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America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

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Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#571

Post by yibg »

nradov wrote: post #169
yibg wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear people (media, politicians) talk about bringing manufacturing jobs back to America, but I haven't heard too much well articulated reasons for why. There are issues with national security, reliance on less than friendly nations etc. For instance, we'd want to grow our own food, even if importing would be cheaper. But those surely aren't the majority of manufacturing jobs. Given the choice of increasing the numb…

Global supply chains seem to be gradually breaking down due to a mix of politics, demographics, and armed conflicts. Everyone has become accustomed to the post-WWII system of global free trade but historically it is an aberration and everything will eventually revert to the mean. I wouldn't be surprised if China disintegrates into another civil war within the next few decades. We can't necessarily rely on foreign cou…

Problem is if we (any country really) tried to build everything ourselves while other countries engages in trade then we are at a major disadvantage.

Of course some things are more sensitive and should be made domestically even at lower efficiency / higher cost. But if that’s applied to everything then we are just shooting ourselves in the foot. Plus the opportunity cost of not doing something else that we are more uniquely positioned to excel at.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#572

Post by avn2109 »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #510
red-iron-pine wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

arguably the biggest driver is simply the cost of oil. crumple zones made of styrofoam and plastic bumpers arn't making things heavy. e.g. https://www.forbes.com/sites/samabuelsamid/2019/01/03/new-ve...

Another thing not mentioned by this poor article (everything forbes does these days is hot garbage), is that vehicles which are heavier do damage quartically proportional to their weight - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_power_law So the ever increasing weight of cars, trucks, SUVs, and especially semi-trucks is also responsible for our roads being shit, full of potholes, and expensive to fix.

Surely they do damage proportional to the fourth power of the contact pressure on the tire contact patch, not the fourth power of the overall vehicle weight, right? So adding axles or wider tires etc mitigates this.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#573

Post by Braxton1980 »

kenhwang wrote: post #360
nradov wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cars haven't gotten any lighter. Rather the reverse. Battery packs are quite heavy.

Even non-EVs have gotten quite a bit heavier due to the inclusion of more structural safety features and creature comforts.

It's also due to the size of the vehicles that are popular today. SUVs and pickup trucks(used as family vehicles).

However the increase has also been offset with weight savings in other places.

- The use of aluminum in suspension components and body panels

- Long ago the move to unibody over body on frame for small cars

- smaller engines, V8s weigh more than an inline 4 cylinder and require heavier suspension components.

For example a 1989 Lamborghini Countach 25th weighs around 3200lbs which is slightly heavier than a 2022 VW Golf GTI (3150~)

I see comments that blame safety technology (electronic components) for increasing the weight of a car but a blind spot monitoring system probably weighs less than 5lbs. A rear camera is also around that.

Structural safety and airbags do add to a cars weight but these changes have made cars extremely safe.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#574

Post by yibg »

teyc wrote: post #286
yibg wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I agree. Tariffs adds cost, unless domestic manufacturing can be done in a more or less cost effective way. Manufacturing works benefit of course but that's a overall small proportion of the population and ought to be (we probably don't want most people to be doing manufacturing work). But the added costs end up be a tax on everyone and a regressive one at that. I also don't see offshoring manufacturing…

why does this arbitrage exist? Why is the cost of energy, the fundamental input into every economy, cheaper in Asia? Tractors consume fuel, fertilisers do too. Human labour is the least efficient at converting fuel into energy. When you dig a little deeper, you'd find an economy structured around keeping rentiers away from the basics: housing, energy and food.

Energy doesn’t come from just raw materials. It takes extraction, refinement, transportation etc in the case of petroleum, or manufacturing, installation etc in the case of wind and solar.

If you mean in terms of general economics, why are some countries cheaper than others, I’m not really qualified to make a statement there. I’m also not talking about if it’s right or wrong. But it is the reality today.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#575

Post by bigbuppo »

gmadsen wrote: post #556
deadbabe wrote: post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once you can run a GPT5 level LLM locally on a device, it’s over. All this mighty infrastructure is no longer any more impressive than a top of the line 2013 Mac Pro in 2025. I think we’re 10 years away from that.

10 years from now, the capabilities of gpt5 will be as relevant to AI as Atari is to modern gaming

So people will be paying money for the nostalgia of ChatGPT after it dies? That tracks.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#576

Post by jszymborski »

Animats wrote: post #563

Jim Farley, the CEO of Ford, has been visiting factories in China.[1] "Ford CEO Jim Farley said Chinese cars have "far superior" technology, lower costs and great quality." Ford is working on fixing this and getting a $30,000 EV out the door.[2] [1] https://insideevs.com/news/764318/ford-ceo-china-evs-humbled... [2] https://archive.is/kUbEW

Very different tact from GM, it seems

https://www.ft.com/content/096e883a-7dea-48a9-bbb3-72f4e79e7...

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#577

Post by Rover222 »

mrinterweb wrote: post #505

Investing in AI infrastructure seems very risky to me. With how short of a lifecycle computing hardware generally has, does it make sense to blow billions on hardware that will need to be replaced in a few years? AI companies have been burning billions on hardware. Will the costs of that hardware be covered by profits before the hardware lifecycle is up? That's a big gamble. We used to talk about AI as having no moat…

Each datacenter iteration that increases the size and power consumption is a stepping stone towards (possibly) recursive self-improvement in AI tech. I think that's the way to frame the absolutely massive bets being made by (only a few) companies. There aren't many companies or nation states in the world that can marshal the resources and talent needed to keep competing on this path.

It's a race to the the most powerful and transformative technology in history.

Or it might all collapse like a house of cards. But worth a shot.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#578

Post by yibg »

trollbridge wrote: post #372
yibg wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like the US in particular isn't able to pick one path and stick with it. The shift towards services has already happened. But investment in silicon, renewables etc is on again off again. There now seems to be a desire to bring all manufacturing jobs back to the US, although it's not clear who wants this or why. e.g. who actually wants clothing and toy manufacturing back in the US? So we have a set of ad hoc…

A great deal of investment in renewables just meant importing solar panels and wind turbines from China that will wear out in 19 years. Outside of a few jobs in trucking to moving parts and a few jobs to install them, it does not create a solid labour base nor good careers. I certainly want clothing manufacture back in the U.S. with a focus on using renewable (ie. not microplastic based) textiles to make articles of…

If we can make the same product domestically better (cheaper, higher quality etc) then that doesn’t require a barrier in theory. Just make it and sell it for cheaper or sell it for the same but with higher quality.

Problem is for the most part that cannot be done. There is a market for made in USA, where people are willing to pay more for higher quality, more sustainable, local etc, but it’s still a relatively small market.

Just like airline tickets. People complain about lack of space and bad food, but when presented with the choice most people still pick the cheapest option.

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#579

Post by codyb »

mrinterweb wrote: post #505

Investing in AI infrastructure seems very risky to me. With how short of a lifecycle computing hardware generally has, does it make sense to blow billions on hardware that will need to be replaced in a few years? AI companies have been burning billions on hardware. Will the costs of that hardware be covered by profits before the hardware lifecycle is up? That's a big gamble. We used to talk about AI as having no moat…

Considering we're two years in and everyone's still... talking about chatbots pretty much. Yea, I'd say that's a hell of a gamble.

Of course the hardware can probably be repurposed towards crypto mining afterwards, so hey!

Re: America is getting an AI gold rush instead of a factory boom

#580

Post by zevon »

helltone wrote: post #529
StopDisinfo910 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think "mucking around" is the correct perspective there. It's hard to argue that most if not all of the recent innovations in manufacturing concern making chains more modulable, and easier and cheaper to modifywhich you could see as bringing manufacturing closer and closer to software engineering and this is probably to be even more true in the year to come. Large scale automation using mostly wireless techno…

Do you have some references for the pick and place and other reconfiguration things you mentioned. I've been out of this space for a while but last I checked these were still incredibly challenging things to get right.

I'd also like more comprehensive write-ups on such topics but either I haven't found the right sources yet or all the people who know how to set up and keep modern fabrication infrastructure going are too busy raking in the cash and making stuff. ^^

If you like visual media, the "Strange Parts" YouTube channel is an interesting source for glimpses into modern, mostly Chinese factories: https://www.youtube.com/@StrangeParts/

Since you're asking about pick and place specifically, https://www.opulo.io/ is an interesting example of how far/cheap you can push such machinery (and the design in and of itself is interesting from a manufacturing point of view). Not all that relevant from a mass-production point of view, though.

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