Solar panels aren't made of lithium, but they are made of a wide variety of other things that have to be mined (which, again, uses up space and has to be taken into consideration), and the batteries which will be…
"No longer needed once the panel is produced" The land used for the mining isn't land that we're just getting back--given the costs of making it useful again for anything else, space used for a lithium mine is in almost…
Strategic installation of solar panels certainly helps maximize efficiency, and is in general a great idea, especially in some areas. But to your point about the space taken up by uranium and coal mines, that's only a…
Happy to discuss the numbers of your numbers-based argument, but you didn't cite your sources.
1370/sq km is at the atmospheric level. The amount that actually reaches the surface is significantly less.
While I'm less optimistic than you on solar power, you're absolutely right about ethanol, which is easily one of the worst and most inefficient power sources we could have possibly chosen to invest in. It's a…
Correct--while the sun sends an enormous amount of free energy our way, it's maddeningly diffuse and requires enormous investments of energy and materials to capture it in a usable and reliable form. The Wynn in Vegas…
I agree with your perspective on this, but my hope is that it won't have a major negative externality at the end of the day--drum machines and drum software have really solid for well over a decade now, but plenty of…
This is a really excellent point, both in general and vis a vis the conflict in Ukraine. Something I see happening often is that some people are quick to confuse expertise-as-credential with expertise-as-substance, or…
I think it's an oversimplification to argue that the mind as a whole is like a closet, but I do think memory specifically works a bit in this way--hence the well-established utility of memory palace methods. Giordano…
This is spot on in my opinion and I wish more people would keep it in mind--it may well be that large language models can eventually become functionally very much like AGI in terms of what they can output, but they are…
I can believe that they've been tracking it for awhile, but it is unlikely that they can easily shoot it down. We probably literally don't have the technical capacity to do so reliably at this time.
The quantifiable characteristics of the light spectrum are the same--the experience of the qualia are not necessarily the same. This is common with taste and smell; it could easily be the same story with the experience…
Qualia are one of the more interesting subjects in the study of mind because they're inextricable from our perceptions and our experience of everything, but they can't be reduced or quantified in any meaningful way. (If…
I don't think you can get good at doing calculations without practicing the calculations, but reading books that discuss the higher-level aspects of math and the philosophical underpinnings can help you look at it in a…
It's not just lithium that's the problem; copper is also a major component, and we don't have nearly enough of that either. A full transition to electric vehicles is not viable with current technologies. If we can make…
I've played both piano and guitar for many years now, and the distinction I'd make is that piano is easier to start out on than guitar, but harder to get good at--in the long run the difficulty of mastery is probably…
By 2030? Lol. Lmao, even. 2050 if we're lucky--we're still not even close to developing a reactor that can produce meaningful amounts of power for a sustained period. It'll take decades more to get to that point, and…
Cool technical achievement, but it has essentially no implications for economically or politically significant energy generation anytime soon.
No, bobajeff is correct. The vast majority of language acquisition occurs through input and exposure to the language via reading and listening. Trying to speak when you have no grasp yet of the grammar and vocabulary is…
Solar panels aren't made of lithium, but they are made of a wide variety of other things that have to be mined (which, again, uses up space and has to be taken into consideration), and the batteries which will be…
"No longer needed once the panel is produced" The land used for the mining isn't land that we're just getting back--given the costs of making it useful again for anything else, space used for a lithium mine is in almost…
Strategic installation of solar panels certainly helps maximize efficiency, and is in general a great idea, especially in some areas. But to your point about the space taken up by uranium and coal mines, that's only a…
Happy to discuss the numbers of your numbers-based argument, but you didn't cite your sources.
1370/sq km is at the atmospheric level. The amount that actually reaches the surface is significantly less.
While I'm less optimistic than you on solar power, you're absolutely right about ethanol, which is easily one of the worst and most inefficient power sources we could have possibly chosen to invest in. It's a…
Correct--while the sun sends an enormous amount of free energy our way, it's maddeningly diffuse and requires enormous investments of energy and materials to capture it in a usable and reliable form. The Wynn in Vegas…
I agree with your perspective on this, but my hope is that it won't have a major negative externality at the end of the day--drum machines and drum software have really solid for well over a decade now, but plenty of…
This is a really excellent point, both in general and vis a vis the conflict in Ukraine. Something I see happening often is that some people are quick to confuse expertise-as-credential with expertise-as-substance, or…
I think it's an oversimplification to argue that the mind as a whole is like a closet, but I do think memory specifically works a bit in this way--hence the well-established utility of memory palace methods. Giordano…
This is spot on in my opinion and I wish more people would keep it in mind--it may well be that large language models can eventually become functionally very much like AGI in terms of what they can output, but they are…
I can believe that they've been tracking it for awhile, but it is unlikely that they can easily shoot it down. We probably literally don't have the technical capacity to do so reliably at this time.
The quantifiable characteristics of the light spectrum are the same--the experience of the qualia are not necessarily the same. This is common with taste and smell; it could easily be the same story with the experience…
Qualia are one of the more interesting subjects in the study of mind because they're inextricable from our perceptions and our experience of everything, but they can't be reduced or quantified in any meaningful way. (If…
I don't think you can get good at doing calculations without practicing the calculations, but reading books that discuss the higher-level aspects of math and the philosophical underpinnings can help you look at it in a…
It's not just lithium that's the problem; copper is also a major component, and we don't have nearly enough of that either. A full transition to electric vehicles is not viable with current technologies. If we can make…
I've played both piano and guitar for many years now, and the distinction I'd make is that piano is easier to start out on than guitar, but harder to get good at--in the long run the difficulty of mastery is probably…
By 2030? Lol. Lmao, even. 2050 if we're lucky--we're still not even close to developing a reactor that can produce meaningful amounts of power for a sustained period. It'll take decades more to get to that point, and…
Cool technical achievement, but it has essentially no implications for economically or politically significant energy generation anytime soon.
No, bobajeff is correct. The vast majority of language acquisition occurs through input and exposure to the language via reading and listening. Trying to speak when you have no grasp yet of the grammar and vocabulary is…