentation.

    My primary use for AI is troubleshooting. Being able to hand it an error message and often figure out what's wrong puts it leagues ahead of Google or StackOverflow.

    7 votes

  20. Comment on Bike manufacturers are making bikes less repairable in ~transport

    DawnPaladin
    Link Parent
    I've been interested in getting an ebike, but I don't know where to start. If you have any suggestions/resources, I'd love to hear them.

    I've been interested in getting an ebike, but I don't know where to start. If you have any suggestions/resources, I'd love to hear them.

    1 vote