Unholy Fear Of Data Centers - Environmentalism, Space X Reality, And The Horror Of An Alien Future

Beverly Adams was afraid, very afraid.  Just the thought of Optimus robots, AI, and the age of virtual reality sent her back under the covers until her shaking stopped. 

'I must get a hold of myself', she said, reaching for the bottle of Xanax and the glass of water on her nightstand.  She swallowed deeply and waited for it to kick in. 

Beverly had been a lifelong progressive on the front lines for the black man, abortion, gays, lesbians, and transgenders, open borders, and the redistribution of wealth.  Social reform and progress towards a more verdant, compassionate and peaceful world had been as much a part of her as, well, indigestion - the only simile that she could think for longevity.  

She had suffered from dyspepsia since cramming for her finals at Brandeis, the only Christian in a world of smart Jews, law school depending on top tier marks, and here she was decades later still suffering from unmeltung.  

Social activism was another story altogether.  During her long commitment to revolutionary change she had made good friends in a spirit of joyful camaraderie, felt good about herself doing the right thing while her classmates were all becoming investment bankers and land developers. 

To be honest, she was a bit queasy about gender issues, and just the thought of men doing, well, what gay men did to each other in bed - wretched, disgusting things -  made her doubt the canon. The principle that gay sex was protected behavior and should be accepted was for her no questions asked but her belief in diversity had its limits.  

Lesbian sex with all that licking and sucking was not the same thing, and she was even tempted by Esther Pilchman, a wiry-haired Jewess from Brooklyn who offered her services.  'Maybe', Beverly said, demurring but not refusing outright. 

In any case, she reupped her support for the gay community, marched with them, flew pride flags and kites with them, and never once let her disgust show. Personal feelings should never get in the way of political principle.  

Beverly was a committed environmentalist although she harbored some skepticism about the epiphanic nature of the woods.  A walk in the park could settle the mind, but briar paths up and down the Shenandoah were a nuisance.  Whenever she was invited for a day-long climb in the mountains, she reached for any excuse, but demurral was tantamount to heresy, so she went along, slogging through buggy copses, glades, and streams.  

Environmentalism which had started with the snail darter, had matured in the era of climate change. Unless toxic petroleum-based emissions were capped, the world would be wrapped in a deadly noxious cloud and would rapidly heat to extinction. Environmentalism was no longer about the protection of little creatures a la St. Francis, but about existential survival.  The end of the world was indeed nigh, the doomsday clock ticking closer to midnight, and soon the lights would be off for good. 

This scared Beverly and she forgot about her buggy climbs to Blackrock Summit or Brown's Gap.  She felt the imminence of disaster like never before.  Her other progressive concerns seemed child's play compared to the coming climate Armageddon.  Gay men could bugger themselves silly for all she cared.  

Nothing dissuaded or distracted her.  The increase in polar ice, the steady ocean temperatures, the lack of Atlantic hurricanes, and negligible rise in ocean levels was deliberate misinformation spread by climate deniers.  Climate change was settled science, now absolute, undeniable fact, so the rumor mongers could spread whatever mischief they pleased and would not stop the gradual incineration of the planet. 

Then out of the blue came AI, innocent enough the first time she used it as a Google enhancer; but once she grasped the enormity of the technological change - its ability to replace reality with virtuality, she panicked. The ground was no longer solid beneath her feet.  Things would be only what they seemed to be, not what they were.  Truth would become fungible and unknowable.  The world as we know it would disappear.  A post-human generation of artificial beings and genetically transformed alternate humans would populate the earth. 

If this nightmarish scenario were not enough, huge data centers were being built to fuel the rapidly growing demand for AI and to provide energy for its geometrically increasing computing power.  The natural landscape was being scoured, razed, emptied of living things to make room. 

Some political leaders were shouting 'Basta!' and were putting legal and legislative obstacles in the way of expanded data center construction.  The newly elected Democrat governor of Texas avowed not one square inch of Texas public land would be sold or leased to Elon Musk. 

Musk, of course, paid no attention.  He was already making plans to build data centers in space and on the moon, solving energy and cooling problems in one fell swoop.  Texas data centers?  Who needs them said Musk, as usual light years ahead of the vaporous politicians cashing in on progressive angst.  

The genie was out of the bottle, and there was no putting him back in.  The issue was only how to keep up with the demand.  The future was one of limitless possibilities. 

All of this frightened Beverly to death now afraid of her own shadow. Her environmentalist self felt calmed by the thought of space industrialization, leaving Planet Earth untouched, but the idea of an alien, genetically modified, semi-robotic race in an unknown, dimensionless universe panicked her; and it was at that moment that she went back under the covers. 

The Xanax helped and she managed to get out of bed knowing that something horrible was gnawing at her but drug-calmed she wasn't sure quite what.  Besides, today was the march on the National Mall for abortion rights, a massive demonstration for the right of women to control their own bodies.  

Yet, as the Xanax began to wear off, the panic seeped back in, and she wondered if it wouldn't be better to have babies, millions of them to populate the world with real, live, living creatures before robots took over.  Better a campaign to induce, motivate, encourage women to reproduce like rabbits than one determined to empty the planet of human beings. 

She shook her head, hoping to clear it.  As weird as the idea seemed, it made perfect sense.  A counter-offer to Silicon Valley and the tech giants Musk, Huang, Ellison, and Page.  Fertility would break up the genius cluster and scatter them to the winds. 

The Pope was in Uruguay preaching fertility, God's gift to Man, our right, duty, and divine responsibility; and despite all the Jews at Brandeis and everywhere else, her Catholic education rose to the fore.  Can you imagine, she thought, Miss Beverly Adams as a restored Catholic, conservative, climate change denier, Fifties house-and-home homemaker? Indeed. 

This of course was behavioral Skinner-esque psychology which took the place of pharmacology.  Once out of the scary world of AI, virtuality, space aliens, robots, and the unimaginable, she could wake calmly to a familiar, comforting world. 

For the time being at least, for the revolution has just begun.