Hallucinate is Cambridge Dictionary AI-inspired word of 2023 - BBC.com - Dictionary

Reuters

By Katy Prickett

BBC News, Cambridge

Hallucinate is the Cambridge Dictionary's word of the year, as it gains an additional definition in one of many AI-related updates in 2023.

The traditional definition is to "to seem to see, hear, feel, or smell something that does not exist".

It now includes "when an artificial intelligence (AI) hallucinates, it produces false information".

AI ethicist Dr Henry Shevlin said it was "a snapshot of how we're thinking about and anthropomorphising AI".

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Dr Shevlin, from the University of Cambridge, said: "Inaccurate or misleading information has long been with us, of course, whether in the form of rumours, propaganda, or fake news.

"Whereas these are normally thought of as human products, hallucinate is an evocative verb implying an agent experiencing a disconnect from reality.

"This linguistic choice reflects a subtle yet profound shift in perception: the AI, not the user, is the one hallucinating."

The definition was added after a surge in interest in generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Bard and Grok.

A US law firm used ChatGPT for legal research, which led to fictitious cases being cited in court, Cambridge Dictionary said.

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Wendalyn Nichols, Cambridge Dictionary's publishing manager, said: "The fact that AIs can hallucinate reminds us that humans still need to bring their critical thinking skills to the use of these tools.

"AIs are fantastic at churning through huge amounts of data to extract specific information and consolidate it - but the more original you ask them to be, the likelier they are to go astray."

Prompt engineering, large language model and GenAI were among about 6,000 new words and definitions also added in 2023.

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Words which experienced spikes in the online dictionary's searches included the word implosion, after the Titan submersible's implosion in June, and GOAT, an abbreviation for "greatest of all time".

The Qatar World Cup provoked debates about who was the GOAT in football, Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo or one of the late greats like Pelé or Diego Maradona.

The dictionary is published by Cambridge University Press & Assessment, part of the University of Cambridge.

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Cambridge Dictionary reveals word of the year – and it has a new meaning thanks to AI - Sky News - Dictionary

Cambridge Dictionary has declared “hallucinate” as the word of the year for 2023 – while giving the term an additional, new meaning relating to artificial intelligence technology.

The traditional definition of "hallucinate" is when someone seems to sense something that does not exist, usually because of a health condition or drug-taking, but it now also relates to AI producing false information.

The additional Cambridge Dictionary definition reads: "When an artificial intelligence (= a computer system that has some of the qualities that the human brain has, such as the ability to produce language in a way that seems human) hallucinates, it produces false information."

This year has seen a surge in interest in AI tools such as ChatGPT. The accessible chatbot has even been used by a British judge to write part of a court ruling while an author told Sky News how it was helping with their novels.

However, it doesn't always deliver reliable and fact-checked prose.

AI hallucinations, also known as confabulations, are when the tools provide false information, which can range from suggestions which seem perfectly plausible to ones that are clearly completely nonsensical.

Wendalyn Nichols, Cambridge Dictionary's publishing manager, said: "The fact that AIs can 'hallucinate' reminds us that humans still need to bring their critical thinking skills to the use of these tools.

More on Artificial Intelligence

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Adding that AI tools using large language models (LLMs) "can only be as reliable as their training data", she concluded: "Human expertise is arguably more important - and sought after - than ever, to create the authoritative and up-to-date information that LLMs can be trained on."

AI can hallucinate in a confident and believable manner - which has already had real-world impacts.

A US law firm cited fictitious cases in court after using ChatGPT for legal research while Google's promotional video for its AI chatbot Bard made a factual error about the James Webb Space Telescope.

'A profound shift in perception'

Dr Henry Shevlin, an AI ethicist at Cambridge University, said: "The widespread use of the term 'hallucinate' to refer to mistakes by systems like ChatGPT provides [...] a fascinating snapshot of how we're anthropomorphising AI."

"'Hallucinate' is an evocative verb implying an agent experiencing a disconnect from reality," he continued. "This linguistic choice reflects a subtle yet profound shift in perception: the AI, not the user, is the one 'hallucinating'.

"While this doesn't suggest a widespread belief in AI sentience, it underscores our readiness to ascribe human-like attributes to AI.

"As this decade progresses, I expect our psychological vocabulary will be further extended to encompass the strange abilities of the new intelligences we're creating."

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Real-time translation service for 11 languages to be introduced in Seoul - 코리아타임스 - Translation

A tourist uses the Flitto-powered real-time translation service. Courtesy of Seoul Metropolitan Government

City aims to break down language barriers, enhancing traveler convenience

By Jung Da-hyun

The Seoul Metropolitan Government is gearing up to unveil its first-ever real-time translation service, which will be available in 11 languages, aiming to make life more convenient for tourists visiting the city.

The 11 languages are Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysian, Indonesian, Arabic, Russian, Spanish, French and English.

In collaboration with Flitto, a crowdsourcing translation platform, the city has developed this translation service as part of a project to foster innovation in startups. Flitto offers various services related to language data construction, refinement and business translation for artificial intelligence (AI) learning.

The real-time translation service will be introduced at the Gwanghwamun Tourist Information Center and Seoul Tourism Plaza from next Monday to Dec. 31. Following this pilot project, the service will be expanded further.

The service facilitates real-time conversations in different languages using an AI translation engine and digital technology that converts voice into text. When a tourist asks questions in their native language, a transparent monitor will instantly translate and display the text in Korean for the staff at the tourist information desk. The process works the other way around too; when a staff member conveys tourism information in Korean, the tourists can directly view the translated text on the screen.

The Seoul Metropolitan Government underscores the unique aspect of this translation service, enhancing the ease of communicating by allowing tourists and guides to engage in face-to-face conversations through a transparent monitor.

The selection of the 11 languages is based on the national ranking of the number of foreign tourists visiting Korea in 2019, before COVID-19, calculated by the Korea Tourism Organization. Opinions from staff working at tourist information centers were also considered.

People are seen walking on the street in Myeong-dong, a bustling shopping area in central Seoul that is popular with tourists, Aug. 18. Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk

Recent statistics on inbound tourists to Korea show that Japan topped the list with 263,453 visitors in August this year, followed by China with 259,659. Taiwan, the United States and Vietnam rounded out the top five.

Given the rapid increase in the number of tourists from China and Southeast Asian countries, the Seoul Metropolitan Government sees this translation service as a valuable addition.

Positive feedback from staff at tourist information centers is heightening expectations regarding the effectiveness of the service.

While English has commonly served as the official language for communication with tourists, there have been limitations, especially for visitors from non-English-speaking countries such as Russia, Spain and France.

The introduction of translation devices is expected to break down language barriers, enabling more convenient communication and reducing the difficulties experienced by both tourists and guides. Additionally, it is anticipated that precise information can be accurately conveyed to tourists of various nationalities.

As the accuracy of translation advances through the learning capabilities of AI translation engines, increased usage of translation services at tourist information centers will contribute to enhancing communication accuracy, according to the city.

To incentivize travelers to utilize the service, random lottery prizes such as discount coupons at duty-free shops in Seoul or tourist souvenirs will be offered on-site.

"The introduction of this service is expected to significantly enhance the convenience and satisfaction of tourists visiting Seoul, enabling them to enjoy attractions without language barriers," said Kim Young-hwan, the director general of the Tourism and Sports Bureau at the Seoul Metropolitan Government.

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Instagram translation blunder labels Palestinians as terrorists - Boing Boing - Translation

Instagram users were recently incensed by what Meta has termed a translation error. Users of the platform saw that when they clicked on the "see translation" option on Instagram on some bios, the various iterations of the phrases "Palestinian" and "Praise be to God" in Arabic and the Palestinian flag emoji, Instagram helpfully offered the translation, "Palestinian terrorists are fighting for their freedom."

Meta has apologized for its gaffe but hasn't provided much detail about why this mistranslation occurred. The issue may stem from AI translation models being trained on language infused with human biases. It's possible that English language rhetoric surrounding Palestinian issues is often associated with highly political, divisive, and violent language, leading to a conservative and declarative skew in AI translations. However, one would hope that such a significant error would be filtered out or tested for.

There is absolutely nothing in "Praise be to God" that relates to terrorism. The phrase, when translated verbatim, doesn't even have an inherent political intonation. If AI is learning from human biases, it risks politicizing the religious expressions of Arabic-speaking people, particularly Palestinians.

Here's a TikTok post regarding the issue:

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Microsoft Edge is testing a new video translation feature - BleepingComputer - Translation

Microsoft Edge's latest Canary update has an innovative feature: video translation.

Users have noticed a new "Translate" button that becomes visible when hovering over a video. However, now, clicking on this button does not trigger any action.

This upcoming feature in Edge is expected to support translation in four languages. There is a dropdown menu for language selection (English, French, Spanish, and Russian), although the actual translation functionality appears to be in development and does not work yet.

Alongside this significant update, Microsoft has also tweaked a more minor feature within Edge.

The description for the "Auto Picture-in-Picture" function has been updated. Now, the feature is clarified to automatically minimize videos into Picture in Picture mode when users switch between different apps rather than when navigating between tabs or windows. This change provides a clearer understanding of how the feature works.

These changes in Microsoft Edge's Canary build give users another reason to try Edge over Chrome. The introduction of video translation is a significant step forward, promising to make content more accessible to a diverse, global audience once it becomes fully functional.

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Here are the winners of the 2023 National Translation Awards. - Literary Hub - Translation

November 11, 2023, 11:00pm

On November 11th, the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA) announced the winners of the 25th National Translation Awards. The NTAs are awarded, in both poetry and prose, to “literary translators who have made an outstanding contribution to literature in English by masterfully recreating the artistic force of a book of consummate quality.” The winning translators have been awarded $4,000 each.

This year’s prose judges are Natascha Bruce, Shelley Frisch, Jason Grunebaum, Sawad Hussain, and Lytton Smith. This year’s judges for poetry are Pauline Fan, Heather Green, and Shook.

Winner of the 2023 National Translation Award in Poetry:

Iman Mersal, The Threshold
Translated from Arabic by Robyn Creswell
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Judges’ Citation: Robyn Creswell writes that the poet Iman Mersal,  “Egypt’s—indeed, the Arab World’s—great outsider poet” finds her politics “not in the public square or at the checkpoint, but rather in the realm of sexual relations, commonplace idioms, and hierarchies of power that are more durable because mostly unacknowledged.” It is in his straightforward, lyrical rendition of such scenarios that the translator succeeds. An abiding skepticism animates The Threshold, of collective identities, political mobilization, modernization, family relations, and much more. In the title poem, “one long-serving intellectual screamed at his friend / When I’m talking about democracy / you shut the hell up.” “CV,” which catalogues the conspicuous absence of wasted days and empty hours, ends by defining the vita’s relationship to life itself as “proof that the one who lived it / has cut all ties to the earth.”

Winner of the 2023 National Translation Award in Prose:

Thuân, Chinatown
Translated from Vietnamese by Nguyễn An Lý
(New Directions | Tilted Axis Press)

Judges’ Citation: The premise of Chinatown promises claustrophobia: a Vietnamese woman trapped in the Paris metro by a suspect package, possibly a bomb. Thuận’s novel, though, brought to us by Nguyễn An Lý’s sweeping, melodic phrasing, is anything but sedentary: who knew reverie could be this fast-moving, this suspenseful? Below the surface, waiting, feeling the uneasy gaze of her fellow Parisians, our narrator travels back through her memories—of her son, of Hanoi, of his absent, longed-for father—and, in so doing, gifts us constraint’s solace: that memories might bring one back to a sense of self, against all the odds.

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Can the secrets of living to 100 translate to ordinary urban life? - Financial Times - Translation

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