zazo

joined 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Here's some math on that "revolutionary" idea to put things into perspective, as it turns out, it's pretty underwhelming:

  • If we used ALL the aluminum produced globally in a year (about 65 million tons), we'd get around 7.30 million tons of hydrogen.
  • While that might sound like a lot, it really isn't.. That hydrogen would contain about 8.30 x 10^14 BTUs of energy.
  • Meanwhile, our annual global methane production is sitting pretty at 1.14 x 10^17 BTU.
  • Doing the math, and our "amazing" aluminum-to-hydrogen process gives us a whopping 0.73% of the energy we get from methane...

And remember, this is assuming we use EVERY SINGLE BIT of aluminum we produce globally!

Obv hydrogen is "cleaner" than gas, but the point is the scale - this method is a drop in the ocean compared to current energy usage.

TL;DR: Using ALL the world's annual aluminum production to make hydrogen would only give us 0.73% of the energy we get from natural gas....

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For the math nerds, here's more detail on the chemistry and energy calc:

  • The reaction: 2 Al + 6 H2O → 2 Al(OH)3 + 3 H2
  • Global aluminum production: ~65 million metric tons/year
  • Molar mass of Al = 26.98 g/mol
  • Moles of Al = 65,000,000,000 kg / 0.02698 kg/mol = 2.41 x 10^12 moles
  • H2 produced = (2.41 x 10^12 moles Al * 3) / 2 = 3.62 x 10^12 moles H2
  • Mass of H2 = 3.62 x 10^12 moles * 2.016 g/mol = 7.30 x 10^12 g = 7.30 million metric tons

BTU Calculation:

  • Energy content of H2 = 113,738 BTU/kg
  • Total energy from H2 = 7.30 x 10^9 kg * 113,738 BTU/kg = 8.30 x 10^14 BTU

Methane Comparison:

  • Annual natural gas production ≈ 4,000 billion cubic meters
  • Assuming 80% methane content: 3,200 billion cubic meters of methane
  • Energy content of methane ≈ 35,663 BTU/m^3
  • Total energy from methane = 3,200 x 10^9 m^3 * 35,663 BTU/m^3 = 1.14 x 10^17 BTU
  • Ratio: (8.30 x 10^14) /(1.14 x 10^17) = 0.0073 or 0.73%
[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

it's still a Li-ion (like most current rechargeables) but the electrolyte - the medium that transfers the ions from the anode to the cathode - (the + and -) inside the battery is made of a solid material instead of the current gen liquid ones. The benefits are less weight/size (as liquids take up more space than solids) and a more stable composition - the liquid electrolyte can't leak - the way batteries get gunky and corroded if left for a while

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago (8 children)

What I don't get is why spend the effort dealing with YTs shit just to increase their userbase when we should be focusing on shifting people away from YT and into decentralized solutions like PeerTube anyways?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

Isn't this just a DIY brushless dynamo? Am I missing something? Still cool tho

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

What if it was so small and light it was only electrons? And what if it accrues its value from the energy expended to create it? Maybe using some sort of cypher to ensure anyone could verify it? Idk maybe we're onto something..

then again it still syphons value to the top so maybe not...

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

If you don't think building chairs or sculptures requires solving "intellectual" challenges you've never tried building a completely wooden multi-axial interlocking joint furniture...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

My dude, my grandfather got fired after the collapse of the soviet economy because "artist" wasn't a productive enough job to be kept around, but he still made art for 20 years after without getting paid because his purpose in life was to create art, not to sell it.

And sure the theft argument would be valid, but that's a strawman, because Adobe have already trained their own image gen model on fully licensed images and real life artists are already paying money to use it, so they must see the value in it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

But like, it will happen anyways. You can't stop Musk from shoving Grok down everyone's throats and firing 80% of his work force to replace them with AI drones.

If we saw the potential in these tools, and decided as a society to just let the machines do all the stuff we don't want to do, and we all got to do whatever meaningful beautiful things our hearts wanted, then sure.

Yes, literally this, my argument is literally we use all our efforts to fight for this, as making something beautiful out of a shit situation is literally all life has and I feel always will be.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (3 children)

Any artist who stops being an artist because someone else can put words into a computer and get a big tiddy goth gf pic out, wasn't really that interested in making art in the first place.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (3 children)

That's a good attitude to have and I'm not advocating for putting down our arms and waiting for big tech to steamroll us all.

But as I've mentioned elsewhere, the people making the AI models are fully aware they are contributing to a technology that will take away their own jobs, because they think that it will create other, even more interesting jobs in the process. (see trad artists swearing off photography in it's early days because it was "mechanical and soulless", only to realize it's creative potential years later)

My advice would be to continue being aware of the negative history of things, but don't let it blind you to the positive aspects either.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (5 children)

See, that's the crux of the argument I feel. You can't have one without the other, you can't have voice generation for the mute without that technology also displacing voice actors in the process.

That's why I think the Luddite approach doesn't work, we can't forcefully break the machines that are capable of so much good because they're also capable of so much bad.

Instead we should focus on helping those that are most negatively impacted by their existence, while supporting everyone that is already being positively affected by them. (like the UBI mentioned in my other comment)

PS. Totes down for replacing CEOs with AI and distributing their salary among the workers

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

It's fine to get paid for your skills, but from experience I can say that developing skills just to get paid is also rather soulless.

Since, sure, I can bet there're furry artists that love drawing sexy tigers to bits, but I can guarantee there's a not-so-small percentage that would much rather draw something else, but the yiffing money is too good to pass up on.

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