Lloyd, I have seen dozens of stories about AI and Jevon's Paradox in the past week. None explains the past history and likely future of AI as clearly as you have done. Kudos!
"So now, the USA has to make head against a nation that not only harvests the beams of the sun with their solar panels but also possesses the power of AI."
And yet, there is this about China (Perplexity):
>> "Based on the most recent data available as of January 31, 2025, China has 1,161 operational coal-fired power plants"
"During the first six months of 2023, China issued permits for the construction of approximately 50 new coal-fired power plants, an average of two per week. China currently has more than 300 coal-fired plants that are either under construction, permitted, or awaiting permitting. If all 300 plants are constructed, China’s inventory of coal-fired power plants will increase by more than 25%.
Currently, China has six times more coal-fired power plants under construction than the rest of the World combined"
So, Lloyd, it isn't just "beams of the sun" - it's a WHOLE lot of fossil fuels. China's marketing is rather slick. China may be the leader in RE but they are the LEADER of coal and emissions.
In essence, the West could "hovel" itself and it wouldn't make a dang worth of difference in the use of coal. And India is right behind them.
They don't care about "offsetting" anything. Xi has a huge political problem in that he has to keep a billion people happy and that means keep on providing them with a more and more modern lifestyle. If he fails, he may literally be dead.
So, he is continuing to expand China energy resources and that will not stop. EVAH!
But to the outside world, they do the nuance that they care. Again, slick marketing.
Asymmetric energy warfare which doesn't care about emissions of any type.
We know the price of everything and the value of nothing
Starting before Aristotle and continuing relentlessly ever since materialism and dualism has replaced interconnection.
The top CEO s at Trump’s Inauguration like Trump himself have gained “ The World” and lost their souls. We witnessed the most massive display of total disconnect in our life times.
Trump is announcing that he will ban antisemitism and his co -President Musk did two well practiced Seig Heils and Bezos and Zuckerberg did nothing.
The Nazis choked 1.5 million Jewish children to death and burnt their tiny bodies in ovens and yet all those people so keen to stay at the apex of the dung heap sat there and the only time there was a negative reaction was when Bishop Budde spoke.
We do not need to travel to Mara . We do not need AI . We are in a death spiral of destruction due to a lack of Wisdom.
How long was the clip you watched? Did you see the entire context (which matters much) or just a sliver of it?
Be assured, there are a lot of folks on the other side of the aisle that have done similar arm/hand movement and no one ever said a thing. Try Tim Walz, for one.
I recently came across an interesting fact about coal used to make electricity. Every megawatt hour of electricity produced by burning coal leaves about 85 kilograms of coal waste, i.e. ash, slag, etc. This leftover crud is usually piled up near the power plant, where it can leach mercury and other nasty chemicals into the environment. Some is used in concrete, but most is just stored. Pretty much every coal power plant is a hazardous waste site, eventually to be cleaned up on the taxpayers' dime.
I looked at my rooftop solar statistics. In ten years, we've generated around 80 MWH.
The concept of sufficiency has been and remains the Achilles heel of humanity (perhaps even life in general). We appear fundamentally incapable as a group of constraining our conviction that if some is good more must be better. Evolution in a world of scarcity hardwired us this way. Reason applied can tame this demon that haunts us all but it takes hard mental work and unfortunately evolution has also built us in such a way as to ensure that we don’t expend a lot of energy thinking about anything beyond our immediate “needs”. It is a lethal combination. We are effectively a virus doomed to kill its host and we have no other host to jump toward to save ourselves. I am at heart am optimist but not a delusional one. We may survive as a species for a while but I see no actionable way forward in the longer run that does not involve a very ugly decline for most of us along the way. I would be delighted to have anyone point out one I have missed.
Fair point. The host will get on fine in the long run but I do think our activities will initiate changes to it that will be the catalyst for our demise or at least a rather severe humbling.
Funny about confluences of things. I was thinking about this vis a vis LED's a week ago when I wasted a couple of hours looking for a replacement for a ceiling mounted LED fixture. Unless one buys a cheep & ugly " builder quality " ceiling fixture there aren't any available where one can just change a light bulb. Once the LED's fail, the whole fixture is junk. On the plus side, I'll have to go to Goodwill & buy a 2nd hand fixture to replace this one.
Lloyd, I have seen dozens of stories about AI and Jevon's Paradox in the past week. None explains the past history and likely future of AI as clearly as you have done. Kudos!
Thank you Steve.
"So now, the USA has to make head against a nation that not only harvests the beams of the sun with their solar panels but also possesses the power of AI."
And yet, there is this about China (Perplexity):
>> "Based on the most recent data available as of January 31, 2025, China has 1,161 operational coal-fired power plants"
Add to that, purportedly, 2 additional coal fired plants/week: https://insights.taylorenglish.com/post/102iw50/china-is-building-coal-fired-power-plants-at-an-alarming-rate
Taylor English: https://insights.taylorenglish.com/post/102iw50/china-is-building-coal-fired-power-plants-at-an-alarming-rate
"During the first six months of 2023, China issued permits for the construction of approximately 50 new coal-fired power plants, an average of two per week. China currently has more than 300 coal-fired plants that are either under construction, permitted, or awaiting permitting. If all 300 plants are constructed, China’s inventory of coal-fired power plants will increase by more than 25%.
Currently, China has six times more coal-fired power plants under construction than the rest of the World combined"
So, Lloyd, it isn't just "beams of the sun" - it's a WHOLE lot of fossil fuels. China's marketing is rather slick. China may be the leader in RE but they are the LEADER of coal and emissions.
In essence, the West could "hovel" itself and it wouldn't make a dang worth of difference in the use of coal. And India is right behind them.
"China needs to offset that amount of coal?"
They don't care about "offsetting" anything. Xi has a huge political problem in that he has to keep a billion people happy and that means keep on providing them with a more and more modern lifestyle. If he fails, he may literally be dead.
So, he is continuing to expand China energy resources and that will not stop. EVAH!
But to the outside world, they do the nuance that they care. Again, slick marketing.
Asymmetric energy warfare which doesn't care about emissions of any type.
But I bet you can compute that in terms of hamburgers, eh?
We do not lack energy we lack wisdom.
We know the price of everything and the value of nothing
Starting before Aristotle and continuing relentlessly ever since materialism and dualism has replaced interconnection.
The top CEO s at Trump’s Inauguration like Trump himself have gained “ The World” and lost their souls. We witnessed the most massive display of total disconnect in our life times.
Trump is announcing that he will ban antisemitism and his co -President Musk did two well practiced Seig Heils and Bezos and Zuckerberg did nothing.
The Nazis choked 1.5 million Jewish children to death and burnt their tiny bodies in ovens and yet all those people so keen to stay at the apex of the dung heap sat there and the only time there was a negative reaction was when Bishop Budde spoke.
We do not need to travel to Mara . We do not need AI . We are in a death spiral of destruction due to a lack of Wisdom.
How long was the clip you watched? Did you see the entire context (which matters much) or just a sliver of it?
Be assured, there are a lot of folks on the other side of the aisle that have done similar arm/hand movement and no one ever said a thing. Try Tim Walz, for one.
Didn't like the Bright Flashlight pointed at you so you deleted your comment?
So few people bother to examine the fuller context. Fewer still go looking for it and comparing such an event to history.
That's intellectual laziness.
I recently came across an interesting fact about coal used to make electricity. Every megawatt hour of electricity produced by burning coal leaves about 85 kilograms of coal waste, i.e. ash, slag, etc. This leftover crud is usually piled up near the power plant, where it can leach mercury and other nasty chemicals into the environment. Some is used in concrete, but most is just stored. Pretty much every coal power plant is a hazardous waste site, eventually to be cleaned up on the taxpayers' dime.
I looked at my rooftop solar statistics. In ten years, we've generated around 80 MWH.
The concept of sufficiency has been and remains the Achilles heel of humanity (perhaps even life in general). We appear fundamentally incapable as a group of constraining our conviction that if some is good more must be better. Evolution in a world of scarcity hardwired us this way. Reason applied can tame this demon that haunts us all but it takes hard mental work and unfortunately evolution has also built us in such a way as to ensure that we don’t expend a lot of energy thinking about anything beyond our immediate “needs”. It is a lethal combination. We are effectively a virus doomed to kill its host and we have no other host to jump toward to save ourselves. I am at heart am optimist but not a delusional one. We may survive as a species for a while but I see no actionable way forward in the longer run that does not involve a very ugly decline for most of us along the way. I would be delighted to have anyone point out one I have missed.
Hey VB?
'We are effectively a virus doomed to kill its host'
Nelson666 reincarnated!
Fair point. The host will get on fine in the long run but I do think our activities will initiate changes to it that will be the catalyst for our demise or at least a rather severe humbling.
Brilliant!
Funny about confluences of things. I was thinking about this vis a vis LED's a week ago when I wasted a couple of hours looking for a replacement for a ceiling mounted LED fixture. Unless one buys a cheep & ugly " builder quality " ceiling fixture there aren't any available where one can just change a light bulb. Once the LED's fail, the whole fixture is junk. On the plus side, I'll have to go to Goodwill & buy a 2nd hand fixture to replace this one.
Always interesting reading you Lloyd. I did not knew about that Jevon's paradox but it sound very similar to the very hilarious Hygrade slogan :)
Have you read “ The Great Derangement “
by Amitav Ghosh?
Are you familiar with Earth 4 All and The Doughnut Economy?
Nexus by Yuval Noah Harari
The Web of Meaning by Jeremy Lent ?
yes to doughnut economics, no to the others, I will have a look.