this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2026
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Billionaires trying to kill the rest of us faster.
Sometimes I wonder where we could be if all the AI money was spent on e.g. fusion energy research instead.
Who cares about fusion? There was a study in the late 90's stating that if only 10% of the capital put towards oil research, exploration, extraction, etc, annually, was put towards renewable energies it would catapult the research output by a factor of 30, by year.
We could have, by now, moved completely towards renewables for everyday life needs and start towards producing more energy we could ever need and put that excess towards greater achievements.
We could be exploring the stars instead. NASA’s original plan was land on Luna, survey, then build a shipyard. Instead we just launched a rocket asap and told Ivan to suck it. The centuries long plan NASA had was just…one small step
You solve the problems you have at home before you start making yourself concerned with what your neighbor is doing at theirs.
Space exploration, as it was sold to the general public, was an arms race. The public demonstration of which nation could build faster the engine and carcass capable of delivering a nuclear payload on the other. The money spent on that would have been better spent towards achieving true and long lasting civilizational goal, like disease and poverty erradication, environmental preservation, clean energy and so forth.
It's the broken window falacy.
I guess we would be 30 years from stable scalable fusion reactions?
I’ve been cynical about them for years but there’s been enough interesting milestones crossed lately that I wonder if an injection of AI money wouldn’t just do the trick.
They don't want us dead, they want us making money for them
They'd really love it if we could be dead and making money for them. They live in hope!
Yes, but they also don't care if the grand majority of us are dead.
They have what they need.
That's why most have bunkers.
Fuckerbergs is in Hawaii.
They just want us to make money. They don't give a fuck if you die.
Not really. They are actively trying to circumvent consumers as a step to making money. That is what the entire AI-circlejerk bubble is about.
They still need us to advance AI until it's able to self-improve. That's why they're pumping so much money into scaling. Once they have that, we'll have lost all leverage - that's what their evaluations are based on.
I don't think the current approach can achieve this, but it looks like they'll do their damndest to try. They've already prepared for the worst, and if they can choose between X years before everything goes to shit, or X minus ? years before it goes to shit BUT they get AGI to play with in their bunkers...
That's funny because I would prefer them dead and I bet there are more who think like me than there are who think like them. Maybe they should start getting frightened. I'm not saying we should kill them, but I wouldn't bat an eye if they just dropped dead. And I bet not much would be lost for humanity after we sat down and made a plan how to redistribute their wealth and equity.
Remember when Elon was all about "transitioning the world to sustainable transportation"? LOL
He was never about that.
He said he was, but actions speak louder and if he ever was he'd be promoting Hydrogen-electric with a Hydrogen ICE transition* instead of battery electric which isn't sustainable and is environmentally disastrous in its own way.
*Diesel ICE can be converted to Hydrogen ICE (note: they still need ~5-10% diesel, so it's not a forever technology) - https://www.unsw.edu.au/engineering/research-technology/is/converting-diesel-engines-to-run-on-hydrogen
Give it up. Hydrogen is not happening. Batteries have won. Now we need to move to more sustainable chemistries.
Oh, and yeah, Elon was always just posing.
While I believe that the various pushes for hydrogen in cars and light trucks is a shameless attempt at replacing the revenue stream from petrol, hydrogen does make a lot of sense for heavy trucks, trains, ships - anywhere diesel or bunker fuel is used now.
Or possibly converted into ammonia which is not as hard to transport. But yeah, there might be some residual uses.
Found the Toyota rep
My diesel car has run on B100 (100% biodiesel) just fine for years. That's already good enough and requires no new technology or infrastructure. Hydrogen is stupid as hell.
Hydrogen can make some degree of sense if we take as an energy reserve, stockpileable, for an event where it is necessary to suplement energy needs.
So many countries with solar farms being turned off to prevent grid collapse could consider building hydrogen plants or, those with sea acess, dessalination stations, to stockpile fresh water underground and extract minerals directly from the water.
Batteries have a much smaller overall environmental footprint than traditional ICE vehicles. Hydrogen is also produced at scale in a super dirty way right now. There is no clean way to produce hydrogen fuel. So, our goal should be less travel overall, public transit, and EVs, in that order.
If we find a way to mass produce hydrogen in a clean way, then I'm all for hydrogen vehicles. But, we aren't there yet.
They don't realise that it's gonna be their own funeral, too. Sure, Elmo and Bebos will most likely die of old age (or drug abuse) in a few decades but many of those cunts are under 30, and they absolutely will have to deal with the apocalyptic consequences of their actions.
And it's not just them at this point; thousands of politicians and property developers are in it as well. I don't think most of them are trying to do harm, they're just blinded by greed.
Too used to money insulating from reality.
maybe they are bitter because they cant live forever and want to take us out. Make as much money out of us as they can, live lavish life and leave everything in ruins after they are done. If we let them, we deserve it. But i dont think we should let them.
Anyone that can should do at least some act of resistance, even if it feels meaningless. Throwing a fucking rock at datacenter physically affects nothing, but symbolically it has value. Imagine 100 people throwin a rock at datacenter, while still likely doenst do anything it would be big message to everyone else. Though it would likely also result in getting into trouble, so everyone should also do some risk evaluation what they can get away with. But simple graffitti could also be effective or even just plain speaking your mind loudly about things.
And most importantly, what the enemy fears most is our unity. So everyone should definitely do everything they can to improve that. Together we stand, separated we die.
Honestly, I don't think we can really stop them. The only people they have to answer to are politicians/government officials and those can be bribed. Sure, we can protest data centres and stuff but even if we're victorious in stopping one from getting built in place a, there's always a place b.
I hope humanity hasnt become too docile, walking peacefully into the slaughterhouse.
Peaceful resistance is good if you have infinite amount of time, so we should be prepared to be non-peaceful and actually resist these fuckers. Maybe even forcing their hand and making them tighten the screws on populace to keep control would help with people wanting actual change because they wouldnt be so comfortable with the oppression anymore, i dont know.
but at this point i'm at peace with either option, resist or die. i just would prefer if humanity didnt go out / lose all potential because of few vile beings.
I'd prefer that as well but I feel so defenceless in the matter
They know that things are going to be shit. They just wasn't the nicest yacht to live on when it does.
I think if they could fully comprehend what was happening right now, they wouldn't do it.
I don't think that's true.
I think they know the future is bleak, and they just want to have the best bio dome or whatever the case may be.
As in, they know they're making things worse, but if they don't do it someone else will. So in a bleak and shit future, do you want to live like a king, or choke to death like the rest of us.
It's a hydra though. If a capitalist leader/billionaire/oil super power abdicates, all available capitalists swarm to fill the vacancy and rake in the power and profits that were given up.
They don't care the world is ending due to their greed and corruption, they just want to be rich and powerful.
Yes, when people get to a certain level of rich, they generally lack vision and imagination; they don’t need it anymore.
See they think they're doing Human Instrumentality from NGE
That they will discover true AGI in their lifetime, and then use it to become a living god.
We really have literacy crisis on our hands. Their estimates put the industry (if we pretend it'll not crash and keep growing) at 34 million tonnes of CO2. What percentage of USAs yearly emissions is that? 0,6% of net emissions.
It's not the animal AG that's doing it, not the oil industry, and not the car industry. It's the 0,6% that MAYBE might happen.
I say this not to ignore those things, but to sensitize your valid impulse to fix global climate change issues to the real culprits. Most importantly, I'd like people to adjust their levels of effort and outrage to the actual impacts instead.
If you cared as much as you pretend you do, you'd already be vegan.