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Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

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Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#291

Post by davkan »

Gormo wrote: post #290
davkan wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a a ludicrous comparison. Not liking what people do in a building is the same as believing in baseless conspiracy theories? Regardless that’s not even why people are rejecting them. People are rejecting them because of what they do outside. Drive up power costs, take up space, use up water, raise the heat, make noise. And with almost zero upside for the community. The fact that they’re owned by unlikable charl…

> Not liking what people do in a building is the same as believing in baseless conspiracy theories? Yes. Obsessing over what people you have no relationship with are doing in their own facilities based on loose-associative, emotion-laden reasoning that leads you to believe that they are somehow harming you is 100% the conspiracy-theory mindset. > People are rejecting them because of what they do outside. Drive up pow…

> No, that doesn't seem correct. These qualities describe essentially all activity, especially economic and commercial activity. Every office building, factory, warehouse, school, hospital, housing complex, power plant, water plant, etc. also does exactly the things on your list.

Do you not recognize that half of the things you listed are ESSENTIAL for a community? The rest at least provide employment. Datacenters bring nothing for the community besides a handful of jobs not nearly commensurate with the downsides.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#292

Post by cratermoon »

smegma2 wrote: post #147
cratermoon wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

What ecosystem is it endangering? Is using the land a problem? Utah has 10.5 million acres of farmland that I would think has some impact on the ecosystem too, should we stop doing that too?

A major flyway for millions of migratory birds.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#293

Post by IshKebab »

Gormo wrote: post #283
IshKebab wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're heuristics but yes there are some clear tells. For prose, Wikipedia has a great list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Signs_of_AI_writing For code, I haven't read as much slop so I'm not as sure but one big tell is an unusual number of basic & unnecessary comments. And if it's version controlled, hilariously long commit messages with multiple sections.

Almost everything on that list seems invalid, at least as a simple checklist criteria. All of the tropes involved are ubiquitous in ordinary semi-formal writing, which is why the LLMs are using them in the first place. It's more reasonable to suggest that a mismatch in tone or register between the style of writing and the venue it's being published in could be an indicator of AI, and it's possible that people misiden…

The list isn't invalid. Those tropes existed before AI but they weren't used incessantly like AI does.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#294

Post by Gormo »

IshKebab wrote: post #293
Gormo wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost everything on that list seems invalid, at least as a simple checklist criteria. All of the tropes involved are ubiquitous in ordinary semi-formal writing, which is why the LLMs are using them in the first place. It's more reasonable to suggest that a mismatch in tone or register between the style of writing and the venue it's being published in could be an indicator of AI, and it's possible that people misiden…

The list isn't invalid. Those tropes existed before AI but they weren't used incessantly like AI does.

What mechanism do you suppose would cause LLMs to use writing tropes at a significantly greater rate than than is found in their training data?

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#295

Post by Gormo »

davkan wrote: post #291
Gormo wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not liking what people do in a building is the same as believing in baseless conspiracy theories? Yes. Obsessing over what people you have no relationship with are doing in their own facilities based on loose-associative, emotion-laden reasoning that leads you to believe that they are somehow harming you is 100% the conspiracy-theory mindset. > People are rejecting them because of what they do outside. Drive up pow…

> No, that doesn't seem correct. These qualities describe essentially all activity, especially economic and commercial activity. Every office building, factory, warehouse, school, hospital, housing complex, power plant, water plant, etc. also does exactly the things on your list. Do you not recognize that half of the things you listed are ESSENTIAL for a community? The rest at least provide employment. Datacenters br…

The point you're trying to make here seems to depend on an underlying premise that for people to use their property in certain ways, it's not enough that they comply with the various rules intended to minimize negative externalities, but that they must also somehow create positive externalities for others in proximity.

That premise isn't one that's generally adhered to as either a moral or legal principle, especially in the US, where we tend to have a strong preference for protecting property rights, and only justify restrictions on the basis of preventing harm to others, not some obligation to create benefit for them.

But aside from that, you seem to be conceding the point -- that opposition to new data centers is coming from concerns about AI itself, and not concerns related merely to the constriction of new commercial infrastructure.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#296

Post by howLongHowLong »

mike_hearn wrote: post #235
howLongHowLong wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://hellawater.com/why-is-my-water-brown-causes-solution... Here's one link amongst many a quick Google search that explains how low system pressure from increased demand can cause discolored water. (Check out the section on municipal water supply disruptions) I live in new orleans and entire neighborhoods need to boil water in periods of high demand.

Me: "that's a supply or piping issue" Your page: "This discoloration happens because of rust, dirt, or old pipes in your plumbing. Problems with the city water supply can also cause it." We're saying the same thing. It's the responsibility of the water system to pump clean water to people. Customers actually using that service can't be blamed for the system's failure to deliver it, as the customers aren't actually ma…

Or the responsibility of the city government not to permit a project which exceeds the capacity of the system to handle

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#297

Post by twoodfin »

kleton wrote: post #185

It's amazing how Karen Hao's (Empire of AI) confusion of cubic meters with liters of water for datacenters continues to get amplified, even after this error was publicly revealed.

Welcome to the memetic discourse!

Something like 20 years on we’re still hearing that “most” bankruptcies are caused by medical bills, even though that study (authored in part by Elizabeth Warren of all things!) was methodological nonsense.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#298

Post by tptacek »

cratermoon wrote: post #264
jwarden wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edward Abby wrote about southern Utah. Red rock country. Box Elder County is northern Utah. Night and day.

You missed the point. Ecosystems are not wastelands. Abbey’s descriptions of his Utah are compelling, but he’s still in places the uninformed would call dusty wastelands.

That is an argument against building data centers --- or anything else --- anywhere in the world.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#299

Post by davkan »

Gormo wrote: post #295
davkan wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, that doesn't seem correct. These qualities describe essentially all activity, especially economic and commercial activity. Every office building, factory, warehouse, school, hospital, housing complex, power plant, water plant, etc. also does exactly the things on your list. Do you not recognize that half of the things you listed are ESSENTIAL for a community? The rest at least provide employment. Datacenters br…

The point you're trying to make here seems to depend on an underlying premise that for people to use their property in certain ways, it's not enough that they comply with the various rules intended to minimize negative externalities, but that they must also somehow create positive externalities for others in proximity. That premise isn't one that's generally adhered to as either a moral or legal principle, especially…

No, my point is that is how most people evaluate these things. How does this massive infrastructure project benefit me and my community. And the math with datacenters is very clearly that they don't. You may think that they have no right to restrict building on private property but that is simply not the case. Municipalities usually do have the right to restrict usage of private property based on their laws. This premise plays out literally everywhere. Not always positively, re NIMBYs.

The recent increase opposition to datacenters online and at national level is absolutely due to AI. AI is in the zeitgeist. And also datacenter construction is increasing as a direct result of AI. I fully agree that the reason datacenter memes are on instagram right now is because of AI.

But at a local level it is fundamentally not about AI, it's about the effect on the community, which again, is negative. AI does have some small part because, as much as you may dislike it, sentiment about the purpose of a project does have an effect on a community's willingness to give a green light. But it's far from the defining issue at a local level where the actual resistance is. Communities were rallying against datacenter construction well before AI entered the conversation.

Re: Erin Brockovich made a map to track data centers around the country

#300

Post by tptacek »

cratermoon wrote: post #270
cootsnuck wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, I wonder the same. Something I've been wanting to read up on is how the land ownership works with these data center deals. Because developers promising massive projects to scoop up a bunch of land, do little to nothing with it, sit on it for awhile, and then eventually just sell it for a profit...that's not a new thing at all and isn't unique to the tech industry. I wouldn't be surprised if a not-so-insignifican…

It's absolutely likely that this Stratos project is a way to lock up land for future development. From Ogden to Provo there are really only two places to expand. West along I-80 a bit into the Oquirrh Mountains, but that runs into the salt flats and DoD land, or NW along I-84 into - you guessed it - Box Elder county. And for those calling it a wasteland, it’s easy to justify turning it into suburbs much like the subu…

What does "absolutely likely" mean?
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