Environmental degradation
In a grim future shaped by greed and exploitation, the Philippines faces environmental devastation at the hands of profit-driven corporations.
Under the guise of progress, ecosystems are pillaged to fuel the development of emerging technologies like cryptocurrency and AI. Mountains are stripped bare for minerals needed for GPUs, while forests are decimated to make room for sprawling data centers. Marginalized Filipinos bear the brunt of this destruction, with miners exploited for their labor and Indigenous communities forcibly displaced from their ancestral lands.
As energy consumption skyrockets and natural resources dwindle, the Philippines becomes even more vulnerable to the ravages of climate change. Sweltering summers demand protective measures, while the onslaught of frequent and ferocious typhoons wreak havoc on an already fragile landscape.
In this desolate future, the pursuit of profit leaves the Philippines a mere shadow of its once vibrant and biodiverse self, its natural beauty sacrificed at the altar of technological advancement.
Amidst the deafening roar of machinery and the choking haze of dust, Filipino children toil away in the depths of nickel mines. Their small hands, calloused and stained with the residue of exploitation, pry loose precious ores from unforgiving earth, a grim testament to the harsh realities of poverty and desperation. Furthermore, as the demand for nickel surges to fuel the ever-expanding appetite for innovation, the once-pristine environment suffers irreparable damage, ravaged by the relentless pursuit of profit. With each swing of their pickaxes, the children unknowingly contribute to the destruction of their own homeland, trapped in a cycle of exploitation and environmental degradation that offers no reprieve.
In the shadow of towering machines and blinking lights, IPs are coerced into constructing a colossal data center, the very infrastructure that tore them from their ancestral lands. Displaced and marginalized, they labor under the watchful eyes of faceless corporations, their sacred grounds desecrated by the relentless march of progress.
Selected Quotes
...I think in general, hindi lang talaga tayo maalaga ng nature...Hindi talaga conscious, pero siyempre malaki rin ang ambag ng capitalism at consumerism and yung structures na yun dito. Bakit nga ba nagtatanggal ng puno sa isang lugar na marami? Kasi magtatayo ng factory o building, magtatayo ng SM. Dun ako nagstart magsulat about environmental art, nung nagputol ang SM ng 40 na puno sa Baguio na di hamak ang tanda sa akin.
I find the climate impact is an unresolved issue...because you required tremendous hardware to develop these AI models and energy, and the same hardware you use for crypto mining [and] GPUs are the ones used for AI development. So that's an open-ended question. Plus, you have a geopolitical issue with Taiwan, which is the largest source of all these chips, right. So if ever war breaks out [and] Taiwan goes down...we'll have a shortage of chips. It's gonna stymie...any movement in AI, right.
[O]bviously, ecologically...we see the destruction of our world in our environment and our planet. As we produce more...room for data, as we produce more heat from technologies that we're using, as we displace more...indigenous peoples from lands because we need to create data centers...And as we improve technologies for war, which are funded by different imperialist projects, like the US.
...[O]f course, there's also the heavy metal requirements of data centers and all those [computer] chips that power AI. And some of that is mined in the Philippines. Because it's so rich in resources, we will be seeing a rapid deterioration of our ecosystems, as we rush into mining for developing computers and chips and all of these things that AI needs in order to emerge.
Going quickly to the ecological world, since I think that's something that's not really been talked about: [the] ecological impact of emerging technology. How, of course, AI requires massive computing power; that also requires massive energy output, first of all. Which...in the absence of renewable energy, will only further intensify [the] climate change crisis, which the Philippines is at the forefront of.
So my pessimistic view sa transport leans heavily towards the environemntal aspect, because...[it keeps going]. It'll become much more difficult to go around. The environment will become more damaged.
