Mike Dillinger, PhD’s Post

𝐃𝐨𝐞𝐬 𝐀𝐈 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐥, 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐛𝐞𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐲 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐠𝐞? "𝑨 𝑫𝒖𝒕𝒄𝒉 𝒑𝒖𝒃𝒍𝒊𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒉𝒐𝒖𝒔𝒆 𝒊𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒅𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒖𝒔𝒆 𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒇𝒊𝒄𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒊𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒍𝒍𝒊𝒈𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒐 𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒔𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆 𝒇𝒊𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏 𝒊𝒏𝒕𝒐 𝑬𝒏𝒈𝒍𝒊𝒔𝒉". The words below are from an article in The Times today, I can't paste the link. "Then felt I like some watcher of the skies / When a new planet swims into his ken,” wrote Keats in his sonnet On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer. No one has better expressed the power of translation to convey the spirit as well as essence of a literary text. Except perhaps as joke or pastiche, no poet is likely to similarly celebrate unleashing Google Translate on, say, Goethe’s Faust or ­Cervantes’s Don Quixote. Just try it and see. Even so, undaunted by the challenge, one publishing house has resolved to use artificial intelligence (AI) to translate commercial fiction books into English. It is Veen, Bosch and Keuning (VBK), the largest trade publisher in the Netherlands. VBK is admittedly cautious in this mission, stressing AI will assist in translation rather than fully ­accomplish it, that the number of titles is in single figures, and that the venture is experimental. Despite these caveats, translators, authors and editors are up in arms. And they have good reason. Language, in the sense of complex meanings conveyed by combining sounds or lexemes, is a distinctively human capability. Contrary to appearances, computer programs can’t convert the nuances of one natural language into those of another. Perhaps one day these limits will be overcome, but the task is formidable. Geoffrey Pullum, a leading scholar of English grammar, has noted that, while machines have made great strides in recent decades in speech recognition, “they exhibit not a flicker of actual linguistic understanding”. Hence every age needs its own translator of Homer, whether it be George Chapman in the 16th century or Emily Wilson today. None but a human intelligence can properly replicate a joke or pun between languages, as the late Anthea Bell did with both Franz Kafka and Asterix the Gaul. Publishers should ponder hard in using AI for translation, before readers force them to reconsider." 𝐀𝐧𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬?

Hey tech bro, why do you hate translators?   Yesterday, a known Dutch tech bro was on BNR Nieuwsradio complaining that his publisher would not let him use AI to ‘translate’ his latest book from Dutch to English. I applaud his publisher for knowing that only a human can deliver a proper book translation. The bro wouldn't be paying for the translation, so why the hate? Someone has to correct the mess AI is going to make. Chances are, that’s going to be a translator getting paid way less and spending more time than they would translating your book. Since you publicly resent having to hire them, they should feel all warm and fuzzy about going the extra mile to make you sound decent in English.   You wrote this book yourself, right? And you want to be paid and credited properly? But the human translator is a burden? Then write your books in English. Oh wait, you can’t because you’re not fluent? Neither is AI. #AI #translation

You are just making your debut at international fairs like @Poultry Tech or @BIOAGRO Poland. For the market the sky is the limit. Your clients are happy, which makes you feel like everything is under control. But is it really?  Is your communication strong enough to meet the challenges of a global market? 📊 In 2022/2023 the value of the NLP translation market (translations done by artificial intelligence) in Poland grew by 28.3% year-on-year (Statista). It appears that many businesses believe that relying on AI will help them avoid the challenges of international communication. ⚠️ But are they really right? Industry insights (including ours) show a growing demand for proofreading services – professional revision of machine translations. This echoes George Bernard Shaw's famous observation: "The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place." We are receiving more and more requests for translation proofreading. Our experts possess not only linguistic and technical skills, but also competencies in assessing the quality of machine translation and identifying and correcting errors. ✨ That's why we offer #proofreading service that eliminates the need to choose between speed, quality, and price. Thanks to our profound knowledge of translation technology and years of expertise, we guarantee a high-quality translation perfectly tailored to your needs, delivered on time and at an affordable price. No more accepting long lead times, high costs, or low quality. You can have it all. 🔗 Want to check? 👉 Get a free quote today and see how we can transform your global communication: https://lnkd.in/dewSiA8x 📧 biuro@arcuslink.pl  📞 +48 667788670  #translation #businesscommunication #globalbusiness #postediting

💬 Grammarly expands into translation: What does this mean for the industry? Grammarly's entry into translation with Grammarly Translate marks a big shift. While it aims to simplify multilingual communication, it raises concerns about accuracy, cultural nuances, and the role of professional translators. 💡 Will this innovation enhance collaboration, or will it oversimplify the complexities of language? More information: https://lnkd.in/eaF4ccXW #translation #AI #localization

Hey y'all Language professionals! are you dead as a parrot? or maybe not? For anyone who is worried that AI or Tech in general will throw us, Language professionals, out of the window, please read this rather insightful piece of writing. <3

💡𝗘𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗼𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁’𝘀 𝗯𝗲𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗼𝘀𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗱, 𝗯𝗹𝘂𝗲, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗼𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲 𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀? It’s not just spelling or grammar – it’s the result of some amazing linguistic research! 🌐✍️  Our team at WebSpellChecker just shared a deep dive into the world of digital proofreading, exploring how WProofreader uses a blend of linguistics and AI (hello, 𝗥𝗲𝗱𝗣𝗲𝗻𝗡𝗲𝘁! 👋) to analyze text on multiple levels. Discover the “color-coded” science behind our tool’s error categories and how we ensure your writing shines. 🌈📝 Check out the article for a peek behind the scenes! 🔗 Read here: https://lnkd.in/dtQ9pXiu #WebSpellChecker #WProofreader #Linguistics #AI #DigitalProofreading #ErrorClassification

“For many there is a deep-seated desire to translate and I also believe there is an audience that desires human-translated content.” It makes sense: who would want to read literature produced by a machine, right? What author would want their carefully-crafted work be spit out in another language artificially? This article mentions a few publishers that have resorted to post-editing processes, but I know that publishers who treat literature respectfully are not thinking of doing this any time soon. Fortunately, there are a lot of them! #translation #litranslators #literarytranslation #machinetranslation #ai https://lnkd.in/dCyedVKn

Nothing new here. Yet still refreshing to hear those opposed to this. We all know AI is now feeding on itself to expand its “brain” and crystallized knowledge because it has run out of data on which to feed. Literary translation is not your run-of-the-mill type of translation—it requires managing nuances, breaking down texts chock full of cultural references and, more importantly, human emotion and sentiment. Replicating that requires more than a simple, automated text analysis.  https://lnkd.in/gj_t5h6N

Can you use Google's Gemini as your professional translator? My latest medium article attends to answer this question. #gemini #ai #google #translation #translate #medium https://lnkd.in/ePRzyEQd

Two Obvious Truths + One Bonus Truth -William Lise Here are the two obvious truths: Truth 1: The need for human translators has not been obviated by MT, with or without AI. Truth 2: If there are 100 translators reading this, fewer than 20 or maybe fewer than 10 of them will still be able to make a living by translating after about mid-2027. Translators incessantly harp on Truth 1, and I agree with Truth 1, but most carefully avoid even thinking about Truth 2 and what it might mean for them. The trick is to be among the few survivors. But don’t worry about how to do that, because there’s a third truth. Truth 3: Almost all the translators who will survive until after about mid-2027 have already done what they need to do to give them the tools to survive. And the tools I’m talking about are not CAT tools or AI software. They’re tools acquired by making early life and career decisions. That includes doing things to acquire field-specific expertise that is convincing to clients having that expertise without the need to Google, and it also includes where to live, yes, even in the age of global connectivity from anywhere. Since it’s too late for most people already translating to start, the task that faces working translators who are facing AI—and that’s almost all translators—is to figure out whether they already have the tools for survival and are in a situation that enables them to do the necessary to survive AI. Most do not have the tools and are not in favorable situations. Once translators can figure that out, they can make decisions about what to do, and that includes getting out of translation or using their hard-earned language ability for something else. Waiting to be swallowed up by the tsunAmI is not a good strategy, unless you are already financially independent and have a comfortable lifeboat at your disposal.