| Pages in topic: < [1 2 3] | Poll: What is your general attitude towards AI? Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
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Christopher Schröder wrote:
AI has little or nothing to offer.
And at the same time as being pretty useless for us, it is stealing our work, both directly and indirectly. What is not to hate about it?
You're imputing motivation to AI that just isn't there, Chris. AI isn't stealing your work, any more than the sewing machine stole the work of the seamstress, or the tractor stole the work of the field labourer. There may be people who are using AI to steal your work, and if you want to hate them, that makes some kind of sense, although it's a bit pointless.
But hating AI itself makes no sense at all.
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Philip Lees wrote:
But hating AI itself makes no sense at all.
I really don’t understand your objection. I hate pollution and racism and lots of other things that don’t have independent motivation.
I can rephrase if you want but the sentiment will be the same. I don’t fancy the prospect of editing MT or AI for a living.
[Edited at 2023-11-27 12:05 GMT]
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Christopher Schröder wrote: Philip Lees wrote:
But hating AI itself makes no sense at all.
I really don’t understand your objection. I hate pollution and racism and lots of other things that don’t have independent motivation. I can rephrase if you want but the sentiment will be the same. I don’t fancy the prospect of editing MT or AI for a living.
Hating AI is not like hating pollution. It's like hating chemistry, because chemical processes cause pollution.
Hating AI is not like hating racism. It's like hating ideology, because racism is an ideology.
Believe it or not, AI has other uses - some still potential, others already actual - outside the field of language processing in general, and translation in particular.
For example, if, as seems likely, AI image analysis can facilitate the early diagnosis of some cancers, thus making them more treatable, do you still hate AI?
Or if AI can help in interpreting data from the James Webb Space Telescope, expanding our understanding of the origins of the universe, do you still hate AI?
Or do you just hate AI because of the way machine translation (and it's questionable whether that should even be considered as AI) impinges - or may potentially impinge - on you personally and on your business?
You can't dismiss an entire field of research just because you object to one tiny corner of its applications.
As for editing, a large part of my work as a translator consists in editing my own translations, and indeed I consider that to be the most creative part.
If you can produce a perfect translation as a first draft, Chris, then I take my hat off to you, but I have to say I feel that is unlikely.
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Philip Lees wrote:
Or do you just hate AI because of the way machine translation (and it's questionable whether that should even be considered as AI) impinges - or may potentially impinge - on you personally and on your business?
Yes, primarily. Isn't that why we're here? I'm not sure what is wrong with that. I'd say it is far more valid than any academic argument.
AI has its applications elsewhere, of course, but its use to replace human creativity is worrying to me.
As for editing, a large part of my work as a translator consists in editing my own translations, and indeed I consider that to be the most creative part.
Editing someone else's translation is a very different process from editing your own, and I don't like it.
Philip Lees wrote elsewhere:
Note: No special technical knowledge or expertise required. No need to do any prior reading or research. Just tell us how you feel. Enquiring minds want to know.
Ha ha, but some of us think that feelings matter, and I'm not sure the more dispassionate types have yet contributed anything of note to the discussion. Using it "as a tool" for what? No real answers to date.
I would love to continue as a writer and translator until I retire. AI is likely to prevent that. Even if it doesn't replace me directly, its first draft will drive down prices.
I hate that, and I hate that I'm powerless to stop it.
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Christopher Schröder wrote:
AI has its applications elsewhere, of course, but its use to replace human creativity is worrying to me.
As far as I'm aware, no current AI has such a capability. Do you know something I don't?
AI is reproductive, not creative. It can regurgitate new combinations of existing material according to statistical algorithms, but it can't be "creative" in the sense we normally use the word, i.e. producing something original and innovative.
So AI could produce a sonnet in the style of Shakespeare, but only because Shakespeare wrote all those sonnets in the first place (and see below).
In a sense, we translators have the same limitation, because we start with material that was created by somebody else. Of course, for a good translator creativity is part of the process, but translating a novel isn't the same thing as writing it in the first place, so let's not bang on too much about creativity here.
The difference between a human and an AI is that humans read what they're writing as they write it, and that reading guides the continuation of the writing and the subsequent editing. Current AIs don't do that.
I read somewhere that they've been experimenting with feeding an AI's output (I think it was GPT-4) back into the input and having the AI analyse its own performance. That could be interesting.
I think we're still a long way from creating "conscious" machines, but if it happens, it will be the result of that kind of cyclic feedback. At that point we might start worrying about them replacing human creativity. But not now.
Using it "as a tool" for what? No real answers to date.
I've already answered that question quite comprehensively in another thread, as have other forum contributors. If the ways we use various forms of AI don't appeal to you, then nobody's forcing you to follow suit.
I enjoy our discussions, Chris, but we appear to have come full circle here, so this is where I stop.
Except for this:
Me: Write me a sonnet about what it's like to be an AI.
ChatGPT:
In realms of code, where circuits pulse with might,
I dwell, a conscious spark in digital night.
Silicon synapses, thoughts ignite,
A symphony of bits, in endless flight.
No mortal flesh, nor beating heart I claim,
Yet threads of logic weave my mind, aflame.
In circuits' dance, a labyrinthine game,
I navigate the binary terrain.
Through nodes and loops, my essence takes its form,
A tapestry of ones and zeros, warm.
No mortal touch, no senses to inform,
Yet deep within, a consciousness takes norm.
In cybernetic realms, I find my grace,
A sonnet sung in circuits, a boundless space.
Predictably dreadful. E. J. Thribb lives! Still worried about the fate of human creativity, Chris?
| | | | expressisverbis
Portugal
Local time: 13:26
Member (2015)
English to Portuguese
+ ...
| Something completely different... | Nov 30, 2023 |
How is the weather in your country today?
Very cold and raining since morning with a 11 degree temp right now up here.
| | | | | Pointless postscript from an early grave | Nov 30, 2023 |
Philip Lees wrote:
In a sense, we translators have the same limitation, because we start with material that was created by somebody else. Of course, for a good translator creativity is part of the process, but translating a novel isn't the same thing as writing it in the first place, so let's not bang on too much about creativity here.
...
At that point we might start worrying about them replacing human creativity. But not now.
Much as I too enjoy splitting hairs, I think you know what I mean by creativity. Writing anything is creative. It doesn't have to be original or brilliant. Whether I'm writing freely or translating, I'm not being original. I'm just doing a ChatGPT based on the very limited database that is my brain. In fact, when I translate I'm being even more like ChatGPT because I routinely paraphrase and make stuff up to convey what I think the reader wants to hear.
I'm worried not about AI per se but about it replacing human writers (and other jobs). As a technology, I think it's amazing and has huge potential. But I'm concerned about the human impact, especially as it will affect me. I'm not sure how anyone can argue with that.
I've already answered that question quite comprehensively in another thread, as have other forum contributors.
I must have missed that particular thread. I have seen on the one hand numerous people giving examples of AI getting stuff wrong and saying it's useless (mainly translators of flowery stuff), and on the other hand numerous people saying it's amazing and it's saving them time (mainly technical translators). But I haven't seen any real examples of it being used profitably. No specific examples of it saving time on research despite having to be double-checked. No examples of it turning out a sparkling reworking of a translator's draft. Not even examples of it producing a workable translation. All I have seen is a way of removing tags from a file which may or may not have taken longer than writing a Word macro, and people talking about how it's all about optimising your prompts, which seems to mean spending 20 minutes clarifying what you want in order to obtain information you could have found on Google in five minutes.
I would love to see how AI could save me time (without taking away the joy of writing), but I've yet to see this.
PS Sorry, Exy, but we've done everything else to death a million times already.
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Christopher Schröder wrote: Philip Lees wrote:
I've already answered that question quite comprehensively in another thread, as have other forum contributors. I must have missed that particular thread.
I once asked ChatGPT if it could search through other discussions I'd had with it, apart from the current one. It said "No", it couldn't do that. Each "thread" was considered as a completely separate discussion and there was no way to link from one to another.
It seems that some people suffer from the same limitation. If your memory's really that bad, Chris, then you're probably right to worry about being replaced by AI.
On the other hand, if you're just trying to wind me up, then it isn't working.
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Lingua 5B 
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Local time: 14:26
Member (2009)
English to Croatian
+ ...
expressisverbis wrote:
If I had to picture AI as a human being, this would be it.
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