fuck elon musk. he promised to build a water treatment plant in memphis to cool grok and then ‘paused’ the planning. not the construction, the planning.
Yes! My family has one and we have to give away zucchinis now, there's no way to process them. If you're concerned about water use, research what plants naturally thrive in the climate in your area. Check if a well can be dug so you don't need to use expensive and treated tap water.
Rain barrels are a really good solution to water needs for home gardens, and usually pretty inexpensive.
I got a couple of flavouring barrels from a food plant I worked at, an adapter to hook them to my downspouts, and a submersible pump that lives inside powered by a solar battery. They're sealed so no issues with mosquitoes, and the pump feeds a garden hose so I'm not carrying buckets around. I basically never use tap water in my garden at all.
This is sadly true. Some places are so dry that capturing rainwater can disrupt the local water table (this is a wild guess). Other places are governed by idiots.
My city gives out rain barrels a couple times a year.
We've tried all kinds of recipes and now have an extremely high-zucchini diet and so do the chickens, yet the freezer keeps filling up. The plants are in overdrive this year. Luckily my parents work in the town and their colleagues gladly take the extras.
No, cows do not need alfalfa or corn. They evolved to eat grass. They need grass. The rest is from intensive farming practices, partly because the USA has a culture where beef is better if the cow was so overfed that the muscle tissue is riddled with fat (it's called marbling) and partly because you can raise cattle's weight and therefore selling price more quickly if they're overfed. This drives more profits at the expense of the cows' health from eating food that they struggle with, giving them recurrent stomach issues and bacterial infections. They then solve that problem by routinely giving them low dose antibiotics, which is the perfect breeding ground for antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria, causing serious problems for human health - we're rapidly running out of antibiotics of last resort.
There are plenty of countries that raise their cows in large fields instead of in barns, eating natural grass that grows purely from rain that falls from the sky, but it's less profitable and needs protecting from American imported beef which is cheaper and more fatty.
The methane is a global problem with beef and dairy, though. Cows release a lot of greenhouse gasses however healthily or naturally they're fed.
Yes, they do, it’s for PROTEIN so the cow can make enough fatty milk that it’s good for the calf and for butter, and so the cow stays healthy in the process. Do you have any idea how much extra protein and fat a pregnant and nursing female of any mammalian species needs in order to stay healthy?
Even the local dairy farms around me, that keep their cows on grass as much as they can, supplement feed.
How did the cows discover agriculture and grew their own breeding supplements of maize and alfalfa before human husbandry? Should we tell the Moose, Elk, and Bison to go buy some tractors or do you think they'll manage with just plows?
You clearly have no idea that grass contains protein.
You're wrong, and instead of finding out whether cows are typically fed on grass alone, yes alone, in the uk and Ireland (but not America where they do it the cow-hurting fat and bacteria ridden way), your source is some American blogger?!
It does, just not enough to keep a pregnant cow healthy. And he blogs, yes, but he’s also a farmer, in case you missed that part. My source is also the farmers around me who keep their cows on grass as much as possible.
Why do you think farmers can’t blog, just curious?
You clearly have no idea that grass contains protein.
It does, just not enough to keep a pregnant cow healthy.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. You're spouting such a bunch of crap. Cows don't need anything except grass, and that's how they've been in the UK for centuries and centuries. They evolved eating grass. Grass is their natural diet.
Maize isn't even indigenous to the UK, only really got going in the 20th century and yet cows have been living in the UK and cultivated for dairy and meat since before the industrial revolution! You didn't even bother to look anything up, you just have the american perverse cow-damaging position as explained to you by what authoritative source? One blogger!
Why do you think farmers can’t blog, just curious?
Holy straw man, batman!
One US blogger's ignorance can't wipe out thousands and thousands of years of happy grass-eating cows without intestinal problems. Even when they're pregnant! Duh.
To be clear: I am a vegan and think it's a great choice to make for both the environment and moral reasons if you have the ability to do it. I don't really proselytize about it, but it makes me very happy when people choose to go vegan. I absolutely do think the huge environmental impacts of animal agriculture, especially industrialized cow consumption, are things that should concern people and see real pushback on a major scale.
And yes, of course, animal agriculture and in particular cow consumption have so many more negative environmental impacts than just water usage, too. I am vegan. I actively condemn this shit. But in general, I have seen this argument used in a lot of "whataboutism" whose primary point appears to be, "this new unnecessary thing we're pushing may cause a lot of bad things, but if you look at these cherry-picked metrics, it's not as bad as this other thing that you already consume, so you might as well let us do whatever we want, too." "You are in blood stepped in so far that, should you wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o’er, so build those data centers" is not a good argument.
I have you tagged as "researches before blindly commenting", thank you for staying true to that and the information.
I think the anti-AI protest should not focus so much on one issue, the water consumption was something that often filled my feed. This comparison to beef is kinda weird and ill-intended, as it takes the worst part (the biggest number) of one and compares it to datacenters saying "see, it does not matter, there are worse things". In my opinion the discussion should be more about "do we even want datacenters including all the risks and problems coming with them". And as you nicely put, there are more disadvantages with that and we should be careful.
It also doesn't mention the amount of methane that cows produce either, which is insanely disproportionate and is destroying our climate. I'll continue using AI all I want as long as those who complain about AI continue eating beef, while I myself do not eat beef, because the benefit gained from using AI far outweighs the benefit of eating beef. So it pays for itself more than enough.
"Let's ignore this big problem because there are other bigger problems"
The same people say shit like: "Why are you sad? There are so many people who have it even worse than you!"
All this makes us do nothing until the "smaller" problems become so big that the damage is done and then those people will say "Well, we are in too deep. It it what it is. Can't change it now 🤡"
yes agriculture and especially beef is a big problem. however, this does not mean we should ignore the newly emerging problems - just because they are not as big as the biggest problem (yet). i also doubt, that any agricultural business uses as much energy as datacenters.
additionally beef is edible. the only edible thing about datacenters is the rich owner.
I don't necessarily disagree in general that AI water and power consumption is an issue, but a couple of nitpicks:
just because they are not as big as the biggest problem (yet).
It's doubtful it'll ever actually reach the scale of the beef industry. The problem is so tiny compared to the beef, it's not even funny. It can also be regulated to demand more efficient water usage in future data centers instead of running evaporative cooling. Not likely to happen under current US admin, but perhaps the next one. The current one is also recommending excessive beef consumption unfortunately, but that's beside the point.
i also doubt, that any agricultural business uses as much energy as datacenters.
Annual AI datacenter energy usage in the US is expected to reach 90 TWh this year. That's 324 petajoules. Annual fossil energy use of cattle is 569 +- 53 PJ. Not sure how much extra should be attributed to cattle in non-fossil energy usage. AI datacenters use local fossil energy (gas turbines) and whatever's in the grid. So for now, beef still requires more. However, data centers could quickly overtake it if forced to use closed loop liquid cooling. They use evaporative to save on energy costs.
Water usage IMO is the bigger problem. Energy generation is a solved problem, you just throw money at panels and batteries for clean energy. Just needs a competent administration and the benefits reach everyone, not just the AI industry. If it's cheap enough and data centers are forced to pay more for water, they'll start building closed loop cooling systems out of their own accord. You can't, however, make cows drink less water or eat less (cow food is plants and plants take water to grow after all) or fart less methane.
I'm not innocent here myself, still enjoy the occasional burger but it's got to be like 3-4 times a year at this point. Most of my meat consumption is chicken at this point, with pork in second place. Luckily my country makes it easier to avoid beef consumption by making it very expensive. Beef mince is now 3-4x more expensive than pork, steak prices are otherworldly.
maybe i should have been more specific: i did not mean the total energy usage of datacenters vs agriculture. i was talking about putting them into relation. not sure which relation makes the most sense: total PJ / total locations ? total PJ / ha land used ? total PJ / total employee ?
it doesn't matter which relation though. the business of datacenters is to put lightning into magic minerals to make funny things...
while you are absolutely right in saying energy production is an engineering problem, it is not a simple problem. water is for sure more severe, as there is a finite amount fresh water to consume. but especially now, when communities are somehow expected to pay for the increased energy usage of the local datacenter, it seems cynical to me, when you say:
Energy generation is a solved problem, you just throw money at panels and batteries for clean energy.
as humans we generally need more and more energy. while we get better at producing it, we are still struggling at keeping up with the demand. so much so, that places that decided against nuclear energy are thinking about new reactors. i won't go into the whole nuclear discussion. but i would say those discussions are telling how important and non-trivial a constant output of electricity is.
Yep one has a very important function while the other is completely useless. Of course, this doesnt mean we shouldnt look into other ways of sustainable sustenance.
We really need to stop farming cows for health and climate reasons. I am more for vegetarianism than for removing data centers.
It has a serious effect that shouldn't be ignored. Everyone says "I can't eat slop" but you won't eat anything if the climate destroys agriculture regardless.
Meat should be a very rare thing for people, like it was in the medieval times. Or even just focus more on poultry, farmed in sustainable and ethical ways? They eat bugs ffs. We can turn bug protein to edible protein through... Farming chicken.
Impact on the economy: AI and tech creates well paying, future-proof jobs, and AI tools unlock new levels of productivity for the entire economy. On the other hand, jobs in animal agriculture are declining over time, and many are low paid and back-breaking.
So they're paid off by big tech to push whataboutism about AI data center water use.
EDIT: They're literally citing themselves about the water usage claims!🤣
Well, if you compare against one of the known worst offenders you will always look better.
But also, the cattle farms at least produce food. For humans to eat. Like, we need food. We don't need waifu chatbots.
This is the same argument as "a human baby takes years of nurture and training until it can do task too." Like, yeah, but that's a human. The reason we do all this shit.
In all fairness, while humans need food to survive, we don’t need beef and there are objectively better options for sustainability than animal agriculture.
Not saying AI isn’t abhorrent, but the argument that beef makes food so its water consumption is not appalling isn’t strong.
But following that argument wouldn't you want to shut down the big water consumers? There are many things using more water than AI data centres.
Not sure how to correctly link comments across instances on lemmy, but I went way too deep into this in another comment here https://slrpnk.net/comment/23703343
Yep livestock and beef specifically is insanely bad for the environment. People who don't want to go vegetarian/vegan can still make a meaningful difference by cutting out beef.
It’s not even power consumption but the sudden change in power consumption, faster than infrastructure can respond. And more importantly it’s datacenters just bypassing rules for everyone else, such as by running on generators
There was a video that put it in interesting perspective ….. ai datacenters are only increasing our power usage by like 1%/year and we used to grow energy consumption by multiples of that. It’s not a big deal …… except that now our infrastructure planning and investment is geared toward zero growth.
In recent years our energy consumption has been flat, so that’s what the industry can support
Yes, people got mad at me for pointing out the land use for data centers is also minuscule compared to any suburban development.
That doesn't make it any less of a concern, but one of the major issues of data centers is that they are bypassing costs by unloading them onto average citizens. They don't want to pay taxes and higher costs for energy and water so they offload electric costs onto everyone else and then abuse the water supply to avoid making a closed loop system.
I keep quoting the exact stat wrong, but most of the world's freshwater goes into agriculture and farming.
Per what?
This looks to be the total number of each category. If so, it's a useless graph. How many L/day are used per single unit. Maybe per farm/datacenter.
Edit.
I did the math
3,562 Cattle farms
21,617,069 L/day/ranch
5,400 data centers
416,667 L/day/data center
45 AI data centers
600,000 L/day/AI data center
This does not take into consideration the heat produced nor fossil fuels consumed by each.
If water is your only metric, cattle ranches are worse. But this isn't a good metric for many reasons, since livestock, being food, is a commodity, while data centers are not.
Let's normalize to technology, ans ignore beef for a moment.
AI data centers consume about 33% more water than non-AI centers.
There is not a situation where this is fine.
The other part I don't see talked about is that evaporative cooling produces water vapour, and water vapour increases greenhouse effects. Normally we don't worry about water vapour emissions because it tends to fall out as rain or snow a couple of weeks later, but this is continuous usage. Continuous plumes of 600 tonnes of water vapour per AI data centre per day.
The point is that the beef industry, while consuming that water, provides a good that is useful. AI data centres do not. The logic that "this thing uses a lot of water so adding anything else that does" is kinda sus, to put it mildly.
That being said, pork belly slays any cut of beef. Beef is grossly overrated.
The cattle industry is a HUGE HUGE HUGE problem, yes it’s true and it’s a global problem. It uses a ton of water, land and resources, makes a ton of methane that contributes to greenhouse gases. THAT SAID, everyone is talking about the water usage of data centers but no one is talking about the way they generate electricity, disposable fuels, they use fossil fuels to power generators to create the huge amounts of electricity they use. They are hugely polluting due to this, their water usage is problematic and it’s the only problem we are talking about because the media has yet again dropped the ball at the behest of the billionaire class. Data centers water usage is problematic but a tiny drop in the bucket compared to their emissions. They have other serious problems too like sound pollution and wastewater runoff that is a direct result of running generators.
The water usage of data centers is “reasonable” (I personally disagree but this chart illustrates the trap) compared to other industries, literally everything else about data centers is wildly unreasonable and the media is essentially silent about it.
Yes. Water consumption has and always will be a dumb ass argument against data centers. There are PLENTY of good reasons, especially power consumption, that it baffles me that the movement hangs on this one.
Interesting I'm of the we have figured the power consumption (technically the issue is now political) issue but the water consumption is a problem. Wanna compare notes?
(The noise is a massive huger problem)
I'm not entirely sure, but it seems to me that you claim that the energy consumption issue of datacenters has been solved.
In what way has it been solved? The only way to solve it is after all by not having AI datacenters consume energy at all, being superflous things and all since: 1. we can easily live without AI datacenters. 2. we desperately need to cut back on energy consumption in every way possible on account of climate change.
Those factors seem at odds with your (possible) claim that the energy consumption of those centers has been solved.
Sorry, this is not the source. May I ask why do you share misinformation?
Not only the article is an entirely different case, has no such chart, but the "clickable links" on the website are fake, too:
They're complaining that the way "Source" in the image is highlighted implies it's a clickable link, which of course it's not.
Despite that, whether the links in the text are highlighted depends on the browser (which is odd). Using Firefox Focus they are invisible but are highlighted in my stock Andoid browser.
In Addition, the data in the text is global data, the data in the post is US only, so it's not the source of the data of the post.
You missed the part about wp-image-4776.lazyautosizes.lazyloaded. This is a critical part of the lore, because it means the author of that page used WordPress, and is lazy.
Thank you for the actual references, effort, and your stance shared regarding it!
For the sake of your opinion on the environment impact, where you suggest to "stop eating animal products", I am sorry, but I disagree. Water used for animals is a water used for a life, which is fair, adequate, and well, one of the main reasons water exists in the first place, I believe. Comparing that to a dead lifeless machinery to support? I do not believe this is a fair comparison.
yes, beef is comically inefiecient (most meat production is too, but beef takes the crown for ineffiency), and data centers have a big incetive to have closed loops water cooling systems, although specially wih loops this big there will always be some significant ammount of lost water
It seems that the majority of the water consumed by the beef industry would be "used" when it falls from the sky on to the soil which then grows a plant that a cow eats.
While I don't think this argument, er, holds water for other reasons, it is worth noting that a lot of cattle feed comes from irrigated crops which are grown in areas where they are draining water from underground aquifers and overdrawn rivers faster than they're being replenished. This video, for example, though it is not wholly about this topic, discusses the common cattle feed of alfalfa, which is a water heavy crop grown widely in the Colorado river basin.
I genuinely don't know how much US beef is fed alfalfa grown with water drawn from rivers.
My intention with the following is not to throw any shade on the US, but I just don't know what the farming practices are elsewhere in the world.
In my state, there are no "feed lots" and cattle exclusively graze in paddocks. Their feed is supplemented with silage and hay but none of which is irrigated, even from a local on-property dam. That is to say that the entirety is their feed is grown with direct rainfall.
I'm just pointing out that while some water inputs may be from rivers, it's not the entirety and I doubt it's the majority.
How nice that you doubt that. Sorry for being snarky, I spent too much time reading through this comment section and your comments are actually among the more reasonable ones. They are just based on anecdotal evidence, which rubs me the wrong way.
To give you some hard data, here is the "raw" version of the USGS from 2015. Rain might play a small factor, but the amount of water that is needed additionally is on another level. https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/1441/circ1441.
I also wrote a way too long comment at the top-level here in case you have too much time.
Also, assuming we trust these numbers: what are these values "per capita"? The beef industry is absolutely massive and AI data centers are new. How many cows/cow farms are dividing that number? How many compute farms/data centers for the others?
It's like saying we should be able to leave babies in the swamps with gators because the numbers show gators kill less babies than humans. Neglecting the fact that humans and gators don't have equal hands-on time with human babies.
Water is a distraction. The heat and fossil fueled power consumption is the real problem. They will burn us all alive and we have to sit back and let it happen because the fascists are in power, I guess.
Without an as-of date, there’s no way I’d trust it. AI data centers are pretty new so it wouldn’t need to go very far back for it to be negligible.
Even if the graph is true, it’s misleading . Whatever water beef is using hasn’t really changed, but AI data Centers are a recent significant change much more likely to affect me. Depending on what you’re trying to show that is probably the wrong type of graph
I do share the fear of exponential data centre growth, but if data centres reach the amount of water consumed by animal agriculture, we're seriously fucked.
Whatever water beef is using hasn’t really changed
It might not have changed much per kg, but overall meat consumption is up by a lot over the last few decades. So yes, it is a problem, not only because of its water use.
but AI data Centers are a recent significant change much more likely to affect me.
Just because you don't see the damage that is already in progress, does not mean that it doesn't affect you. Agriculture is in the process of drying up the aquifers in the USA, and that has been a problem since before AI
The world is indeed consuming more meat but I was understanding this as a us-centric story and beef consumption has actually been trending down. We still eat too much meat but at least are choosing chicken over beef
Agriculture as a whole plays a big part in pollution and wasting water. I personally think being able to get "out of season" foods is a huge waste of resources and extremely damaging to the ecosystem as a whole.
We had a really fucking bad year for crops in general, so bad even the hay died. And if you think about it, all that water was wasted just generating dead biomass. Which is worse than the usual over consumption concerns.
Idk where I'm going with this, so I'll just leave it at that.
27 million litres that did not have to be used to generate CSAM and shitty essays.
Your argument is basically "AI is good because the beef industry is worse." Fucking moronic. Get the fuck out of here bootlicker.
Sadly you will die with the rest of us when the cascading environmental collapse gets even worse because of AI being powered by obscene amounts of fossil fuels. Fuck you, bootlicker.
The numbers for data centers are likely a lot higher than this. It should include consumption for creating the building and hardware but I have a hard time believing that this is included in that number. Let alone the amount used for electricity generation.
AI data centers are disruptive from the context. They’ve been built haphazardly and quickly. Evaporative coolers, gas turbines, big lots in urban areas; all this is done because they literally cannot wait 6 more months to construct things properly.
It’s billionaire FOMO.
So they end up spewing gas into neighborhoods or running water dry not because of sheer volume, but because they just plopped the data centers down with zero mindfulness, nor any time for infrastructure to adapt.
…But.
On the whole, their water use is minuscule.
So is their energy use compared to, say, metal foundry industries.
Or emissions compared to concrete or ranching industries. Or shipping.
Not that it makes those industries unproblematic.
And I’m counting the hardware construction here, too. Fabs are intense, the datacenter supply chain is long, but the scale really isn’t that big. Just as an example, literally every Nvidia and AMD AI GPU comes from just one complex in Taiwan. The memory comes from three. And the other components on the PCB are pretty modest too.
How do you think that compares to, say, every steel foundry on the planet? And all the coal they ingest?
And the notion that “AI” will somehow require a fraction of all human economic output is propaganda from Sam Altman to trick people into giving him money.
It’s a lie.
It’s a lie for many nested reasons. We cannot possibly use that much “AI,” and even if we did, we shouldn’t, and even if we somehow do anyway, it’s getting exponentially less intensive to run. Not more expensive. It’s all just nonsense out of his mouth, and for some reason he doesn’t get called out for it.
I’m not trying to excuse the buildout, to be clear.
But I think the resources need to be put into perspective.
Oh boy, here we go again. We had this discussion two weeks ago over on !conservation@slrpnk.net (with a cross-post to a vegan community, but please don't go there and start harassing vegans. It was enough of a shit-show already.), where I wrote way too long of a comment, and the post got deleted afterwards. What a waste. But since it is brought up here again, I'm gonna recycle some of that and make you relive it with me. [Turns out this comment is even longer than my original one. Sorry for that.]
The best source I could find to get a rough idea of what is using how much water (in the USA) was the USGS Estimated Use of Water in the United States in 2015. (yes, there were no AI data centres in 2015, but bear with me, this is gonna be a long ride.)
One of the main problems in discussing this is that there are different kinds of water use, which luckily the USGS publication differentiates - namely "consumptive use" (water that is not available after the process) and, well, "non-consumptive use" (they report it as "reclaimed waste-water", i.e. water that, possibly after treatment, is immediately returned to rivers or similar for further use).
As the report compares total water use, "thermoelectric" (not sure why they use that term, it's probably supposed to be "thermal") power generation is the biggest reported category with 41%, followed by irrigation with 37%. When looking at consumptive use, the share is vastly different - only a fraction of the water used by thermal power generation is evaporated (see page 42), it consumes "only" 4.3 BGal/day, compared to 73 BGal/day for irrigation (page 30). That's not even in the same ballpark!
::: spoiler [Reveal spoiler to get ahead of people mentioning the categories livestock and irrigation in the publication]
One thing I dislike about the publication, but can't really blame them for it, is that they separate water use for irrigation and livestock. They put livestock at 1% of water usage, but also explicitly state "The livestock category excludes on-farm domestic use, lawn and garden watering, and irrigation water use.", meaning it is really mainly the water directly consumed by the animals, which is almost negligible compared to the crops they are fed. This wrongfully gives the impression that animal agriculture only makes up 1% of water usage.
:::
Turns out water use != water use. However I’d argue, that people would rather agree, that the kind of water “consumed” by growing plants is more permanent than water being “consumed” by cooling power plants, where most of the water is put back into the water cycle immediately.
So now we have a rough picture of how much water is used for agriculture, and how much for (thermal) power generation.
My point would be that it is very unlikely, that AI data centres use more water than the power plants that generate their electricity (on average; not all electricity is generated in thermal power plants), especially as thermal power plants generate at least as much heat as electricity, so the power plants already need as much cooling as you'd need if you just turned their electricity into heat (which data centres basically do). But even if the data centres used as much water as all the thermal power plants in the USA, it would still only be a fraction of the water used for irrigation.
Now considering that feeding animals is less efficient in converting farmed area and water to calories for human consumption instead of directly feeding people, and it should be quite obvious, that animal products are responsible for a big portion of easily avoidable water usage (For some fun comparisons: calorie supply by food group - In the USA 72% of calories are provided by plants, the remaining 28% are some form of animal product vs global land use for food production - 80% of agricultural land is estimated to be for livestock, vs 16% for food crops (granted, livestock land includes land for grazing, but even without that, it's 6 million km^2 for animal feed crops vs 8 million km^2 for crops for human food, so disproportionate to the amount of calories they provide))
And on top of all of that, if it wasn't already enough - the water usage of animal agriculture hasn't just recently started to become a problem, it has been a problem for quite some time. In the USA most aquifers are drying up including some very important ones for agriculture - and that was a problem before AI data centres sprung up everywhere
Water consumption of AI is not the main environmental problem, its energy use and especially the source of that energy is way more concerning.
The thing is that yes, we should not use AI for all the reasons that have been mentioned numerous times, but if you focus on environmental problems, then the best thing you can do is stop eating animal products. Heck, it doesn't even cost anything. On the contrary, it would be cheaper. It doesn't even require new technologies! Going vegan is degrowth in action.
That being said, I'll still condemn you if you use AI, even if you are vegan.
::: spoiler [Bonus round - golf course water usage]
You still don't have enough? In the now-deleted post there was also a discussion about water usage of golf courses compared to data centres. The
USGA estimates golf course water usage at roughly 2 BGal/day. An insane amount, when thinking about it, but tiny compared to agriculture.
:::
Thank you for the actual references, effort, and your stance shared regarding it!
For the sake of your opinion on the environment impact, where you suggest to "stop eating animal products", I am sorry, but I disagree. Water used for animals is a water used for a life, which is fair, adequate, and well, one of the main reasons water exists in the first place, I believe. Comparing that to a dead lifeless machinery to support? I do not believe this is a fair comparison.
AfaIk, unlike power plants which use e.g. the water of rivers for cooling, data centers use either drinking water or ground water for their cooling needs and thus, contribute to a decrease of ground water level if it's not used in sustainable amounts.
It doesn’t come out clean. There’s a lot of additives added as part of the cooling system. While it can be cleaned up, like it’s theoretically possible to build an effectively closed loop, they’re not actually doing that. Also it’s often potable water from residential supplies that comes from reservoirs and it’s not going back in those reservoirs.
It is the heating up of waterways that can devestate ecosystems but it is way more problematic of course if ground water is wasted on that. Anyhow, if they don't do that, the main issue with AI data centers is insane pollution by illegal emergency gas turbine power planrs and noise.
It's more about killing whatever aquifer if they get too much. But near-zero waste ones exist. There just isn't legislation pushing for it. Which is what we should be arguing for. Sustainable data centers.
You are silently killing millions of innocent workers and artists for using AI just to generate slop. Beef does not, even if your argument is "methane, global warming," AI is still killing more and at a faster pace. You are morally inferior, deplorable, abhorrent and repulsive for all the support you're showing to AI. Are you just fucking lazy and so uncreative or what? Cannot do shit the hard way anymore, eh?
People who don't mind getting artists and workers replaced with AI are not people nor humans anymore.
Beef is so close to being artificial. There are already high-end restaurants in Spain and I think Israel (ew) serving Plant-Based 3D-Printed Patties and/or Lab-Grown 3D-Bio Printing, which is the closest to real animal meat, without having to kill or pollute. They say it tastes the same, and has the same nutrition value.
And in just 5 years AI has managed to surpass that impact at a global scale. Not only with those who work at beef, but pretty much almost any job, like teachers, translators, proofreaders, junior journalists, transcriptionists, writers, product description writers, musicians, painters, software engineers, office jobs, customer service/support; including those you think they wouldn't replace, like plumbers, electricians, actors, everyone who used to work at say, an ad for any company, like Coke's scandal with the Christmas AI ad they made, those workers and actors are gone now.
Wait, there are more that deserve to be mentioned: 3D Artists, Graphic Designers, Logo Designers, Web Developers, Photo Editors, Video Editors, Voice Actors, Bookkeepers, Payroll Clerks, Waiters and Clerks, Legal Assistants, Contract Reviewers, HR assistants, Recruiters, so many researchers have been let go... I'd never end this list. Just wait until AI spreads more and you start to see more people without nothing to lose.
These will keep increasing. The more companies adopt AI without creating jobs or giving those fired employees an alternative to do and make money anymore, the more people will die in silence. You will maybe only wake up once it happens to someone close to you. It already happened to someone close to me, who couldn't make it anymore because AI made it so hard and miserable. It's especially harder here in Mexico, we have less opportunities, and the fact AI took many of those few opportunities away, it made things worse. Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck. You might look at suicide rates in the USA and see they are currently decreasing by like 3 or 4%, but that's because Covid hit people too hard. AI will be a little slower, but it will be steady and consistent. Just give it time.
AI is here to stay forever and keep replacing workers and artists without creating new jobs. It is going to kill way more people through depression, poverty and loss of purpose in life more than the beef industry ever has in its entire existence. AI companies are currently burning books. Just like you don't own physical game discs anymore, soon you won't own your PC either, they will make everything a cloud-based subscription, a monitor that connects to their servers. They are setting up the gatekeeping of knowledge. AI needs regulation ASAP.
Beef is not close to being artificial, this is marketing designed to trick you into eating beef.
AI also is not close to actually replacing jobs. It's being used for labor intensification, those people still have jobs but now on top of their old job they have to also wrestle with the shitty AI to try and make it useful. The idea that AI is going to replace labor is also marketing, designed to trick investors who dream of the day they won't ever have to pay anyone or negotiate with unions. There will be a point where it can, but the LLMs can't, and they never will, and as soon as we stop pretending the bubble will pop.
On both accounts you're just regurgitating the marketing you have been fed.
How exactly is replacing beef with artificial beef marketing for eating beef? The technology is brand new, it still needs time before expanding. It will replace the need to have animals in cages. We will be able to grown our own in labs that do not hurt any more animals or create pollution.
"Today we are eliminating around 4,800 roles, about 2.1% of our global workforce..." "I also want to be direct that the roles eliminated today are not being replaced by AI. At the same time, what is true is that AI is changing how work gets done..." Sure. Subtle contradiction. "Second, we will do this thoughtfully. As mentioned above, we are working on alternative solutions to job eliminations, and beyond this, we will continue to invest in equipping employees with new skills, including in AI..."
No wonder one of their most recent updates bricked so many hard drives.
So many people consult AIs instead of their local doctors, therapists, plumbers, electricians or whatever. So many people subscribe to an artist's Patreon, download or screenshot their art, to feed it to an LLM to have an endless supply of their product, without having to pay them a monthly fee anymore. 3D artists lost so much work. With AI, you can replace hundreds of them and only use a few who will dedicate their time to cleaning and polishing the meshes AI outputs. Not having to do that from scratch removed the need for so many artists. Problem is, those artists who get fired are not getting a job as easy anymore, or a salary that reflects their true worth. These are just a few small examples. Why are you saying this is not happening?
How exactly is replacing beef with artificial beef marketing for eating beef?
It's marketing for not giving up beef now. "Oh don't worry, you don't have to give up anything, just wait for technology to fix it!"
And how can you say AI is not replacing jobs with the constant waves of layoffs people are constantly seeing everyday?
We're in a recession and they're using AI as an excuse to lay people off. The AI isn't actually able to do their jobs, they just don't want to spook investors.
Beef-eaters were not going to give up beef regardless. You are making it sound like they single-handedly stopped millions of potential vegans. It did not. It wasn't even an ad, it was an article announcing the tech in a niche tech-driven community where I saw it. They never showed it on TV or anywhere important in my country, Mexico, because it's still so niche.
Would you rather they don't even work on that or something? You prefer beef-eaters to keep killing animals?
What you said about AI is also wrong. It's a massive generalization fallacy. A lot of CEOs and stakeholders don't understand LLMs and genuinely think AI is this holy grail that can replace workers. The massive layoffs after Covid did trigger or accelerate the recession, but so did AI. You are making them sound smarter than what they are.
People are replacing their therapists, doctors, plumbers, electricians, artists and so on because they trust AI more. How can you still say AI is not replacing jobs? You sound pro-AI. You are whitewashing AI with statements like those.
Yes. I'm not sure that even includes feed. 100x the water on lawns, 30x on golf courses. 1 lb of consumed beef equals around 650,000 prompts in terms of emissions. You are being lied to and manipulated so that only the elites use this technology!
The feed is where most of that water consumption for the beef industry comes from IIRC. Growing a bunch of alfalfa, corn and whatever to feed the cows.
Yeah but I don't think this includes the water from feed, I think this is just the direct water. But I'm not sure. I think it's like 100x or more water that animal agriculture uses. Similar levels for emissions. I honestly think this is a psyop to get the average person to not use AI as a force multiplier. 95% of AI is corporate, anyway. Abstention does very little besides deprive oneself of a tool that They are using to great effect, against us.
The point however is that we're growing a lot more vegetables, because we need the food.
Human water consumption is also higher than data center consumption, the conclusion should be that the chart is dumb, not that we should kill humans to support data centers.
What are you comparing against? Only the water drank by cattle? That's laughably ignorant.
It doesn't matter if you go by weight, volume, or calories - eating plants is a ton less water-intensive than feeding it to cattle raised for slaughter.
Ok dude, you've strayed way off topic. I'm not arguing against you at all. The chart in the post is comparing the water used in the entire US cattle industry against AI water usage. My point is that the total amount of water used to grow vegetables for human consumption in the US would dwarf that beef bar, and this chart is dumb.
You're going to shit your pants when you see how much water is used to grow vegetables for human consumption.
The point being this chart is dumb, because of course we use water to grow food, because we only eat life and life requires water, and comparing this stat to data center water usage makes no sense. And of course beef uses significantly more water to raise than an equal caloric amount of vegetables, but the amount of water used to grow vegetables for human consumption still dwarfs the amount of water used to raise cattle. Why not throw that on the chart too?
People think I'm somehow defending eating meat when I'm just saying that growing food of any kind takes a lot of water, and the comparison in this chart is dumb
Haven't done any research, but those numbers often include "green water", so basically rain falling on the pastures. That inflates the numbers immensely.
Hey great! Cool that you share your unfounded opinion with us! Sorry for being snarky, but I spend too much time looking into this.
Depending on how much you actually want to read, either look at my other comment in this thread or read up on the reported numbers by the US Geological Survey
Ezra Klein just had an episode with Jasmine Sun who goes around and studies data centers specifically. She basically said they've figured water consumption out by having a closed loop cooling system. So they recycle the water reducing the needed to pull in outrageous amounts of water everyday. On the other hand they are fucking up the electrical grid big time. That's a problem they've yet to solve.
But they’re not using those closed loop cooling systems. It’s too expensive and they’re taking as many shortcuts as they can. Like xAI using „temporary“ converted jet engines as gas turbines for power.
The thing is, not even open loop cooling systems "use" that much water. The water is returned to the cycle after usage. So it shouldn't be a problem, unless they contaminate that water somehow, which actually does not even sound that unlikely...
193 Comments
turdburglar@piefed.social · 155 pts · 28d
SatansMaggotyCumFart@piefed.world · 33 pts · 28d
I’ve seen hundreds of sexy cows and only one or two good-looking data centers.
qyron@sopuli.xyz · 11 pts · 27d
That sentence does not read well, regardless the intent I put to it.
I am at loss if I should commend you or be horrified. If not both.
rainwall@piefed.social · 14 pts · 27d
"Fuck one cow, and you're a cow fucker. Fuck one datacenter? You're a hero."
qyron@sopuli.xyz · 7 pts · 27d
"Burn a cow, you're a monster. Burn a datacenter, become the monster monsters fear."
wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 28d
chomps down on a piping hot gpu
Crunchy, yet delicious.
aarch0x40@piefed.social · 15 pts · 28d
Hey! That's my brain!
FreddiesLantern@leminal.space · 4 pts · 27d
Talk about crunching numbers amirite?
wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
grooooan :p
asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
6 - a native species garden
ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org · 3 pts · 27d
Yes! My family has one and we have to give away zucchinis now, there's no way to process them. If you're concerned about water use, research what plants naturally thrive in the climate in your area. Check if a well can be dug so you don't need to use expensive and treated tap water.
ivanvector@piefed.ca · 4 pts · 27d
Rain barrels are a really good solution to water needs for home gardens, and usually pretty inexpensive.
I got a couple of flavouring barrels from a food plant I worked at, an adapter to hook them to my downspouts, and a submersible pump that lives inside powered by a solar battery. They're sealed so no issues with mosquitoes, and the pump feeds a garden hose so I'm not carrying buckets around. I basically never use tap water in my garden at all.
DrPop@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
Be sure to look up local laws before getting a rain barrel. For some reason some cities have laws against them.
ivanvector@piefed.ca · 1 pts · 24d
This is sadly true. Some places are so dry that capturing rainwater can disrupt the local water table (this is a wild guess). Other places are governed by idiots.
My city gives out rain barrels a couple times a year.
turdburglar@piefed.social · 1 pts · 27d
yeah the plants really love the un-chlorinated in floridated water.
turdburglar@piefed.social · 1 pts · 27d
ok so check it - we started shredding the overflow squash and cooking it down into tomatoes to make a great pasta sauce.
also zucchini bread is awesome.
ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org · 1 pts · 27d
We've tried all kinds of recipes and now have an extremely high-zucchini diet and so do the chickens, yet the freezer keeps filling up. The plants are in overdrive this year. Luckily my parents work in the town and their colleagues gladly take the extras.
turdburglar@piefed.social · 1 pts · 27d
do you have a magic trick for battling the squash vine borers?
Seleni@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 28d
Milk cows need corn, alfalfa, and grass, because they need the extra nutrients, since they’re, y’know, raising a baby.
And before anyone goes off on me about how we shouldn’t have dairy cows, y’all can pry cheese and ice cream out of my cold, dead fingers.
davidagain@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 27d
No, cows do not need alfalfa or corn. They evolved to eat grass. They need grass. The rest is from intensive farming practices, partly because the USA has a culture where beef is better if the cow was so overfed that the muscle tissue is riddled with fat (it's called marbling) and partly because you can raise cattle's weight and therefore selling price more quickly if they're overfed. This drives more profits at the expense of the cows' health from eating food that they struggle with, giving them recurrent stomach issues and bacterial infections. They then solve that problem by routinely giving them low dose antibiotics, which is the perfect breeding ground for antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria, causing serious problems for human health - we're rapidly running out of antibiotics of last resort.
There are plenty of countries that raise their cows in large fields instead of in barns, eating natural grass that grows purely from rain that falls from the sky, but it's less profitable and needs protecting from American imported beef which is cheaper and more fatty.
The methane is a global problem with beef and dairy, though. Cows release a lot of greenhouse gasses however healthily or naturally they're fed.
Seleni@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
Yes, they do, it’s for PROTEIN so the cow can make enough fatty milk that it’s good for the calf and for butter, and so the cow stays healthy in the process. Do you have any idea how much extra protein and fat a pregnant and nursing female of any mammalian species needs in order to stay healthy?
Even the local dairy farms around me, that keep their cows on grass as much as they can, supplement feed.
Here’s an actual farmer talking about it if you want to hear from someone in the industry.
For more cow related content, here’s him on how the beef cattle industry are largely a bunch of whiny bastards who want to have their cake and eat it too, if you want to have something that is actually worth getting mad about.
An addendum, just for funsies: him talking about the silliest chicken myth he’s ever heard (and he’s heard a lot).
Promethiel@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 26d
How did the cows discover agriculture and grew their own breeding supplements of maize and alfalfa before human husbandry? Should we tell the Moose, Elk, and Bison to go buy some tractors or do you think they'll manage with just plows?
davidagain@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 27d
You clearly have no idea that grass contains protein.
You're wrong, and instead of finding out whether cows are typically fed on grass alone, yes alone, in the uk and Ireland (but not America where they do it the cow-hurting fat and bacteria ridden way), your source is some American blogger?!
Seleni@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 27d
It does, just not enough to keep a pregnant cow healthy. And he blogs, yes, but he’s also a farmer, in case you missed that part. My source is also the farmers around me who keep their cows on grass as much as possible.
Why do you think farmers can’t blog, just curious?
davidagain@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 26d
Wrong, wrong, wrong. You're spouting such a bunch of crap. Cows don't need anything except grass, and that's how they've been in the UK for centuries and centuries. They evolved eating grass. Grass is their natural diet.
Maize isn't even indigenous to the UK, only really got going in the 20th century and yet cows have been living in the UK and cultivated for dairy and meat since before the industrial revolution! You didn't even bother to look anything up, you just have the american perverse cow-damaging position as explained to you by what authoritative source? One blogger!
Holy straw man, batman!
One US blogger's ignorance can't wipe out thousands and thousands of years of happy grass-eating cows without intestinal problems. Even when they're pregnant! Duh.
Seleni@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 26d
pomegranatefern@sh.itjust.works · 70 pts · 28d
To be clear: I am a vegan and think it's a great choice to make for both the environment and moral reasons if you have the ability to do it. I don't really proselytize about it, but it makes me very happy when people choose to go vegan. I absolutely do think the huge environmental impacts of animal agriculture, especially industrialized cow consumption, are things that should concern people and see real pushback on a major scale.
But this feels like a really cherry-picked 'whataboutism' graph and that raises my hackles. In the first place, this focuses on one very specific metric (water consumption) without considering the major other negative impacts of data centers like electricity rates, infrasound noise pollution of surrounding communities, and so on. Other people have also pointed out that this ignores things like the amount of water used in chip manufacturing. Recycling water for data center cooling makes data centers use less water, but, in a cruel twist, also concentrates pollutants already found in the groundwater, which means that the water that does get returned to the environment now has a higher concentration of pollutants.(And yes, in some cosmic irony, agriculture including animal agriculture was involved in releasing those pollutants in the first place). Meta had an incident where data center construction released bacteria-contaminated water into the environment.
And yes, of course, animal agriculture and in particular cow consumption have so many more negative environmental impacts than just water usage, too. I am vegan. I actively condemn this shit. But in general, I have seen this argument used in a lot of "whataboutism" whose primary point appears to be, "this new unnecessary thing we're pushing may cause a lot of bad things, but if you look at these cherry-picked metrics, it's not as bad as this other thing that you already consume, so you might as well let us do whatever we want, too." "You are in blood stepped in so far that, should you wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o’er, so build those data centers" is not a good argument.
Holli25@slrpnk.net · 11 pts · 27d
I have you tagged as "researches before blindly commenting", thank you for staying true to that and the information.
I think the anti-AI protest should not focus so much on one issue, the water consumption was something that often filled my feed. This comparison to beef is kinda weird and ill-intended, as it takes the worst part (the biggest number) of one and compares it to datacenters saying "see, it does not matter, there are worse things". In my opinion the discussion should be more about "do we even want datacenters including all the risks and problems coming with them". And as you nicely put, there are more disadvantages with that and we should be careful.
pomegranatefern@sh.itjust.works · 7 pts · 27d
I am extremely flattered by this; thank you so much. You've made my day here.
victorz@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
Both of you made my day with this interaction. Beautiful stuff.
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -47 pts · 28d
It also doesn't mention the amount of methane that cows produce either, which is insanely disproportionate and is destroying our climate. I'll continue using AI all I want as long as those who complain about AI continue eating beef, while I myself do not eat beef, because the benefit gained from using AI far outweighs the benefit of eating beef. So it pays for itself more than enough.
very_well_lost@lemmy.world · 42 pts · 28d
Are these benefits in the room with us right now?
ZDL@lazysoci.al · 24 pts · 28d
Benefit gained from using LLMbeciles? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! wheeze
ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 27d
Hello concern troll!
wheez@lemmy.zip · 11 pts · 27d
This is one insane take. If you recognize that both are bad, why do choose between one or the other?
queermunist@lemmy.ml · 9 pts · 27d
They always tell on themselves.
Here's an idea: no beef and no chatbots
snoons@piefed.ca · 2 pts · 27d
Do the boots really taste so good as to completely lose any sense of self preservation in a vain attempt to proselytize sane and cognizant people?
MrSmith@lemmy.world · 63 pts · 27d
OP is an AI booster, check their profile.
This is an attempt to disregard the damage that's done by slop generators, comparing it to most inefficient food source.
Hope you have a terrible day, op.
Ibuthyr@feddit.org · 14 pts · 27d
Its post history is all over the place. To me it looks like an AI bot account.
onnekas@sopuli.xyz · 46 pts · 27d
I hate this kind of reasoning.
"Let's ignore this big problem because there are other bigger problems"
The same people say shit like: "Why are you sad? There are so many people who have it even worse than you!"
All this makes us do nothing until the "smaller" problems become so big that the damage is done and then those people will say "Well, we are in too deep. It it what it is. Can't change it now 🤡"
victorz@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 27d
There's a comet colliding with earth? Pff, the Andromeda Galaxy will collide with our galaxy, too!!!1
sem@piefed.blahaj.zone · 44 pts · 28d
Yes beef is probably the least efficient massively consumed food.
ToxicWaste@lemmy.cafe · 29 pts · 27d
yes agriculture and especially beef is a big problem. however, this does not mean we should ignore the newly emerging problems - just because they are not as big as the biggest problem (yet). i also doubt, that any agricultural business uses as much energy as datacenters.
additionally beef is edible. the only edible thing about datacenters is the rich owner.
boonhet@sopuli.xyz · 5 pts · 27d
I don't necessarily disagree in general that AI water and power consumption is an issue, but a couple of nitpicks:
It's doubtful it'll ever actually reach the scale of the beef industry. The problem is so tiny compared to the beef, it's not even funny. It can also be regulated to demand more efficient water usage in future data centers instead of running evaporative cooling. Not likely to happen under current US admin, but perhaps the next one. The current one is also recommending excessive beef consumption unfortunately, but that's beside the point.
Annual AI datacenter energy usage in the US is expected to reach 90 TWh this year. That's 324 petajoules. Annual fossil energy use of cattle is 569 +- 53 PJ. Not sure how much extra should be attributed to cattle in non-fossil energy usage. AI datacenters use local fossil energy (gas turbines) and whatever's in the grid. So for now, beef still requires more. However, data centers could quickly overtake it if forced to use closed loop liquid cooling. They use evaporative to save on energy costs.
Water usage IMO is the bigger problem. Energy generation is a solved problem, you just throw money at panels and batteries for clean energy. Just needs a competent administration and the benefits reach everyone, not just the AI industry. If it's cheap enough and data centers are forced to pay more for water, they'll start building closed loop cooling systems out of their own accord. You can't, however, make cows drink less water or eat less (cow food is plants and plants take water to grow after all) or fart less methane.
I'm not innocent here myself, still enjoy the occasional burger but it's got to be like 3-4 times a year at this point. Most of my meat consumption is chicken at this point, with pork in second place. Luckily my country makes it easier to avoid beef consumption by making it very expensive. Beef mince is now 3-4x more expensive than pork, steak prices are otherworldly.
ToxicWaste@lemmy.cafe · 2 pts · 27d
maybe i should have been more specific: i did not mean the total energy usage of datacenters vs agriculture. i was talking about putting them into relation. not sure which relation makes the most sense: total PJ / total locations ? total PJ / ha land used ? total PJ / total employee ?
it doesn't matter which relation though. the business of datacenters is to put lightning into magic minerals to make funny things...
while you are absolutely right in saying energy production is an engineering problem, it is not a simple problem. water is for sure more severe, as there is a finite amount fresh water to consume. but especially now, when communities are somehow expected to pay for the increased energy usage of the local datacenter, it seems cynical to me, when you say:
as humans we generally need more and more energy. while we get better at producing it, we are still struggling at keeping up with the demand. so much so, that places that decided against nuclear energy are thinking about new reactors. i won't go into the whole nuclear discussion. but i would say those discussions are telling how important and non-trivial a constant output of electricity is.
cosmos8188@leminal.space · 2 pts · 27d
Yep one has a very important function while the other is completely useless. Of course, this doesnt mean we shouldnt look into other ways of sustainable sustenance.
AA5B@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 27d
Spending all day in the smoker would melt some of that richness out and make it nice and tender
terranoid@lemmy.cafe · 26 pts · 28d
We really need to stop farming cows for health and climate reasons. I am more for vegetarianism than for removing data centers.
It has a serious effect that shouldn't be ignored. Everyone says "I can't eat slop" but you won't eat anything if the climate destroys agriculture regardless.
Meat should be a very rare thing for people, like it was in the medieval times. Or even just focus more on poultry, farmed in sustainable and ethical ways? They eat bugs ffs. We can turn bug protein to edible protein through... Farming chicken.
spectrums_coherence@piefed.social · 9 pts · 28d
Or just eat tofu.
Many parts of the world were mostly vegan until very recently, but that doesn't stop them from developing amazing cuisines.
Most people in non-herding economy simply cannot afford meat just a couple hundred years ago.
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 22 pts · 28d
So, from a real source and not some reddit or linked in post: https://bryantresearch.co.uk/insight-items/comparing-water-footprint-ai/
Yes, this is true. But, those numbers do not include:
ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 27d
Scrolled through the article, found this:
So they're paid off by big tech to push whataboutism about AI data center water use.
EDIT: They're literally citing themselves about the water usage claims!🤣
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 27d
You mean their graph? That is common to mark your Images that can be reused.
And now. They are not paid by fucking Tech. And you can also watch Hanks video on this, or, do the math yourself
MrSmith@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
It's at least 10x than what OP claims
https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/ai-data-centers-water-consumption-140002428.html
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
I don't see a date at OPs data. But still the basic assumption holds.
MrSmith@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
550m gallons is 2B liters/day?
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
Roughly, yes.
Don_alForno@feddit.org · 21 pts · 26d
Well, if you compare against one of the known worst offenders you will always look better.
But also, the cattle farms at least produce food. For humans to eat. Like, we need food. We don't need waifu chatbots.
This is the same argument as "a human baby takes years of nurture and training until it can do task too." Like, yeah, but that's a human. The reason we do all this shit.
lemmy_acct_id_8647@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 26d
In all fairness, while humans need food to survive, we don’t need beef and there are objectively better options for sustainability than animal agriculture.
Not saying AI isn’t abhorrent, but the argument that beef makes food so its water consumption is not appalling isn’t strong.
Don_alForno@feddit.org · 2 pts · 25d
Of course. It's still of greater and more essential use to us than waifu chatbots.
I didn't say it's not appaling. I did say at least it makes something useful, and that comparing the two does not absolve AI.
Goldholz@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 1 pts · 25d
Not just produce food but also material like hides for leather production. And leather can be used for clothing.
However meat production is not better in comparison. Both are polution centers. Meat farms AND ai
PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de · 18 pts · 27d
Yes, water consumption is a shit reason to argue against data centers. Power consumption is the real big issue
zqps@sh.itjust.works · 7 pts · 27d
It's still a valid reason considering how many US counties are struggling with droughts.
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
But following that argument wouldn't you want to shut down the big water consumers? There are many things using more water than AI data centres.
Not sure how to correctly link comments across instances on lemmy, but I went way too deep into this in another comment here https://slrpnk.net/comment/23703343
Tl;dr for this specific case: (animal) agriculture is the main reason the aquifers in USA are drying out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogallala_Aquifer#Accelerated_decline_in_aquifer_storage
TheLegendaryAssholeOfJushinLiger@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 27d
1 pound of beef equals 650,000 prompts in terms of emissions. Livestock is about 150x more emissions than AI.
queermunist@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 27d
Power consumption has issues other than emissions, the increased demand is driving up utility prices and reopening coal plants.
PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de · 2 pts · 27d
Yep livestock and beef specifically is insanely bad for the environment. People who don't want to go vegetarian/vegan can still make a meaningful difference by cutting out beef.
AA5B@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
It’s not even power consumption but the sudden change in power consumption, faster than infrastructure can respond. And more importantly it’s datacenters just bypassing rules for everyone else, such as by running on generators
There was a video that put it in interesting perspective ….. ai datacenters are only increasing our power usage by like 1%/year and we used to grow energy consumption by multiples of that. It’s not a big deal …… except that now our infrastructure planning and investment is geared toward zero growth.
In recent years our energy consumption has been flat, so that’s what the industry can support
mlg@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 27d
Yes, people got mad at me for pointing out the land use for data centers is also minuscule compared to any suburban development.
That doesn't make it any less of a concern, but one of the major issues of data centers is that they are bypassing costs by unloading them onto average citizens. They don't want to pay taxes and higher costs for energy and water so they offload electric costs onto everyone else and then abuse the water supply to avoid making a closed loop system.
I keep quoting the exact stat wrong, but most of the world's freshwater goes into agriculture and farming.
01189998819991197253@infosec.pub · 17 pts · 27d
Per what?
This looks to be the total number of each category. If so, it's a useless graph. How many L/day are used per single unit. Maybe per farm/datacenter.
Edit.
I did the math
3,562 Cattle farms
21,617,069 L/day/ranch
5,400 data centers
416,667 L/day/data center
45 AI data centers
600,000 L/day/AI data center
This does not take into consideration the heat produced nor fossil fuels consumed by each.
If water is your only metric, cattle ranches are worse. But this isn't a good metric for many reasons, since livestock, being food, is a commodity, while data centers are not.
Let's normalize to technology, ans ignore beef for a moment.
AI data centers consume about 33% more water than non-AI centers.
There is not a situation where this is fine.
wewbull@feddit.uk · 2 pts · 26d
The other part I don't see talked about is that evaporative cooling produces water vapour, and water vapour increases greenhouse effects. Normally we don't worry about water vapour emissions because it tends to fall out as rain or snow a couple of weeks later, but this is continuous usage. Continuous plumes of 600 tonnes of water vapour per AI data centre per day.
queermunist@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 26d
I think that's more of a localized pressure, like how corn sweat makes the Midwest super humid.
LORDSMEGMA@sh.itjust.works · 15 pts · 28d
I can't eat data
FilthyHands@sh.itjust.works · 20 pts · 28d
Then why do they call them chips?
elevenbones@sh.itjust.works · 13 pts · 28d
Yeah, its ok to have just one byte...
I_Jedi@lemmy.today · 3 pts · 28d
It's because gallium arsenide is tasty. Yummy!
Miller@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 28d
I don't use cows for data storage.
TAG@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 28d
I would not recommend using an AI data center for storage either.
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -26 pts · 28d
Cool, who gives a shit? That seems besides the point. Are you using that to continue justifying eating beef which is consuming way more water than AI?
LORDSMEGMA@sh.itjust.works · 10 pts · 28d
Yes
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -24 pts · 28d
elevenbones@sh.itjust.works · 6 pts · 28d
I'll have what he's having
ZDL@lazysoci.al · 6 pts · 28d
The point is that the beef industry, while consuming that water, provides a good that is useful. AI data centres do not. The logic that "this thing uses a lot of water so adding anything else that does" is kinda sus, to put it mildly.
That being said, pork belly slays any cut of beef. Beef is grossly overrated.
CultLeader4Hire@lemmy.world · 14 pts · 27d
The cattle industry is a HUGE HUGE HUGE problem, yes it’s true and it’s a global problem. It uses a ton of water, land and resources, makes a ton of methane that contributes to greenhouse gases. THAT SAID, everyone is talking about the water usage of data centers but no one is talking about the way they generate electricity, disposable fuels, they use fossil fuels to power generators to create the huge amounts of electricity they use. They are hugely polluting due to this, their water usage is problematic and it’s the only problem we are talking about because the media has yet again dropped the ball at the behest of the billionaire class. Data centers water usage is problematic but a tiny drop in the bucket compared to their emissions. They have other serious problems too like sound pollution and wastewater runoff that is a direct result of running generators.
The water usage of data centers is “reasonable” (I personally disagree but this chart illustrates the trap) compared to other industries, literally everything else about data centers is wildly unreasonable and the media is essentially silent about it.
Psionicsickness@reddthat.com · 14 pts · 28d
Yes. Water consumption has and always will be a dumb ass argument against data centers. There are PLENTY of good reasons, especially power consumption, that it baffles me that the movement hangs on this one.
slacktoid@lemmy.ml · 0 pts · 28d
Interesting I'm of the we have figured the power consumption (technically the issue is now political) issue but the water consumption is a problem. Wanna compare notes? (The noise is a massive huger problem)
Rothe@piefed.social · 3 pts · 27d
I'm not entirely sure, but it seems to me that you claim that the energy consumption issue of datacenters has been solved.
In what way has it been solved? The only way to solve it is after all by not having AI datacenters consume energy at all, being superflous things and all since: 1. we can easily live without AI datacenters. 2. we desperately need to cut back on energy consumption in every way possible on account of climate change.
Those factors seem at odds with your (possible) claim that the energy consumption of those centers has been solved.
slacktoid@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 26d
We have figured how to create renewable energy, it's just the politics of today that don't let its use.
I don't agree with your only way to solve it.
Why do you think renewable energy can't meet these demands?
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
If you really wanna compare notes, feel free to add some here https://slrpnk.net/comment/23703343. I'm on @Psionicsickness@reddthat.coms side
artwork@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 28d
"Guys where is source?"
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 28d
https://bryantresearch.co.uk/insight-items/comparing-water-footprint-ai/
artwork@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 28d
Sorry, this is not the source. May I ask why do you share misinformation?
Not only the article is an entirely different case, has no such chart, but the "clickable links" on the website are fake, too:
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 28d
That is the original source I know. The content describes the content of the graph. Where is this misinformation? What did I miss?
Successful_Try543@feddit.org · 5 pts · 28d
They're complaining that the way "Source" in the image is highlighted implies it's a clickable link, which of course it's not.
Despite that, whether the links in the text are highlighted depends on the browser (which is odd). Using Firefox Focus they are invisible but are highlighted in my stock Andoid browser.
In Addition, the data in the text is global data, the data in the post is US only, so it's not the source of the data of the post.
I_Jedi@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 28d
You missed the part about wp-image-4776.lazyautosizes.lazyloaded. This is a critical part of the lore, because it means the author of that page used WordPress, and is lazy.
vapeloki@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 28d
I clicked all links. None of them are fake. So, what the shit are you talking about?
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
I hope I won't regret this, this is already the second time https://slrpnk.net/comment/23703343
artwork@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 19d
Thank you for the actual references, effort, and your stance shared regarding it!
For the sake of your opinion on the environment impact, where you suggest to "stop eating animal products", I am sorry, but I disagree. Water used for animals is a water used for a life, which is fair, adequate, and well, one of the main reasons water exists in the first place, I believe. Comparing that to a dead lifeless machinery to support? I do not believe this is a fair comparison.
protogen420@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 10 pts · 27d
yes, beef is comically inefiecient (most meat production is too, but beef takes the crown for ineffiency), and data centers have a big incetive to have closed loops water cooling systems, although specially wih loops this big there will always be some significant ammount of lost water
_stranger_@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 28d
steaks > slop
Kolanaki@pawb.social · 6 pts · 28d
Unless they're sloppy steaks.
NihilsineNefas@slrpnk.net · 9 pts · 27d
What's missing is the plastic and steel industries, and the power sector, but it's pretty accurate
charonn0@startrek.website · 8 pts · 28d
I prefer the cows.
fizzle@quokk.au · 8 pts · 28d
I don't think this is a reasonable comparison.
It seems that the majority of the water consumed by the beef industry would be "used" when it falls from the sky on to the soil which then grows a plant that a cow eats.
pomegranatefern@sh.itjust.works · 15 pts · 28d
While I don't think this argument, er, holds water for other reasons, it is worth noting that a lot of cattle feed comes from irrigated crops which are grown in areas where they are draining water from underground aquifers and overdrawn rivers faster than they're being replenished. This video, for example, though it is not wholly about this topic, discusses the common cattle feed of alfalfa, which is a water heavy crop grown widely in the Colorado river basin.
fizzle@quokk.au · 1 pts · 27d
I genuinely don't know how much US beef is fed alfalfa grown with water drawn from rivers.
My intention with the following is not to throw any shade on the US, but I just don't know what the farming practices are elsewhere in the world.
In my state, there are no "feed lots" and cattle exclusively graze in paddocks. Their feed is supplemented with silage and hay but none of which is irrigated, even from a local on-property dam. That is to say that the entirety is their feed is grown with direct rainfall.
I'm just pointing out that while some water inputs may be from rivers, it's not the entirety and I doubt it's the majority.
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
How nice that you doubt that. Sorry for being snarky, I spent too much time reading through this comment section and your comments are actually among the more reasonable ones. They are just based on anecdotal evidence, which rubs me the wrong way.
To give you some hard data, here is the "raw" version of the USGS from 2015. Rain might play a small factor, but the amount of water that is needed additionally is on another level. https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/1441/circ1441.
I also wrote a way too long comment at the top-level here in case you have too much time.
qarbone@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
Also, assuming we trust these numbers: what are these values "per capita"? The beef industry is absolutely massive and AI data centers are new. How many cows/cow farms are dividing that number? How many compute farms/data centers for the others?
It's like saying we should be able to leave babies in the swamps with gators because the numbers show gators kill less babies than humans. Neglecting the fact that humans and gators don't have equal hands-on time with human babies.
TheLegendaryAssholeOfJushinLiger@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 27d
No. These don't include that. 95% of water usage is from feed, regardless. Livestock also have enormous emissions, vastly dwarfing that of AI.
Mac@mander.xyz · 8 pts · 27d
If no source: not true
nbsp@programming.dev · 7 pts · 28d
are these things related, or we changing the subject on ourselves for no particular reason?
weps@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
yes, they both have an environmental impact
not in the same category though. eating meat can't be compared to using AI because the difference is so big
Leviathan@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 27d
Water is a distraction. The heat and fossil fueled power consumption is the real problem. They will burn us all alive and we have to sit back and let it happen because the fascists are in power, I guess.
dumnezero@piefed.social · 7 pts · 27d
Yes. I'm vegan and anti-AI.
TORFdot0@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 28d
I can eat a cow, I can’t eat a data center.
Alvaro@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 12 pts · 27d
You can also not eat a cow, just like you would probably tell others not to use AI
RabbitMix@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 27d
but at least they'd get useful energy for their body out of eating a cow, unlike an AI prompt which likely won't generate anything useful.
AA5B@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 27d
Without an as-of date, there’s no way I’d trust it. AI data centers are pretty new so it wouldn’t need to go very far back for it to be negligible.
Even if the graph is true, it’s misleading . Whatever water beef is using hasn’t really changed, but AI data Centers are a recent significant change much more likely to affect me. Depending on what you’re trying to show that is probably the wrong type of graph
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 0 pts · 27d
I do share the fear of exponential data centre growth, but if data centres reach the amount of water consumed by animal agriculture, we're seriously fucked.
It might not have changed much per kg, but overall meat consumption is up by a lot over the last few decades. So yes, it is a problem, not only because of its water use.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-meat-consumption-by-type-kilograms-per-year
Just because you don't see the damage that is already in progress, does not mean that it doesn't affect you. Agriculture is in the process of drying up the aquifers in the USA, and that has been a problem since before AI
AA5B@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 26d
The world is indeed consuming more meat but I was understanding this as a us-centric story and beef consumption has actually been trending down. We still eat too much meat but at least are choosing chicken over beef
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-meat-usa
spicehoarder@lemmy.zip · 7 pts · 28d
Agriculture as a whole plays a big part in pollution and wasting water. I personally think being able to get "out of season" foods is a huge waste of resources and extremely damaging to the ecosystem as a whole.
We had a really fucking bad year for crops in general, so bad even the hay died. And if you think about it, all that water was wasted just generating dead biomass. Which is worse than the usual over consumption concerns.
Idk where I'm going with this, so I'll just leave it at that.
sundray@lemmus.org · 6 pts · 28d
Gr8
b8
m8
JigglySackles@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 27d
That doesn't seem likely. And the pollution done to said water will be much different.
snoons@piefed.ca · 4 pts · 27d
27 million litres that did not have to be used to generate CSAM and shitty essays.
Your argument is basically "AI is good because the beef industry is worse." Fucking moronic. Get the fuck out of here bootlicker.
Sadly you will die with the rest of us when the cascading environmental collapse gets even worse because of AI being powered by obscene amounts of fossil fuels. Fuck you, bootlicker.
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 27d
I don't eat beef dumb fuck. I'm not the problem here. I looked at the verified data, and all you have is the word "bootlicker".
JamesTBagg@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 26d
What verified data? He had the word bootlicker and all you have are the words "verified data." Where's your sources and data?
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 26d
https://lemmy.world/post/50340865
JamesTBagg@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 22d
That's deforestation not water use.
snoons@piefed.ca · -1 pts · 27d
Seeth harder pls, it amuses us. 😘
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -5 pts · 27d
Goldholz@lemmy.blahaj.zone · -1 pts · 27d
Im going to steal that
LodeMike@lemmy.today · 3 pts · 27d
The numbers for data centers are likely a lot higher than this. It should include consumption for creating the building and hardware but I have a hard time believing that this is included in that number. Let alone the amount used for electricity generation.
JcbAzPx@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
The largest mass of datacenters are still in construction. Using old data to pretend it's not a problem is just gross.
jaykrown@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 27d
They're going to cancel all of them because the bubble is about to collapse. Using future predictions as verified fact is a stupid idea.
brucethemoose@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
Yes.
AI data centers are disruptive from the context. They’ve been built haphazardly and quickly. Evaporative coolers, gas turbines, big lots in urban areas; all this is done because they literally cannot wait 6 more months to construct things properly.
It’s billionaire FOMO.
So they end up spewing gas into neighborhoods or running water dry not because of sheer volume, but because they just plopped the data centers down with zero mindfulness, nor any time for infrastructure to adapt.
…But.
On the whole, their water use is minuscule.
So is their energy use compared to, say, metal foundry industries.
Or emissions compared to concrete or ranching industries. Or shipping.
Not that it makes those industries unproblematic.
And I’m counting the hardware construction here, too. Fabs are intense, the datacenter supply chain is long, but the scale really isn’t that big. Just as an example, literally every Nvidia and AMD AI GPU comes from just one complex in Taiwan. The memory comes from three. And the other components on the PCB are pretty modest too.
How do you think that compares to, say, every steel foundry on the planet? And all the coal they ingest?
And the notion that “AI” will somehow require a fraction of all human economic output is propaganda from Sam Altman to trick people into giving him money.
It’s a lie.
It’s a lie for many nested reasons. We cannot possibly use that much “AI,” and even if we did, we shouldn’t, and even if we somehow do anyway, it’s getting exponentially less intensive to run. Not more expensive. It’s all just nonsense out of his mouth, and for some reason he doesn’t get called out for it.
I’m not trying to excuse the buildout, to be clear.
But I think the resources need to be put into perspective.
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 3 pts · 27d
Oh boy, here we go again. We had this discussion two weeks ago over on !conservation@slrpnk.net (with a cross-post to a vegan community, but please don't go there and start harassing vegans. It was enough of a shit-show already.), where I wrote way too long of a comment, and the post got deleted afterwards. What a waste. But since it is brought up here again, I'm gonna recycle some of that and make you relive it with me. [Turns out this comment is even longer than my original one. Sorry for that.]
The best source I could find to get a rough idea of what is using how much water (in the USA) was the USGS Estimated Use of Water in the United States in 2015. (yes, there were no AI data centres in 2015, but bear with me, this is gonna be a long ride.)
One of the main problems in discussing this is that there are different kinds of water use, which luckily the USGS publication differentiates - namely "consumptive use" (water that is not available after the process) and, well, "non-consumptive use" (they report it as "reclaimed waste-water", i.e. water that, possibly after treatment, is immediately returned to rivers or similar for further use).
As the report compares total water use, "thermoelectric" (not sure why they use that term, it's probably supposed to be "thermal") power generation is the biggest reported category with 41%, followed by irrigation with 37%. When looking at consumptive use, the share is vastly different - only a fraction of the water used by thermal power generation is evaporated (see page 42), it consumes "only" 4.3 BGal/day, compared to 73 BGal/day for irrigation (page 30). That's not even in the same ballpark!
::: spoiler [Reveal spoiler to get ahead of people mentioning the categories livestock and irrigation in the publication] One thing I dislike about the publication, but can't really blame them for it, is that they separate water use for irrigation and livestock. They put livestock at 1% of water usage, but also explicitly state "The livestock category excludes on-farm domestic use, lawn and garden watering, and irrigation water use.", meaning it is really mainly the water directly consumed by the animals, which is almost negligible compared to the crops they are fed. This wrongfully gives the impression that animal agriculture only makes up 1% of water usage. :::
Turns out water use != water use. However I’d argue, that people would rather agree, that the kind of water “consumed” by growing plants is more permanent than water being “consumed” by cooling power plants, where most of the water is put back into the water cycle immediately.
So now we have a rough picture of how much water is used for agriculture, and how much for (thermal) power generation.
My point would be that it is very unlikely, that AI data centres use more water than the power plants that generate their electricity (on average; not all electricity is generated in thermal power plants), especially as thermal power plants generate at least as much heat as electricity, so the power plants already need as much cooling as you'd need if you just turned their electricity into heat (which data centres basically do). But even if the data centres used as much water as all the thermal power plants in the USA, it would still only be a fraction of the water used for irrigation.
Now considering that feeding animals is less efficient in converting farmed area and water to calories for human consumption instead of directly feeding people, and it should be quite obvious, that animal products are responsible for a big portion of easily avoidable water usage (For some fun comparisons: calorie supply by food group - In the USA 72% of calories are provided by plants, the remaining 28% are some form of animal product vs global land use for food production - 80% of agricultural land is estimated to be for livestock, vs 16% for food crops (granted, livestock land includes land for grazing, but even without that, it's 6 million km^2 for animal feed crops vs 8 million km^2 for crops for human food, so disproportionate to the amount of calories they provide))
And on top of all of that, if it wasn't already enough - the water usage of animal agriculture hasn't just recently started to become a problem, it has been a problem for quite some time. In the USA most aquifers are drying up including some very important ones for agriculture - and that was a problem before AI data centres sprung up everywhere
Water consumption of AI is not the main environmental problem, its energy use and especially the source of that energy is way more concerning.
The thing is that yes, we should not use AI for all the reasons that have been mentioned numerous times, but if you focus on environmental problems, then the best thing you can do is stop eating animal products. Heck, it doesn't even cost anything. On the contrary, it would be cheaper. It doesn't even require new technologies! Going vegan is degrowth in action.
That being said, I'll still condemn you if you use AI, even if you are vegan.
::: spoiler [Bonus round - golf course water usage] You still don't have enough? In the now-deleted post there was also a discussion about water usage of golf courses compared to data centres. The USGA estimates golf course water usage at roughly 2 BGal/day. An insane amount, when thinking about it, but tiny compared to agriculture. :::
artwork@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 19d
sonofearth@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
sit@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 27d
I don’t get the hypehate around water-„consumption“ of data Centers. The water goes in and in some way back out. It doesn’t vanish.
Successful_Try543@feddit.org · 10 pts · 27d
AfaIk, unlike power plants which use e.g. the water of rivers for cooling, data centers use either drinking water or ground water for their cooling needs and thus, contribute to a decrease of ground water level if it's not used in sustainable amounts.
nightlily@leminal.space · 4 pts · 27d
It doesn’t come out clean. There’s a lot of additives added as part of the cooling system. While it can be cleaned up, like it’s theoretically possible to build an effectively closed loop, they’re not actually doing that. Also it’s often potable water from residential supplies that comes from reservoirs and it’s not going back in those reservoirs.
Jiral@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
It is the heating up of waterways that can devestate ecosystems but it is way more problematic of course if ground water is wasted on that. Anyhow, if they don't do that, the main issue with AI data centers is insane pollution by illegal emergency gas turbine power planrs and noise.
weps@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 27d
that's just the first law of thermodynamics
or maybe the law of conservation of mass
but you can't ignore the second law of thermodynamics
there's no less hydrogen and oxygen in the universe but the usability of it changes
TheLegendaryAssholeOfJushinLiger@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 27d
It's more about killing whatever aquifer if they get too much. But near-zero waste ones exist. There just isn't legislation pushing for it. Which is what we should be arguing for. Sustainable data centers.
commie@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 27d
whats the source of your data?
Hupf@feddit.org · 2 pts · 26d
The data center, duh.
Almacca@aussie.zone · 1 pts · 28d
Now do corn, a lot of which gets turned into biofuel.
ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 27d
Oh, a vegan AI slop user!🤣🤣🤣
Most AI providers are ran by far-right chuds, who don't care about animal welfare, and call animal rights/environmental activism "toxic empathy".
Ariselas@piefed.ca · 1 pts · 28d
I can't eat data
weps@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
you also can not eat a cow
it's obvious which one of these 2 you should do
remon@ani.social · 1 pts · 27d
You can most definitely eat a cow ...
weps@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
you can also not eat it
remon@ani.social · 1 pts · 27d
True, but it's definitely possible.
PepperoniNipple@lazysoci.al · 0 pts · 27d
You are silently killing millions of innocent workers and artists for using AI just to generate slop. Beef does not, even if your argument is "methane, global warming," AI is still killing more and at a faster pace. You are morally inferior, deplorable, abhorrent and repulsive for all the support you're showing to AI. Are you just fucking lazy and so uncreative or what? Cannot do shit the hard way anymore, eh?
People who don't mind getting artists and workers replaced with AI are not people nor humans anymore.
queermunist@lemmy.ml · 2 pts · 27d
Beef kills a lot of people, actually. People who work in slaughterhouses have higher rates of suicide, addiction, overdose, etc.
PepperoniNipple@lazysoci.al · 0 pts · 27d
Beef is so close to being artificial. There are already high-end restaurants in Spain and I think Israel (ew) serving Plant-Based 3D-Printed Patties and/or Lab-Grown 3D-Bio Printing, which is the closest to real animal meat, without having to kill or pollute. They say it tastes the same, and has the same nutrition value.
And in just 5 years AI has managed to surpass that impact at a global scale. Not only with those who work at beef, but pretty much almost any job, like teachers, translators, proofreaders, junior journalists, transcriptionists, writers, product description writers, musicians, painters, software engineers, office jobs, customer service/support; including those you think they wouldn't replace, like plumbers, electricians, actors, everyone who used to work at say, an ad for any company, like Coke's scandal with the Christmas AI ad they made, those workers and actors are gone now.
Wait, there are more that deserve to be mentioned: 3D Artists, Graphic Designers, Logo Designers, Web Developers, Photo Editors, Video Editors, Voice Actors, Bookkeepers, Payroll Clerks, Waiters and Clerks, Legal Assistants, Contract Reviewers, HR assistants, Recruiters, so many researchers have been let go... I'd never end this list. Just wait until AI spreads more and you start to see more people without nothing to lose.
These will keep increasing. The more companies adopt AI without creating jobs or giving those fired employees an alternative to do and make money anymore, the more people will die in silence. You will maybe only wake up once it happens to someone close to you. It already happened to someone close to me, who couldn't make it anymore because AI made it so hard and miserable. It's especially harder here in Mexico, we have less opportunities, and the fact AI took many of those few opportunities away, it made things worse. Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck. You might look at suicide rates in the USA and see they are currently decreasing by like 3 or 4%, but that's because Covid hit people too hard. AI will be a little slower, but it will be steady and consistent. Just give it time.
AI is here to stay forever and keep replacing workers and artists without creating new jobs. It is going to kill way more people through depression, poverty and loss of purpose in life more than the beef industry ever has in its entire existence. AI companies are currently burning books. Just like you don't own physical game discs anymore, soon you won't own your PC either, they will make everything a cloud-based subscription, a monitor that connects to their servers. They are setting up the gatekeeping of knowledge. AI needs regulation ASAP.
queermunist@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 26d
Beef is not close to being artificial, this is marketing designed to trick you into eating beef.
AI also is not close to actually replacing jobs. It's being used for labor intensification, those people still have jobs but now on top of their old job they have to also wrestle with the shitty AI to try and make it useful. The idea that AI is going to replace labor is also marketing, designed to trick investors who dream of the day they won't ever have to pay anyone or negotiate with unions. There will be a point where it can, but the LLMs can't, and they never will, and as soon as we stop pretending the bubble will pop.
On both accounts you're just regurgitating the marketing you have been fed.
PepperoniNipple@lazysoci.al · 1 pts · 26d
How exactly is replacing beef with artificial beef marketing for eating beef? The technology is brand new, it still needs time before expanding. It will replace the need to have animals in cages. We will be able to grown our own in labs that do not hurt any more animals or create pollution.
And how can you say AI is not replacing jobs with the constant waves of layoffs people are constantly seeing everyday? The most recent one being Windows/Microsoft (https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2026/07/06/the-latest-in-our-company-transformation/)
"Today we are eliminating around 4,800 roles, about 2.1% of our global workforce..." "I also want to be direct that the roles eliminated today are not being replaced by AI. At the same time, what is true is that AI is changing how work gets done..." Sure. Subtle contradiction. "Second, we will do this thoughtfully. As mentioned above, we are working on alternative solutions to job eliminations, and beyond this, we will continue to invest in equipping employees with new skills, including in AI..."
No wonder one of their most recent updates bricked so many hard drives.
So many people consult AIs instead of their local doctors, therapists, plumbers, electricians or whatever. So many people subscribe to an artist's Patreon, download or screenshot their art, to feed it to an LLM to have an endless supply of their product, without having to pay them a monthly fee anymore. 3D artists lost so much work. With AI, you can replace hundreds of them and only use a few who will dedicate their time to cleaning and polishing the meshes AI outputs. Not having to do that from scratch removed the need for so many artists. Problem is, those artists who get fired are not getting a job as easy anymore, or a salary that reflects their true worth. These are just a few small examples. Why are you saying this is not happening?
queermunist@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 24d
It's marketing for not giving up beef now. "Oh don't worry, you don't have to give up anything, just wait for technology to fix it!"
We're in a recession and they're using AI as an excuse to lay people off. The AI isn't actually able to do their jobs, they just don't want to spook investors.
PepperoniNipple@lazysoci.al · 1 pts · 22d
Beef-eaters were not going to give up beef regardless. You are making it sound like they single-handedly stopped millions of potential vegans. It did not. It wasn't even an ad, it was an article announcing the tech in a niche tech-driven community where I saw it. They never showed it on TV or anywhere important in my country, Mexico, because it's still so niche.
Would you rather they don't even work on that or something? You prefer beef-eaters to keep killing animals?
What you said about AI is also wrong. It's a massive generalization fallacy. A lot of CEOs and stakeholders don't understand LLMs and genuinely think AI is this holy grail that can replace workers. The massive layoffs after Covid did trigger or accelerate the recession, but so did AI. You are making them sound smarter than what they are.
People are replacing their therapists, doctors, plumbers, electricians, artists and so on because they trust AI more. How can you still say AI is not replacing jobs? You sound pro-AI. You are whitewashing AI with statements like those.
TheLegendaryAssholeOfJushinLiger@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 27d
Yes. I'm not sure that even includes feed. 100x the water on lawns, 30x on golf courses. 1 lb of consumed beef equals around 650,000 prompts in terms of emissions. You are being lied to and manipulated so that only the elites use this technology!
boonhet@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 27d
The feed is where most of that water consumption for the beef industry comes from IIRC. Growing a bunch of alfalfa, corn and whatever to feed the cows.
TheLegendaryAssholeOfJushinLiger@sh.itjust.works · -1 pts · 27d
Yeah but I don't think this includes the water from feed, I think this is just the direct water. But I'm not sure. I think it's like 100x or more water that animal agriculture uses. Similar levels for emissions. I honestly think this is a psyop to get the average person to not use AI as a force multiplier. 95% of AI is corporate, anyway. Abstention does very little besides deprive oneself of a tool that They are using to great effect, against us.
protist@retrofed.com · -1 pts · 27d
You're going to shit your pants when you see how much water is used to grow vegetables
zqps@sh.itjust.works · 20 pts · 27d
Vegetables grown for human consumption are many times less water-intensive than meat.
Brainsploosh@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 27d
True.
The point however is that we're growing a lot more vegetables, because we need the food.
Human water consumption is also higher than data center consumption, the conclusion should be that the chart is dumb, not that we should kill humans to support data centers.
protist@retrofed.com · -1 pts · 27d
Yes, and the total quantity of water used to grow vegetables is significantly higher
zqps@sh.itjust.works · 8 pts · 27d
What are you comparing against? Only the water drank by cattle? That's laughably ignorant.
It doesn't matter if you go by weight, volume, or calories - eating plants is a ton less water-intensive than feeding it to cattle raised for slaughter.
protist@retrofed.com · 1 pts · 27d
Ok dude, you've strayed way off topic. I'm not arguing against you at all. The chart in the post is comparing the water used in the entire US cattle industry against AI water usage. My point is that the total amount of water used to grow vegetables for human consumption in the US would dwarf that beef bar, and this chart is dumb.
Gold_E_Lox@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 27d
depending on how you define "vegetable" this could be argued i think.
protist@retrofed.com · 1 pts · 27d
Plants for human consumption.
Gold_E_Lox@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 27d
so does that mean we should be comparing it to water usage for all animal agriculture instead of just one specific "crop" of livestock?
Rcklsabndn@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 27d
And a shit load of the vegetables grown are feed for livestock, as well as corn for biofuel for cars (in the States, at least).
Sorry I don't have time to find any solid numbers.
PlaidBaron@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 27d
What, pray tell, do you think cattle eat friendo?
protist@retrofed.com · -2 pts · 27d
You're going to shit your pants when you see how much water is used to grow vegetables for human consumption.
The point being this chart is dumb, because of course we use water to grow food, because we only eat life and life requires water, and comparing this stat to data center water usage makes no sense. And of course beef uses significantly more water to raise than an equal caloric amount of vegetables, but the amount of water used to grow vegetables for human consumption still dwarfs the amount of water used to raise cattle. Why not throw that on the chart too?
PlaidBaron@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 27d
You really thought people were going to understand that convoluted point with that comment? Bruh.
protist@retrofed.com · -1 pts · 27d
You're going to shit your pants when you see how much water we use to grow vegetables
PlaidBaron@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 27d
Im gonna shit in your pants if you dont stop.
magic_smoke@lemmy.blahaj.zone · -2 pts · 27d
Grain, the sort we don't eat.
Do you think the average beef cattle is eating a Caesar salad?
PlaidBaron@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 27d
No. Thats my point. The grain we dont eat uses water to grow. Water that would otherwise be used to grow food we do eat.
This is why beef uses more water than veggies.
schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 27d
If a cow can eat it, so can we.
If we don't want to eat it, we're choosing to feed cows with that land instead of people.
Some things really are a zero sum game.
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
I don't really expect to reach you with this, but it's worth a try - https://slrpnk.net/comment/23703343
protist@retrofed.com · 0 pts · 27d
People think I'm somehow defending eating meat when I'm just saying that growing food of any kind takes a lot of water, and the comparison in this chart is dumb
FatVegan@leminal.space · 1 pts · 27d
Yeah but we eat these. We don't feed animals and torture them to then eat them.
realitaetsverlust@piefed.zip · -2 pts · 27d
Haven't done any research, but those numbers often include "green water", so basically rain falling on the pastures. That inflates the numbers immensely.
So I wouldn't trust it.
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
Hey great! Cool that you share your unfounded opinion with us! Sorry for being snarky, but I spend too much time looking into this.
Depending on how much you actually want to read, either look at my other comment in this thread or read up on the reported numbers by the US Geological Survey
CovfefeKills@lemmy.world · -4 pts · 27d
Welp fuck AI tripping over their ignorance again trying to say the beef industry is good because they saw a chart.
JakoJakoJako13@piefed.social · -6 pts · 28d
Ezra Klein just had an episode with Jasmine Sun who goes around and studies data centers specifically. She basically said they've figured water consumption out by having a closed loop cooling system. So they recycle the water reducing the needed to pull in outrageous amounts of water everyday. On the other hand they are fucking up the electrical grid big time. That's a problem they've yet to solve.
ZDL@lazysoci.al · 4 pts · 28d
It's easy to solve that problem too. Shut off the power. It's not as if the AI data centres are actually doing anything useful.
nightlily@leminal.space · 2 pts · 27d
But they’re not using those closed loop cooling systems. It’s too expensive and they’re taking as many shortcuts as they can. Like xAI using „temporary“ converted jet engines as gas turbines for power.
Chaf@slrpnk.net · 1 pts · 27d
The thing is, not even open loop cooling systems "use" that much water. The water is returned to the cycle after usage. So it shouldn't be a problem, unless they contaminate that water somehow, which actually does not even sound that unlikely...
Anyways, thermal power plants often use open loop cooling systems, and their water "usage" is also fairly small compared to agriculture. You can see either here https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/1441/circ1441.pdf or in the way too long comment I wrote https://slrpnk.net/comment/23703343