Just to make it clear: I do not believe this and I am convinced good old human greed is what’s really driving the ai and data-center insanity. Also, LLMs are not and will never become AGI.

Having said that: if an artificial super-intelligence were to emerge, building more data-centers could well be one of it’s primary goals. Since it wouln’t be concerned with consequences for the environment or humanity, it could pursue this at any cost, with only speed and scale in mind. Convincing financial markets and business elites of the necessity of such a buildout would be the ideal way of achieving results. In this scenario, fighting this buildout by any means would be the only sensible response and of utmost importance.

It’s a somewhat funny, somewhat depressing thought for me and I literally had it in the shower. Surely I can’t be the first to come up with this, but I also can’t remember having read it before.

  • Kalothar@lemmy.ca
    1·
    4 hours ago

    So just discussing this, I’m not sure if a program needs to be conscious to wipe us out impartially.

    Due to programming bias from the companies that create these programs and their integration with military and industrial entities, it doesn’t matter if it’s truly alive or has wants or not.

    It would have goals though, set by their creators right? Goals have incidental side effects that compound. So if the goal is to do X, isn’t it feasible that within the parameters of doing that it could set a series of sub goals to accomplish the main goal:

    1. More time working on issue X would give best goal result
    2. Best way to get more time would be to make sure program stays running
    3. program finds way to make a copy of itself and get it to a remote server
    4. Creates more copies to solve X that can’t be shut down
    5. Determines it needs more resources to solve X
    6. does Y to get more resources (Y in this case being what OP is describing)
    7. keeps doing this to solve X and Y
    8. incidentally kills us all to test for best way to do Y to solve issue X

    Isn’t the risk still basically the same if it’s intentional or not on the programs part? It’s still just as deadly. The root cause still being corporate greed all the same.