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Comment by bottlepalm | Hacker News Reader

Sign of a coming AI arms race?

If the image generation market is getting too saturated, maybe OpenAI can sell something to the government. No one has deeper pockets.

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There’s a long history of the top tier of computing hardware being export controlled. This is more of a recognition (a bit late eh?) of the utility of these graphics cards, though really it’s about time we started calling them something else.

Since we have Cold War II (with the hot war still not fought by NATO), we should expect similarities to Cold War I: bans on high-tech exports, classifying more stuff, even public lies in an attempt to misdirect the adversary (see [SDI]). Good thing if encryption is not declared munition as it was back then [W].

[SDI]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Defense_Initiative

[W]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_of_cryptography_from_th...

An AI arms race will be limited by the silicon it's built on. The arms race will be in the fabrication of the chips. You can only scale old nodes so far.

The cheapest solution out of all the possibilities is to just use a back channel to get them, of course.

I've always hoped that the US would restrict hardware exports under ITAR, as AI is absolutely a military weapon.

I doubt, though, that they will restrict the export of the raw material for creating AI: data.

They can’t even get their own companies to restrict the use of their citizen’s data lol.

Allowing US companies to serve people relevant ads and allowing US companies to aid our number one adversary in developing the most potentially dangerous technology humans will every create are two very different things.

> Allowing US companies to serve people relevant ads

Except these companies do way more than just serve innocent ads, as the Snowden reveals have showed; They are complicit in way more than that.

As someone from outside either country, neither the US nor China developing AI sounds particularly appealing.

Convince me that mass surveillance in a genocidal police state is not one of the most potentially dangerous technologies humans will ever create.

They can, but don't. Applying specific restrictions and switching from small fines to business-continuity-affecting rulings would solve the issue very quickly.

Or they don't because they can't? Those that would be inclined would never receive the funds and media support needed to get elected.

They intentionally choose not to.

Data can be stolen. It is in fact stolen all of the time with breaches and leaks.

More likely a landwar in asia.

Taiwan is where these cards come from right?

Thats my understanding.

Not inconceivable …

For those who don't get the reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMz7JBRbmNo

The scariest aspect of geopolitics is how quickly things change. It is probably because normal times appear in slow motion geopolitically.

Between whom?

Hard to see any particular country having the desire or where for all to undertake such an endeavour.

China/Taiwan

From either of these countries perspective, this would be a civil war.

Not really a land war.

Also China has desire to resolve the civil war by other means.

Yes, but chairman Xi is stupid enough to launch an invasion even involuntarily due to military provocations (misfires) to quell unrest at home by projecting anger outside.

>where for all

Wherewithal?

Thanks

Russia/Ukraine

That's Europe.

Eurasia, technically Russia spans both continents.

Geographically they ain't even considered separate continents.

Miiiiiight wanna review where 75% of Russia is.

So when US is fighting a war in the middle east it's actually happening in the Caribbean because US has territory there?

The 25% of Russia where people live is in Europe.

Not that there's anything coming up right now, but Pakistan is looking extremely fragile right now with a dead economy and an unprecedented natural disaster. That, along with a more right wing India can't be good news.

China and India.

Indeed it is in the past tense now unofficially, rather than completely covertly.

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