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[–] 121 points 7 months ago* (8 children)

Can I remind everyone that it is impossible to produce helium in a practical way?

It is literally only produced through a fusion reaction, and that happens in stars and in incredibly tiny quantities in fusion reactors.

Whenever it's released, it basically just floats away into space and is lost forever.

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  • [–] 19 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    Can I remind everyone that it is impossible to produce helium in a practical way?

    Sun has been doing it for millions of years and it's a big dumb ball of energy.

    Incidentally...

    Is it practical? No. Is it producing any Helium right now? No. Is it probably just a big investor scam? Sure. But still more practical than trying to conquer Iran.

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  • [–] 7 points 7 months ago*

    That doesn't actually sound like they intend on producing usable helium though. That sounds like they intend on doing a really difficult and expensive fusion reaction to produce helium 3, which they will then use in a cheaper and easier to do fusion reaction, and the end result of all of that should be electricity and no net new helium since it's expensive and rare AF and they need it all to make the whole process remotely plausibly profitable.

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  • [–] 3 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

    So we just need to get rid of all helium and all billionaires will be gone?

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  • [–] 107 points 7 months ago (8 children)

    Critical for AI

    It's critical for lithography, the process that makes all of the magical chips that make the modern world function.

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  • [–] 38 points 7 months ago (3 children)

    WSJ is corporatist slop, so it’s no surprise they decided to lead with “ai”. Gotta keep pumping the market.

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  • [–] -3 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    Isn't WSJ directly own by Bezos himself, or am I confusing them for something else?

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  • [–] 31 points 7 months ago

    So THIS is how they hallucinate.

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  • [–] 47 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    So it's going to be rerouted from the MRIs I take it…

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  • [–] 56 points 7 months ago (4 children)

    Never mind AI, MRIs are more important.

    At least we have the US Helium Res— dammit, Biden!

    The U.S. just sold its helium stockpile. Here’s why the medical world is worried

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  • [–] 29 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    Dammit, Obama maybe - the act was passed by Congress in 2013.

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  • [–] 19 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (3 children)

    I'd guess that most industrial users of helium don't consume it and could theoretically recover it from whatever process it's involved in rather than just releasing it.

    EDIT: Hard drives being an exception, as apparently some ship helium-filled; there, it's actually being consumed during the manufacture.

    EDIT2: I'd also point out that in the long run, we probably do have to be more conservative with our helium supply. We get it from pockets in the earth. It's actually not all that common; it just happens, though, that we go to a lot of effort to extract natural gas, and that happens to sometimes also come up with helium, so we get that supply. But because it's not reactive, it doesn't bond to anything


    it stays in gas form. When we let it go, it heads to near the top of our atmosphere and eventually gets lost to solar wind. Many users who today just release it


    because why not, as the natural gas people will be providing more, and it's cheaper that way


    probably will need to capture what they're using if we want helium to continue to be available.

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  • [–] 14 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    The problem is that helium is notoriously hard to contain. It's transported and stored super-cooled, but it still gases off, and to release pressure they just have to release it into the atmosphere. It effectively has a shelf life and so it has to be constantly replenished.

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  • [–] 26 points 7 months ago

    Can the AI just talk in a lower voice? I don't see why this is that critical.

    The media really can't get it can they I'm fine with AI having problems, I'm supposed to feel sorry for them upsetting some way but I just don't.

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  • [–] 12 points 7 months ago

    I'm reading all of these comments with the helium-voice in my head.

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  • [–] 9 points 7 months ago

    I realize there are benefits to attacking Iran, but it's still wrong.

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  • [–] 9 points 7 months ago

    It's not just AI, it's integrated electronics in general.

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  • [–] 7 points 7 months ago* (1 child)

    Also used in MRI machines and semiconductor manufacturing. Probably some other important stuff as well.

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  • [–] 37 points 7 months ago (23 children)
  • [–] 102 points 7 months ago (17 children)

    Unfortunately it's also critical for MRIs.

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  • [–] 61 points 7 months ago (4 children)

    Yeah, what a crazy headline that AI was the thing mentioned and not 1 of the many other real life uses that offer greater solutions to us.

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  • [–] 15 points 7 months ago (4 children)

    Maybe we'll get lucky, and by the time the helium supply is restored, we've done away with the shitty not-really-AI craze, saving more helium for things of use to humanity.

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  • [–] 7 points 7 months ago (3 children)

    Maybe this is why they're now ramping up going back to the moon? Gonna start fuckin the moon up for all that sweet Helium 3.

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  • [–] 7 points 7 months ago

    We could be at war with Iran for a century, sending strike teams in to siphon helium out of the ground and smuggle it back to the US in stealth jets and submarines, and it would still be significantly cheaper than trying to mine the moon.

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  • [–] 14 points 7 months ago (4 children)

    Okay, but do you really think we're going to prioritize the enormous loss-leading CSAM engines over lifesaving medical diagnostics machines?

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  • [–] 4 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    I trust our leaders to make the right decisions. Just a small bump in the road or two lately, that's all.

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  • [–] 3 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    My understanding is that MRIs don't consume helium, in the same way air conditioning units don't consume refrigerant, so helium is only needed for making new MRI machines.

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  • [–] 8 points 7 months ago*

    New ones, and not all if them, work this way, as in there's tiny helium condensing unit. Older ones just let it go and require topping up every couple months (guessing by how often helium in NMR is topped up). Also every emergency shutdown invariably blows off all of helium inside

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  • [–] 13 points 7 months ago (4 children)

    It's not like its really used on AI inference, but it's used in high grade semiconductor manufacturing. so helium shortage will hit anything with a modern semiconductors in it. So it's not "whatever".

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago (2 children)

    Have you missed what all the fucking semiconductors are being bought up for the past year or so?

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago

    Yeah and they will keep begin bought by AI companies, even if the production sags. If the prices were unaffordable now they will be even more so if there is a real production choke. They can keep tossing few extra billions to keep the bubble going, you and I cannot compete with that.

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  • [–] 10 points 7 months ago

    LOL.

    LMAO even.

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  • [–] 11 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    At least some positive news! Fuck AI

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  • [–] 27 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    If you read the article, it isn't about AI.

    It's used to cool lithography machines which produce all CPUs, GPUs, RAM, etc. The entire world of electronics is built on the output of these lithography machines.

    The headline may as well say "Iran War Chokes Off Helium Supply Critical for Skibidi Toilet memes" Helium isn't used in AI datacenters, it has nothing to do with AI outside of the fact that every processor is made using lithography.

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  • [–] 4 points 7 months ago

    Big tech's support of this dipshit finally biting themselves in the ass

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  • [–] 5 points 7 months ago

    This sounds like good news.

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  • [–] 4 points 7 months ago

    what do I laugh when I think about helium and choking

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  • [–] 8 points 7 months ago* (14 children)

    This is bad news that feels like good news. Like when your house burns down, but it kills your abusive parents, so you’re kind of happy about it because it means you didn’t have to go through with your plans, and it means you don’t have to become a murderer after all.

    And you have all that money saved up, and you already got that scholarship to college, and you can just move on with your life without any of those chains tying you to them in your former life…

    So, really, what’s the actual fucking problem here? no more birthday balloons? Boo fucking hoo. My shitty parents never threw me a birthday party anyway.

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  • [–] 24 points 7 months ago (8 children)

    No more medical imaging.
    No more fibre optics.
    No more semiconductors.
    No more laparoscopic or eye surgery.
    No more hard drives.
    No more titanium.
    No more rockets.

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  • [+] -8 points 7 months ago* (5 children)

    I feel like you weren’t really listening to what I had to say

    Tell me: when you read my post, what did you hear?

    How did that translate in your head?

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  • [–] 21 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    You asked:

    So, really, what’s the actual fucking problem here?

    That's what they heard.

    They answered:

    No more medical imaging.
    No more fibre optics.
    No more semiconductors.
    No more laparoscopic or eye surgery.
    No more hard drives.
    No more titanium.
    No more rockets.

    That's what you didn't hear I guess.

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  • [+] -6 points 7 months ago* (1 child)

    You guessed wrong

    What they didn’t hear is the problems of society that the blind pursuit of commercial mining of minerals causes society.

    But when commercial profit is your only motive, fuck people, right? Who gives a shit about them?

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  • [–] 5 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

    While I agree that the blind pursuit of capital will ultimately be our downfall, helium shortages actually have real, tangible effects on the very people you seem to vouch for.

    I feel you're lashing out for the mere sake of lashing out, regardless of who your target is. We're on the same side here.

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  • [–] 9 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    I think your untreated trauma is negatively affecting how you treat the people around you.

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  • [–] -1 points 7 months ago*

    We all have untreated trauma.

    I think the carelessness with which corporations pursue commercial mining profits traumatically affects society.

    Blaming me, an individual, just for pointing that out, is pretty ridiculous.

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  • [–] 2 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    Yeah, like when your peice of shit abusive husband dies drunk driving do you don't have to worry about your search history or Netflix watch list.

    And you weren't even really into true crime anyway but it was kind of nice seeing what mistakes other people made and your peice of shit husband thinks it's dumb so you can get some peace.

    Anyway, yeah, feels like it should be good cuz fuck AI but it's gonna effect lots of other things too.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago

    Knowing your abusive husband was a piece of shit just because you saw other people like him being called a piece of shit on some true crime show on Netflix gives you validation, but he was a piece of shit anyway, whether you saw that true crime show or not. And AI is evil, whether you read it on Reddit or not.

    Truth doesn’t need to be validated for it to be true. It just makes you feel better about it. That wasn’t really my point.

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  • [–] 0 points 7 months ago (1 child)

    Let's fucking go! I'm so rooting for Iran.

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