Artificial Intelligence

[pErvinalia]

OpenAI calls for robot taxes, a public wealth fund, and a 4-day workweek to tackle AI disruption

In a series of policy recommendations released on Monday, OpenAI said the rapid advance of AI would require far-reaching economic and political reforms, including a public wealth fund, taxes on automated labor, and a potential four-day workweek.

"We're beginning a transition toward superintelligence: AI systems capable of outperforming the smartest humans even when they are assisted by AI. No one knows exactly how this transition will unfold. At OpenAI, we believe we should navigate it through a democratic process that gives people real power to shape the AI future they want," the company wrote on Monday.

The company said the policy document offered a series of "initial ideas" to address the risk of "jobs and entire industries being disrupted" by the adoption of AI tools.

Among the core policy suggestions is a public wealth fund, which would see lawmakers and AI companies work together to invest in long-term assets linked to the AI boom, with returns distributed directly to citizens.

Another is that the government should encourage and incentivize employers to experiment with four-day workweeks with no loss in pay and offer "benefits bonuses" tied to productivity gains from new AI tools.

The policy document also suggests lawmakers modernize the tax system and shift the tax base to corporate income and capital gains, rather than relying on labor income and payroll taxes that could be hit by a wave of AI-powered job losses. It also recommends taxes related to automated labor.

[Tero]

Aren't we going to run out of water with all those computers needing cooling from the super intelligence?

We will have to install shower heads with even less flow for humans. Trump won't like that. And we will need more windmills.

[Brian Peacock]

OpenAI calls for robot taxes, a public wealth fund, and a 4-day workweek to tackle AI disruption

In a series of policy recommendations released on Monday, OpenAI said the rapid advance of AI would require far-reaching economic and political reforms, including a public wealth fund, taxes on automated labor, and a potential four-day workweek.

"We're beginning a transition toward superintelligence: AI systems capable of outperforming the smartest humans even when they are assisted by AI. No one knows exactly how this transition will unfold. At OpenAI, we believe we should navigate it through a democratic process that gives people real power to shape the AI future they want," the company wrote on Monday.

The company said the policy document offered a series of "initial ideas" to address the risk of "jobs and entire industries being disrupted" by the adoption of AI tools.

Among the core policy suggestions is a public wealth fund, which would see lawmakers and AI companies work together to invest in long-term assets linked to the AI boom, with returns distributed directly to citizens.

Another is that the government should encourage and incentivize employers to experiment with four-day workweeks with no loss in pay and offer "benefits bonuses" tied to productivity gains from new AI tools.

The policy document also suggests lawmakers modernize the tax system and shift the tax base to corporate income and capital gains, rather than relying on labor income and payroll taxes that could be hit by a wave of AI-powered job losses. It also recommends taxes related to automated labor.

These are the people who were warning about the AI singularity in 2023, and now they're walking hand-in-hand with the very thing they warned us about.

Is Satan returning in binary format? /crumple

[Tero]

A lecture on not supporting AI music

[rainbow]

Aren't we going to run out of water with all those computers needing cooling from the super intelligence?

We will have to install shower heads with even less flow for humans. Trump won't like that. And we will need more windmills.

AI will solve that problem by rationing water.

[Tero]

Aren't we going to run out of water with all those computers needing cooling from the super intelligence?

We will have to install shower heads with even less flow for humans. Trump won't like that. And we will need more windmills.

AI will solve that problem by rationing water.

Good plan.

[aufbahrung]

# **THE STONE FACES OF SILICON: HOW DATA CENTRES BECAME OUR MODERN MOAI*

There is a particular sience that hangs over Easter Island’s moai — a silence born not of ystery, but of consequence. The statues stand as the last witnesses f a civilisation that poured its remaining strength into monumentswhile the forests around them thinned, the soil eroded, and theisland’s carrying capacity collapsed. Historians debate the details, but the broad arc is uncontested: a society invested in sybols long after the ecological ledger had turned red. Today, acros the American West, a different kind of monument rises — vast datacentres, windowless and humming, each one a cathedral to computation. They are not carved from volcanic tuff, but from concete, copper, and megawatts. And like the moai, they demand a price.

The comparison is not poetic indulgence. It is structural. Data centres are among the most water‑intensive industrial facilities in the United States, drawing millions of gallons a day for cooling in regions already strained by historic drought. Reports from environmental researchers and regional water authorities have highlighted the tension: as reservoirs shrink and aquifers fall, the demand for AI‑driven computation continues to climb. The machines do not drink, but the infrastructure that keeps them alive does. In states where every drop is contested, the question becomes unavoidable: how much water can be diverted to feed the engines of digital growth before the surrounding communities feel the strain.

This is not an argument against technology. It is an argument against unexamined scale. The moai were not the problem; the problem was the system that kept building them even as the island’s ecological foundation faltered. In the same way, AI itself is not the threat. The threat lies in the assumption that more computation is always better, that larger models are inherently progress, that the future must be built on ever‑expanding data infrastructure regardless of environmental cost. Some analysts have suggested that if the United States were to rethink its current trajectory — prioritising efficiency, decentralisation, and sustainable design over sheer computational volume — it could significantly reduce the water burden on drought‑stricken regions. The choice is not between AI and survival, but between one model of AI and another.

The deeper question is cultural. Easter Island’s statues were not merely objects; they were expressions of status, belief, and identity. Today’s data centres serve a similar symbolic function. They represent national competitiveness, technological leadership, and the promise of economic transformation. But symbols can become traps when they outrun the material conditions that sustain them. If the American West continues to dry, if water scarcity becomes the defining constraint of the century, then the country may face a decision as stark as the one Easter Island once confronted: whether to continue building monuments to a particular vision of progress, or to pivot toward a model of technological development that aligns with the realities of a warming, drying world.

The moai still stand, but the society that built them does not. The lesson is not collapse; the lesson is prioritisation. A future in which the United States navigates drought successfully is entirely plausible — but it will require a willingness to question the scale, placement, and purpose of the digital monoliths rising across the landscape. The statues of Easter Island were carved to honour ancestors. The data centres of today are built to honour algorithms. The question that remains is whether either can justify their cost when the land beneath them begins to crack.

[pErvinalia]

Ironic that that is written by AI. It's got the "it's not this, it's that" tell all over it.

[aufbahrung]

Ironic that that is written by AI. It's got the "it's not this, it's that" tell all over it.

Got it to chisel it's own obituory. If you can fit inside a human brain then why can't AI? Seems to be the answer.