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Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

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Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#51
post #30

Summary of the concrete actions: 1. Early 2025: Identify Federal sites for AI data centers, clean energy facilities, and geothermal zones. Streamline permitting processes and draft reporting requirements for AI infrastructure. Develop a plan for global collaboration on trusted AI infrastructure. 2. By Mid-2025: Issue solicitations for AI infrastructure projects on Federal sites. Select winning proposals and announce…

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

They'll be scouring the internet for signs of thoughtcrime and jamming the sources they find. Also, automating those sectors that tend to produce whistleblowers.

Because if they don't do the bad thing first, some bogeyman might become better at it than they are. Same logic that gave us the Manhattan project.

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#52
post #38
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

Well, it would funnel tax dollars to already-established companies that don't need the subsidies. :p I have some sympathy for certain domestic capabilities (e.g. chip fabrication) but this "AI" bubble cross-infecting government policy is frustrating to watch.

>> Well, it would funnel tax dollars to already-established companies that don't need the subsidies.

Yeah it sounded like a gift to nVidia.

My prediction was that nVidia would ride the quantum wave by offering systems to simulate quantum computers with huge classical ones. They would do that by asking the government to fund such systems for "quantum algorithm research" since nobody really knows what to use QC for yet.

This move primes that relationship using the current AI hype boom.

So look for their quantum simulation-optimized chips in the near future.

GPU, gpgpu, crypto, ray tracing, AI, quantum. nvidia is a master at milking dollars from tech fads.

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#53
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

I suspect we are not in a race for a better LLM, but a race to the singularity. "I. J. Good's intelligence explosion model of 1965, an upgradable intelligent agent could eventually enter a positive feedback loop of self-improvement cycles, each successive; and more intelligent generation appearing more and more rapidly, causing a rapid increase ("explosion") in intelligence which would ultimately result in a powerful…

> I suspect we are not in a race for a better LLM, but a race to the singularity.

We are in the race for a better LLM*, deliberately disguised as a race to the singularity, because that's what gets investor-dollars and fame.

* And anything else close enough to ride on their hype-coattails

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#54
post #30

Summary of the concrete actions: 1. Early 2025: Identify Federal sites for AI data centers, clean energy facilities, and geothermal zones. Streamline permitting processes and draft reporting requirements for AI infrastructure. Develop a plan for global collaboration on trusted AI infrastructure. 2. By Mid-2025: Issue solicitations for AI infrastructure projects on Federal sites. Select winning proposals and announce…

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

If it's for the government.. Bureaucratic processes?

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#56
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

I suspect we are not in a race for a better LLM, but a race to the singularity. "I. J. Good's intelligence explosion model of 1965, an upgradable intelligent agent could eventually enter a positive feedback loop of self-improvement cycles, each successive; and more intelligent generation appearing more and more rapidly, causing a rapid increase ("explosion") in intelligence which would ultimately result in a powerful…

Belief in a coming technological singularity is completely unscientific and based on zero hard evidence. It is essentially a secular religion with computers cast as deities to either usher in a new utopia or exterminate us all. Surely I am coming quickly, sayeth the Lord.

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#57
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe but there's such a small amount of time between now and the new admin, it couldn't be that difficult to kill the bureaucracy behind it? If had been going to 3-4 years already, sure I can see that.

when new presidents come in the rest of the government employees don’t change as well. some of these at higher levels are career employees who will serve through many presidents. timing your asks to just get approved by an outgoing president can make your future bright

Historically you are correct that only around 4,000 employees of the US federal government are 'political hires' that the President can change/hire/fire. However in October 2020, Trump ordered Schedule F [0] that effectively increases the number of career bureaucrats that could be made by political appointment rather than by a competitive process. The Order was promptly rescinded by the Biden administration in Jan 2021. [1]

The Trump administration said that they believed Schedule F would increase the number of career positions to roughly 50,000 existing jobs. However many think tanks and union members believe that Schedule F could be interpreted much more broadly and could include well over 100,000 positions.

If the Trump administration revives the Schedule F order, it could mean very significant changes for many career bureaucrats.

[0] - https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2020-10-26/pdf/2020-2... [1] - https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-action...

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#58
post #41
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

What would the cost be of not undertaking these actions?

In the micro, nothing. We'd have a bunch of extra cash we can spend on other stuff.

In the macro?

The overall goal is keeping the US competitive in technology. Both in terms of producing/controlling IP as well as (perhaps even more crucially) remaining a premier destination for technologists from all over the world. The cost of not achieving that goal is... incalculable, but large.

Whether or not this is a good way to achieve that goal is of course up for debate.

Re: Executive order on advancing United States leadership in AI infrastructure

#59
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Provided all this centralized governement owned and run infra somehow gets built, what it would be actually doing to warrant the expense ? I am quite skeptical in this regard. :P

I suspect we are not in a race for a better LLM, but a race to the singularity. "I. J. Good's intelligence explosion model of 1965, an upgradable intelligent agent could eventually enter a positive feedback loop of self-improvement cycles, each successive; and more intelligent generation appearing more and more rapidly, causing a rapid increase ("explosion") in intelligence which would ultimately result in a powerful…

Is there any reason whatsoever that I should think that I. J. Good's intelligence explosion model of 1965 corresponds to reality?
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