[Ads-l] Slang Sense of "Catfishing"

[Ben Zimmer]

Yes, Emily Bender did make that complaint about "hallucination" in the WOTY
voting. I quoted her along similar lines when I wrote about "hallucination"
for my Wall Street Journal column back in April.

---
https://www.wsj.com/articles/hallucination-when-chatbots-and-people-see-what-isnt-there-91c6c88b?st=spvdnolqjd9u5aj&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
University of Washington computational linguist Emily M. Bender agrees,
noting that the term incorrectly “suggests that the language model is
having perceptions and experiences.” She also is concerned about “making
light of what can be a serious mental health symptom.” While alternatives
like “synthesized ungrounded text” might be a mouthful, they avoid the
pitfalls of imagining that AI systems have human perceptions, hallucinatory
or otherwise.
---

On Mon, Jan 8, 2024 at 8:16 AM Joe Salmons <
000008f18d0e0c45-dmarc-request at listserv.uga.edu> wrote:

> Was it Emily Bender who said at WOTY that ‘hallucinate’ makes AI seem like
> it has consciousness or something to that effect?
> Joe
>
> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Amy
> West <medievalist at W-STS.COM>
> Date: Monday, January 8, 2024 at 08:07
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Slang Sense of "Catfishing"
> On 1/8/24 12:00 AM, ADS-L automatic digest system wrote:
> > Date:    Sun, 7 Jan 2024 12:49:27 -0500
> > From:    Jonathan Lighter<wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject: Re: Slang Sense of "Catfishing"
> >
> > If a machine can invent an apposite title like "Love in the Time of
> Spam,"
> > we may as well admit it's over.
> >
> > I've had even more spectacularly future-dystopic experiences with both
> > Google Bard and Bing, but I'll spare you the details.
> >
> > JL
>
>
> Just earlier this morning I was wondering about the choice of
> "hallucinate" vs. "fabricate" for AIs making up sh*t.
>
> ---Amy West
>
>
>

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org