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rimeice | 5 months ago

> Some people think artificial intelligence will be the most important technology of the 21st century.

I don’t, I think a workable fusion reactor will be the most important technology of the 21st century.

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jacknews|5 months ago

How so?

The maximum possible benefit of fusion (aside from the science gained in the attempt) is cheap energy.

We'll get very cheap energy just by massively rolling out existing solar panels (maybe some at sea), and other renewables, HVDC and batteries/storage.

Fusion is almost certain to be uneconomical in comparison if it's even feasible technically.

AI, is already dramtically impacting some fields, including science (eg deepfold), and AGI would be a step-change.

rimeice|5 months ago

Cheap, _limitless_ energy from fusion could solve almost every geopolitical/environmental issue we face today. Europe is acutely aware of this at the moment and it's why China and America are investing mega bucks. We will eventually run out of finite energy sources. Even if we do capture the max capacity possible from renewables with 100% efficiency, our energy consumption rates increasing at current rates will eventually exceed this max capacity. Those rates are accelerating. We really have no choice.

hx8|5 months ago

Fusion at 100% grid scale might be better for the environment than solar at 100% grid scale.

It might be nice if at the end of the 21st century that is something we care.

gizajob|5 months ago

We’ll probably need to innovate one of those to power the immense requirements of AI chatbots.

geerlingguy|5 months ago

I think we'll need a few hundred, if spending continues like it has this year.

_heimdall|5 months ago

What makes you think we'll have fusion reactors in the 21st century?

ponector|4 months ago

What makes people think we'll have AGI in the 21st century? LLM is not AI, and as far away from AGI as self-parking car.

Quarrelsome|5 months ago

ITER apparently fires up in 2039.

rimeice|5 months ago

I don’t think we’ll have the choice.

Bigsy|5 months ago

Deepmind are working on solving the plasma control issue at the moment, I suspect they're probably using a bit of AI.... and I wouldn't put it past them to crack it.

robinhoode|5 months ago

This is the thing with AI: We can always come up with a new architecture with different inputs & outputs to solve lots of problems that couldn't be solved before.

People equating AI with other single-problem-solving technologies are clearly not seeing the bigger picture.

BrokenCogs|5 months ago

Time travel will be the most important invention of the 21st century ;)

nemo|5 months ago

Time travel was the most important invention of the 1800s too, but that goes to show how bad resolving the temporal paradox issue is, now that entire history is gone.

seydor|5 months ago

but people say that AI will spit out that fusion reactor, ergo AI investment is prior in the ordo investimendi or whatever it would be called (by an AI)

tbrownaw|5 months ago

We'll finally have electricity that's too cheap to meter.

fundatus|5 months ago

Why would it be too cheap to meter? You're still heating up water and putting it through a turbine. We've been doing that for ages (just different sources of energy for the heating up part) and we still meter energy because these things cost money and need lots of maintenance.

Perz1val|5 months ago

As we have more and more solars, we see rises for being connected to the grid more and more while electricity stays relatively cheap. Fusion won't change that, somebody has to pay for the guy reconnecting cables after a storm

lopis|5 months ago

And we'll use it all to run more crypto/AI/next thing

DengistKhan|4 months ago

Residential will still cost more somehow.

mattmaroon|5 months ago

Because it’ll power AI!

fundatus|5 months ago

I mean, we already have a giant working fusion reactor (the sun) and we can even harvest it's energy (solar, wind, etc)! That's pretty awesome.

NoGravitas|5 months ago

Using gravitational containment rather than magnetic containment is a pretty cool approach.

baq|5 months ago

if AI won't be a fad like everything else, we're going to need these, pronto

...and it does seem this time that we aren't even in the huge overcapacity part of the bubble yet, and won't be for a year or two.