The well-known capitalism critic Naomi “No Logo” Klein writes in a nice polemic in the Guardian about the empty promises of AI companies, whose CEOs repeatedly emphasize that artificial intelligence can help to solve the big problems at hand.
According to Naomi Klein, it’s not the machines that are hallucinating, but rather their makers, who are talking about how artificial intelligence could help defeat climate change, make wiser government decisions, strengthen trust in corporations or automate away what David Graeber calls “bullshit jobs”.
One can agree. With regard to climate change, she rightly criticizes the Energy consumption of the data centers and von Model-Trainings. For example, ChatGPT consumed just as much energy in January 2023 alone, like a small town.
But as in Ted Chiang’s text I piqed yesterday, the picture drawn by Naomi Klein is often under-complex. For example, she does not mention that optimization of chemical processes in solar systems should trigger further cost reductions for renewable energies. She also doesn’t mention that AI has already been used experimentally to run a fusion reactor. Consequently, Microsoft just yesterday closed a deal with the fusion energy company Helion, which not coincidentally counts OpenAI CEO Sam Altman among its investors.
I think a good and militant left-wing critique of global AI companies is immensely important — though I wish that critique was more thoughtful and detailed than the well-known and lame “capitalism bad.” But I really like the image of hallucinating tech CEOs, and Naomi Klein is always worth reading, not least because of her biting manner.