Since energy cannot be created or destroyed, and has a strong tendency to spread out every which way through surrounding space, you have to be really careful how you draw the boundaries around what counts as "consumed". Solving that problem might be equivalent to solving Friendliness in general.
Do you think this is a loophole allowing arbitrary actions? Or do you think that an AI would simply say, "I don't know what it means for energy to be consumed, so I'm not going to do anything."
I don't know much about physics, but do you think that some sort of measure of entropy might work better?
The Future of Humanity Institute wants to pick the brains of the less wrongers :-)
Do you have suggestions for safe questions to ask an Oracle? Interpret the question as narrowly or broadly as you want; new or unusual ideas especially welcome.