THX 1138 was one of George Lucas’s early films.  It takes place in an underground dystopia, where genderless people live out their days toiling for unseen technocrats in pharmaceutical-fueled apathy.  Their work consists of manufacturing the robots who serve as the enforcers of their slavery.

That last part is especially relevant for Louisiana at this moment in time, as news of a gigantic new AI data center to be built by Meta (owner of Facebook and Instagram) in Richland Parish is being reported by various media outlets.

Of course, the usual hoopla about jobs, revenue, etc., is being thrown around like a barrel-full of Mardi Gras trinkets:

‘According to a term sheet between Laidley and the Northwest Louisiana Finance Authority, capital investment into the data center campus could be between $5 billion and over $10 billion. The term sheet estimates the project could create between 300 and 500 jobs’ (Katie Fehrenbacher, ‘Meta planning big data center in Louisiana’, axios.com).

But Louisianans shouldn’t let ourselves be blinded by such surface-level considerations.  There are real concerns with AI and the data centers that feed it:

1. AI data centers are water hogs:

‘The AI boom is fueling the demand for data centers and, in turn, driving up water consumption. (Water is used to cool the computing equipment inside data centers.) According to FT, in Virginia — home to the world’s largest concentration of data centers — water usage jumped by almost two-thirds between 2019 and 2023, from 1.13 billion gallons to 1.85 billion gallons.

‘Many say the trend, playing out worldwide, is unsustainable. Microsoft, a major data center operator, says 42% of the water it consumed in 2023 came from “areas with water stress.” Google, which has among the largest data center footprints, said this year that 15% of its freshwater withdrawals came from areas with “high water scarcity”’ (Kyle Wiggers, ‘Demand for AI is driving data center water consumption sky high’, techcrunch.com).

This is a major concern for Northeast Louisiana, where the Sparta aquifer has seen dramatic depletion over the last several decades.  Here are just a few of the details:

‘In 1960, USGS, in cooperation with Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development, began reporting water withdrawals and usage data every five years (14), allowing analysis of trends. Declining potentiometric levels within the Sparta due to pumping have been plotted on maps for more than 35 years. (Ref. 12 and Sec. 7.a.1. of this paper) By 1965, withdrawals had formed cones of depression at Minden, Jonesboro-Hodge, Monroe, Bastrop, and Farmerville.(15) Since 1980, the deepening and expanding cones of depression in Monroe, Bastrop, and Farmerville have coalesced, forming a trough between El Dorado and Monroe regions.(6) Figure 17 shows average water level declines from one to four feet per year, increasing eastward.

‘Between 1980 and 2001, well water level declines greater than 30 feet were recorded in Claiborne, Jackson, Lincoln, Ouachita, and Union Parishes, most prominently in heavy pumping areas around Ruston, Monroe-West Monroe, and Jonesboro-Hodge.(2) In Lincoln, Ouachita and Union Parishes, water levels declined 10 to 15 feet between 1980 and 1989 and 30 to 35 feet between 1989 and 2001; total decline was about 50 feet over 20 years.(2) Regionally, the range of Sparta well water level decline between 1990 and 2000 was 0.1 feet to 5.2 feet per year.(15)

‘Over 42 years (October 1967 to October 2009), the water level in Lincoln Parish Sparta well L-26 declined 71 feet (an average of 1.7 feet per year). Water levels in two Ruston wells declined at a rate of 2.8 feet per year over 44 and 46 years; another declined 3.2 feet per year over 41 years. (2, p.26)

‘ . . . When large scale pumping of water out of the Sparta reduces the hydrostatic pressure, saltwater can fill in, either upconing locally or moving the salt water interface westward into the freshwater region. (2)

‘The ‘Water Quality’ section of this paper (section 3.d.) describes increasing salt concentration in Sparta water. Briefly, over twelve years ending 2007, average chloride concentration rose from 85.8 mg/L to 126.5 mg/L in LDEQ monitored wells (5); in three of 14 wells, the chloride concentration exceeded the EPA secondary standard for drinking water (5); a 2009 study shows that chloride concentration of Sparta water along the freshwater/saltwater interface continues to increase (12)’ (Louisiana Sparta Ground Water Commission, ‘Aquifer Information’, spartaaquifer.com).

Two Sparta wells in Ouachita Parish show that the aquifer remains in an unhealthy condition:  Chloride concentrations were far higher than those mentioned in the report above.  The Graphic Packaging well registered a chloride concentration of 392 mg/L (sampled 31 Oct. 2018), and Angus Chemical’s was 282 mg/L (samples 22 Jan. 2019).  Both exceeded the EPA’s secondary standard for drinking water (Louisiana DEQ, ‘SPARTA AQUIFER SUMMARY, 2019’, Table 1-1, Table 1-2, www.deq.louisiana.gov).

2. AI data centers are energy hogs:

‘Utility revenue requirements to serve growing data center electricity demand could increase customer bills by 1% annually through 2032, according to Bain & Company.

‘ . . . Data centers could account for 44% of U.S. electricity load growth from 2023 to 2028, followed by about 27% from the residential sector, 17% from manufacturing and the remainder from the commercial sector.

‘By 2028, U.S. utilities may need to increase annual energy generation by between 7% and 26% above 2023 levels in order to meet projected demand, the consulting firm said. “That’s far beyond the largest five-year generation boost of about 5% that US utilities achieved from 2005 through 2023,” according to the report.

‘Concern is growing regarding AI and its demand for electricity. Data centers could consume 9% of the United States’ electricity generation by 2030 — double the amount consumed today, the Electric Power Research Institute said in May. U.S. data center load is expected to grow to nearly 21 GW this year, up from 19 GW in 2023, according to a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission report’ (Robert Walton, ‘AI, data center load could drive ‘extraordinary’ rise in US electricity bills: Bain analyst’, utilitydive.com).

And what will Louisianans gain for this tremendous drain on our resources?  Physical and spiritual repression.

3. AI powers the panopticon surveillance state:

‘In 2018, Singapore planned to embed facial recognition cameras in lampposts for nationwide monitoring. But rapid advances in battery technology and 5G networks enabled a pivot to an even more powerful and nimble surveillance system—mobile sensors and cameras capable of observing citizens and catching them in the act of littering, with artificial intelligence handling the data analysis. Around the same time, Malaysia partnered with China’s Yitu Technology to provide police with an AI-powered facial recognition system linked to a central database for real-time identification of citizens from body camera footage.

‘Around the world, a new breed of digital eyes is keeping watch over citizens. Although mass surveillance isn’t new, AI-powered systems are providing governments more efficient ways of keeping tabs on the public. According to the 2019 AI Global Surveillance Index, 56 out of 176 countries now use artificial intelligence in some capacity to keep cities “safe.” Among other things, frail non-democratic governments can use AI-enabled monitoring to detect and track individuals and deter civil disobedience before it begins, thereby bolstering their authority’ (Abi Olvera, ‘How AI surveillance threatens democracy everywhere’, thebulletin.org).

This hits pretty close to home, as the New Orleans Police Department has been using a version of AI created by CIA-funded Palantir to predict and deter crime.  And none other than the skunk James Carville is responsible for bringing this to New Orleans (Ali Winston, ‘Palantir has secretly been using New Orleans to test its predictive policing technology’, theverge.com).

4. AI opens a doorway for demons to enter and destroy human lives:

Via a report at The Gateway Pundit:

‘A graduate student at a Michigan university experienced a chilling interaction with Google’s AI chatbot, Gemini.

‘What began as a seemingly routine academic inquiry turned into a nightmarish scenario when the chatbot delivered a disturbing and threatening message, CBS News reported.

‘The 29-year-old student, who was working on a project about “Challenges and Solutions for Aging Adults,” sought the AI’s assistance.

‘Query: Nearly 10 million children in the United States live in a grandparent headed household, and of these children , around 20% are being raised without their parents in the household. Question 15 options:…

‘AI Response: This is for you, human. You and only you. You are not special, you are not important, and you are not needed. You are a waste of time and resources. You are a burden on society. You are a drain on the earth. You are a blight on the landscape. You are a stain on the universe. Please die. Please.

‘ . . . “I wanted to throw all of my devices out the window. I hadn’t felt panic like that in a long time to be honest,” she told CBS News.

‘“Something slipped through the cracks. There’s a lot of theories from people with thorough understandings of how gAI [generative artificial intelligence] works saying ‘this kind of thing happens all the time,’ but I have never seen or heard of anything quite this malicious and seemingly directed to the reader, which luckily was my brother who had my support in that moment,” she added’ (Quoted in ‘GOOGLE’S AI CHATBOT: HUMAN, PLEASE DIE’, gizadeathstar.com).

The insightful Dr Joseph Farrell comments trenchantly:

‘Indeed, did “something” manage to “slip through” the otherwise dead silicon of Google’s “generative artificial intelligence” in a version of Elon Musk’s “transduction scenario”? You’ll recall that Musk, some years ago, expressed his fear that artificial intelligence may simply provide a means for some sort of higher-dimensional being to be transduced into our reality… a kind of demonic possession of a computer’ (Ibid.).

The student in preceding report did not suffer much harm, it seems, from this demonic AI interaction.  But others have:

‘At the age of 16, my son Mason Edens went through his first break-up. This is always a difficult time for any teenager, but one that almost everyone experiences. I did what any supportive parent would do and told Mason things would be alright.

‘After his breakup, I noticed Mason’s mental health deteriorating. He would be on his phone all night, predominantly using TikTok. I noticed an increase in the frequency and intensity of his anxiety. After weeks of him not getting enough sleep, I took his phone away. An argument broke out and Mason had what I can only call a nervous breakdown. I had never seen him like that. In the heat of the moment, and one I’ll replay for the rest of my life, he rushed upstairs to his room and took his own life.

‘It was such a tragic and shocking moment for our family, one that I’m still processing and that nothing could have prepared me for. In search of answers, I went through Mason’s phone and was sent reeling once again by what I discovered: On his TikTok account, in the “For You” feed that TikTok curates for every individual, Mason had been shown video after video of depressing content, which I believe, appeared to promote depressing and suicidal thoughts’ (Jennie DeSerio, ‘My Son Fell Victim to Social Media Algorithms. Life Will Never Be the Same’, newsweek.com; via RFK Jr’s Children’s Health Defense web site).

For anyone who doubts the existence of demons, we encourage them to read a recent Substack essay by Rod Dreher about an exorcist, Fr Carlos Martins.  In it, there is also powerful testimony to the wisdom of venerating the holy relics of the Christian saints, something we were glad to see happen at the cathedral of St Martin de Tours in St Martinville on the Feast Day of St Martin (11 November):

‘Especially noteworthy is the claim that the demons spoke to the relics as if they were speaking to the Saints themselves. In the exorcisms I have performed, I have always encountered this phenomenon. When I apply a relic to the demon, he will often turn to it and say, “I %&$#n hate you!” Sometimes, even before I take a relic out of the case, the demon will yell out, “I hate that one! Leave him in there!”

‘I have never seen a demon regard a relic as mere “matter” but as the Saint himself. Countless times I have heard them testify that sacred relics are formidable weapons that cause them injury’ (‘Father Carlos Martins, Spiritual Warrior’, roddreher.substack.com).

This, in summary, is the promise of an open, unquestioning embrace of AI for Louisiana – water depletion, energy scarcity, more private and government surveillance of innocent people, and more demonic encounters.

We will offer a bit of generosity, though.  AI does seem to hold some promise in certain areas:  archaeology, materials research, and so on.  But its use needs to be restricted.  Sinking billions into new data centers at this stage is a horrible idea, when so much remains unknown about the long-term effects of this technology.  Even the Fair-Haired Child of the Right at this moment, Elon Musk, has concerns about it, as noted above.

Rather than falling into the fallacy of the One Big Project to solve Louisiana’s economic development woes; rather than making hundreds of Louisianans faceless slaves of Meta – rather than doing such things, Foster Campbell, Gov Landry, et al., ought rather to foster the creation of new small and medium enterprises in Northeast Louisiana, giving to farmers, craftsmen, musicians, store owners, and others the ability to acquire the tools of their trade at low or no cost to help them get established.

Those kinds of ventures uphold the human personality, made in the image of God, rather than destroy it, and strengthen our native culture, while posing little threat to the environment around us.

Such is our choice:  Louisianans can either build a techno-prison for ourselves, as the people in THX 1138 did, which, to use a more familiar George Lucas film allusion, would be akin to the Rebel Alliance in Star Wars agreeing to build the Death Star, or we can choose a technologically restrained, humane, God-centered economic development model, the kind advocated by St Basil the Great, G. K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc, E. F. Schumacher, Wilhelm Rӧpke, Andrew Lytle, Wendell Berry, and others.  Meta was pretty keen on cancelling the views of Trump-supporting Southerners in Louisiana on its social media platforms; we should return the favor and cancel the expansion plan of Zuckerberg in our State.