Trivial AI use can have devastating climate consequences

THE future of humanity, we are told, will be irrevocably shaped by artificial intelligence (AI). That same future is also under existential threat from global warming and its disastrous consequences – a threat that is being exacerbated by the unthinking use of AI.

Of course, there are many powerful and life-changing uses for AI, from cancer research to predictive data analytics.

Perhaps the most widespread use today, however, is arguably the most trivial: generative AI (GenAI), not least in the form of large language models (LLMs) that spit out text based on spotting linguistic patterns, rather than engaging with meaning.