In class this week, we had the chance to have a group discussion around the topic of GenAI power\/water use. The question prompts were:<\/p>\n
We found that the first two questions were intertwined, as in some situations, you do not have much say around if GenAI is used; therefore, you cannot avoid it. An example of that we discussed was simply doing a Google search; the first answer you will see is powered by Google Gemini. Now there is a setting where you can turn off the automatic use of Google Gemini; however, it is hard to avoid. Multiple other services now have GenAI built into the programming without you even know which makes it very hard to avoid the use of GenAI. With this being said, I am sure you could find a way to turn off all the uses of GenAI, but it would not be easy.<\/p>\n
Moving on to the next three questions, we ended up bouncing between them as well, as they seemed to be very connected. When it comes to the question \u201cCan the environmental impacts be mitigated?\u201d our first reaction was to say yes, as we hope that is the case, but we feel it is hard to know. We felt that we ourselves could try to mitigate the impacts, but we do not feel we have enough power to make a big difference. This is how the next question comes into play: we believed the tech giants who created these problems must be able to find solutions and ways to mitigate the impact, but will they? Is there enough drive for them to want to? What benefit will they gain from it? These questions answered the next question, as we do not believe Elon Musk will save us; there is not enough in it for him. His current proposed solution with the orbital data centres seems unrealistic and bound to have its own problems.<\/p>\n
That leads us to the final question: Does it make a difference if I use Gen AI or not? I related this topic to recycling, as much as I always try to recycle as much as I can, I will bring recyclables home just to recycle correctly. I will clean any food container in order to recycle it. I will even pick up recycling that my roommate throws out and clean it to recycle it, but in the grand scheme of things, how much does this make an impact? Can I individually help save the environment by having good recycling principles? That I do not know, but I do know it allows me to live up to my own standards and values, and it makes my ethical consciousness feel at ease. I believe that if I can stand by my own values and educate others, eventually it can help make a difference. If one day I throw out a plastic cup because I can not find a recycling bin anywhere, will that make a big difference? Probably not. I see using Gen AI in the same way. I can do my research, find ways to use it ethically and with the least amount of water\/power usage as possible, but if it is necessary for me to use it or more convenient at times, it won\u2019t destroy the world. I can try to educate others and promote ethical use of GenAI, but at this point, I feel that is the best I can personally do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In class this week, we had the chance to have a group discussion around the topic of GenAI power\/water use. The question prompts were: Do we have any choice about using GenAI? Can we avoid its use? Can the environmental… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5727\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/edtechuvic.ca\/edci336\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}