This is the starting point of the real second Cold War. The moment the US admits it can not fight China. Just as it admitted it could not fight the Soviet Union and began the first cold war. The world settling into protection of their spheres of influence while cold war operations and proxy wars are undertaken instead.

Difference is that the roles are reversed this time, China is ascendant and US is in decline. The outcome is historically predictable, just need the US to be drawn into a long war it can not win nor withdraw from.

AI bubble will burst sending the US into economic catastrophe from which it will jump into wars to save itself then be unable to get out of them and eventually collapse.

[–] Evilsandwichman@hexbear.net 16 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Right but the difference is the USSR was too principled to use their nukes; I am putting zero faith in a government that refuses to rule it out (which by the way doesn't just mean America, but the UK; British PMs are usually asked if they'd use such weapons and the answer is always yes)

[–] Omegamint@hexbear.net 20 points 5 days ago

It’s really the only thing that really worries me for the world. The psychos here really are willing to burn it all down

[–] theturtlemoves@hexbear.net 6 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

British PMs are usually asked if they'd use such weapons and the answer is always yes

Corbyn publicly said no. This refusal to potentially kill thousands of civilians was seen as a sign of weakness.

the USSR was too principled to use their nuke

China also has a 'no first use' policy.

[–] MarmiteLover123@hexbear.net 2 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

If the AI bubble bursts, the US won't be the most effected country. AI LLMs have global market penetration, they're everywhere. If the US economy is being propped up by AI, so is almost every other economy in countries with decent Internet access. Sure the AI companies aren't based in these nations and are based in the US. But the workforce in almost every country with good Internet is using AI. If economic growth over the last few years is tied to AI, these nations are in a vulnerable position as a lot of GDP growth has been almost stagnant. Remove AI, and that's now negative GDP growth... The US has had decent annualised GDP growth over the past few years, it wouldn't be great if it became stagnant, but it would be better than going into the negatives. What I'm saying is that the US economy has a bigger safety net than most here, even if greater risk is involved as almost all the AI companies are from the US.

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 5 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

The US GDP growth being higher is a factor of the AI infrastructure and power supply for it being constructed there. The rest of the world's GDP growth is not driven by AI except China's direct AI competition with the US but to a far lesser extent because their focus isn't AGI. Only the US' is. The rest of the world neither has had the data center construction nor the power construction to drive it, and AI itself is not a significant improvement to productivity so far as proven by multiple studies, so AI is not improving their growth, AI is driving growth solely in the country that its infrastructure is constructed in. The US will bear an absolutely enormous and catastrophic economic hit when all of the growth of the last several years driven by AI is wiped out in the crash and none of this infrastructure is useful for anything else other than AI. Other countries will take a hit but it will not be the same, it will be the knock-on effect of secondary industry related to AI.

Normal companies that happen to have workers using AI will be largely unaffected, workers will just go back to not using AI if they have to, and that won't affect productivity because AI does not improve it.