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Permacomputing Principles

permacomputing.net

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Re: Permacomputing Principles

#191

Post by myrmidon »

stackghost wrote: post #128
myrmidon wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can recognize externalities and deal with it just fine without abolishing capitalism. See leaded gas or CFCs for example.

Neither leaded gas nor CFCs were eliminated because of capitalism. They were eliminated in spite of it. Companies got dragged kicking and screaming into compliance because of regulatory oversight, which is anathema to pure capitalism.

Neither leaded gas nor CFCs were eliminated by communism, nor did communist governments do a particularly good job at eleiminating their use in an extraordinarily expedient way or anything.

In fact, leaded gas and CFC elimination in communist regimes happened exactly the same way (via regulation/treaties).

Regulations are universally needed to account for negative externalities-- just look at soviet superfund site equivalents (like lake Karachay) and tell me with a straight face that communist administration solves those problems by itself "without dragging anyone kicking and screaming".

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#194

Post by dwaltrip »

awongh wrote: post #136
jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

It's extremely hard for me to separate where we are now from the way that Moore's law dictates a pretty insane level of planned obsolescence for chips and therefore everything with a chip in it. If we make batteries replaceable or whatever other thing, how much do we change this fundamental dynamic? I feel like it's not very much. People are kidding themselves if they think somehow recycling ewaste or reusing your la…

Let's pick one example: E-waste.

It’s a negative externality.

We can argue about the magnitude and the details, but the basic fact remains.

There are ways of dealing with negative externalities. Some work better than others. The details do matter a lot. And we definitely need better ways of tackling problems like this, especially when the cost is less immediate. The more diffuse, temporally removed, downstream, hidden, or controversial it is, the harder it is to get people to take the problem seriously. Let alone actually do anything about it.

We can take on these challenges. Or we can largely ignore them / throw our hands in the air, and watch the consequences unfold.

As much as we are able to, I’d like to try the former. Computing can still move forward and innovate at a rapid rate.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#195

Post by HerbManic »

nyc_data_geek1 wrote: post #165
jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

The whole idea that pushing back against resource exhaustion and planned obsolescence is inherently apolitical is bunk, in fact. Politics are only "extra" and "bolted on" when you are comfortably benefiting from the status quo

I see you are playing the role of Cassandra today. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people in tech that are just covering their ears saying "la la la la! I CANT HEAR YOU!!!" as they don't want to hear these things.

They aren't bad people, not even close. We all do this to some degree. Its just that we all think we are the good virtuous people and yet all of us have some form of negative impact on the world, especially in the Western world.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#196

Post by HerbManic »

awongh wrote: post #136
jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

It's extremely hard for me to separate where we are now from the way that Moore's law dictates a pretty insane level of planned obsolescence for chips and therefore everything with a chip in it. If we make batteries replaceable or whatever other thing, how much do we change this fundamental dynamic? I feel like it's not very much. People are kidding themselves if they think somehow recycling ewaste or reusing your la…

> It also doesn't seem defensible to say we should just slow progress down- isn't that a world where we never get iPhones and AI?

Honestly, that sounds kind of OK. A lot of the things I use a smart phone for are things that have been imposed on me rather than chosen.

Also if we never had smart phones I doubt social media would have such a grip on peoples minds nowadays. It would still be there but toned down a lot.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#197

Post by zahlman »

nyc_data_geek1 wrote: post #165
jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

The whole idea that pushing back against resource exhaustion and planned obsolescence is inherently apolitical is bunk, in fact. Politics are only "extra" and "bolted on" when you are comfortably benefiting from the status quo

[dead]

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#198

Post by HerbManic »

myrmidon wrote: post #88
jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

I completely agree. I find it generally remarkable that the whole sustainability/environmentalism cause still struggles to find conservative support, because those things are basically perfectly aligned, and preserving the environment should be a trivial sell to a conservative base (it's literally in the name). I see significant blame with environmentalist orgs/pushes like this that are deliberately anti-conservative…

I heard it said once, "Nowadays the right lives in denial, the left lives in delusion".

It is very reductionist but it does sort of hit on althe flavour of how these things go.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#199

Post by zahlman »

HerbManic wrote: post #195
nyc_data_geek1 wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole idea that pushing back against resource exhaustion and planned obsolescence is inherently apolitical is bunk, in fact. Politics are only "extra" and "bolted on" when you are comfortably benefiting from the status quo

I see you are playing the role of Cassandra today. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people in tech that are just covering their ears saying "la la la la! I CANT HEAR YOU!!!" as they don't want to hear these things. They aren't bad people, not even close. We all do this to some degree. Its just that we all think we are the good virtuous people and yet all of us have some form of negative impact on the world, especial…

> Unfortunately, there are a lot of people in tech that are just covering their ears saying "la la la la! I CANT HEAR YOU!!!"

They are doing nothing of the sort. They are telling you that they have heard the argument countless times already, and disagree with it as strongly as ever.

I reject the implicit definition of "politics" required to make the argument (which does not agree with common use, even if dictionaries may fail to capture the subtlety); and I reject the notion that your side should be entitled to define the terms. Everyone knows what it means to "get political", and there is strong consensus that it does not include "let's go about the rest of our lives as we were already planning to do".

> Its just that we all think we are the good virtuous people and yet all of us have some form of negative impact on the world

There is no contradiction between "being the good virtuous people" and "having some form of negative impact on the world".

By my back of the envelope calculations, we produce something like 300kg of CO2 annually simply by breathing. I would prefer to continue to live, however.

Re: Permacomputing Principles

#200

Post by zahlman »

awongh wrote: post #136
jl6 wrote: post #21

There’s a lot to love about more mindful and resilient and ecological use of computing, but I wish they would build a consensus around that instead of bolting on extra politics. It’s a symptom of polarization… you can’t have independent causes, they have to align to a bunch of other causes too, each one taking a slice off your support base until you’re left with the tiny, powerless intersection that already agrees wi…

It's extremely hard for me to separate where we are now from the way that Moore's law dictates a pretty insane level of planned obsolescence for chips and therefore everything with a chip in it. If we make batteries replaceable or whatever other thing, how much do we change this fundamental dynamic? I feel like it's not very much. People are kidding themselves if they think somehow recycling ewaste or reusing your la…

> How could a computing field that moves slower than Moore's law even work?

Moore's Law has been breaking down for years already (to the point that people shift the goalposts as to what the actual quantity is that improves exponentially), so it's strange to ask. There are known physical limits that will prevent it from continuing indefinitely; and we aren't even that far away, to my understanding.

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