I heard that Tencent's AI simultaneous interpretation "overturned" at the Boao Forum. Of course, I only heard about it and didn't see it in person. However, the various live pictures are real hammers, which proves that the AI has indeed translated some puzzling words and popped up a large number of inexplicable words. Later, the Tencent translator who was responsible for the simultaneous interpretation task also admitted that there were phenomena such as "meaningless repetition of words, capitalization and confusion of characters in a large area".
In the author's opinion, the significance of this high-profile AI simultaneous interpretation error is not only to contribute tidbits about the Boao Forum to the people who eat melons, but more importantly, it is an embarrassing but effective science popularization.
Several scientists have said something similar: the public should have "reasonable expectations" for artificial intelligence. Too high or too low expectations will cause harm to the development of the artificial intelligence industry. Helpless, many reports on artificial intelligence now follow the "stunning" route. If there is a result, it will be hype, as if the AI can rule the world in the next second; if there is a mistake, it will be a bitter storm, and I can’t wait to kick you to the ground and step on a few more feet.
In fact, in daily applications, AI can basically guarantee that the chain will not be dropped, or even if the chain is dropped, there will be no consequences. Liu Qingfeng, chairman of iFLYTEK, said that their iFLYTEK translator is about the level of CET-6 in college English, which helps users to play a role in daily communication when traveling abroad and looking for restaurants. But simultaneous interpretation is very different, even if the professional English level 8, it may not be able to do simultaneous interpretation. Simultaneous interpretation is a talent on the top of the translation industry. In front of them, artificial intelligence is still a student. If you want to say "replacement", you will feel a little guilty.
The person in charge of Tencent Translator also said in an interview with the media that AI translation needs to be continuously improved. The Boao Forum site has diverse languages, highly professional topics, and a lot of noise interference, so various problems will definitely be encountered. Moreover, there are no punctuation marks when speaking on the spot. According to each person's language usage habits, various mood particles will be passed on. AI usually diligently performs speech recognition on all words, and then starts text translation. It cannot exclude "water words", and it is easy to dig a hole for itself. If the speaker's poetry is prosperous and comes with an ancient poem, the AI translation will probably tremble even more - to tell the truth, the average level simultaneous interpreter may not be able to handle it.
Therefore, when using AI for simultaneous interpretation, problems are inevitable. Tencent also admitted that they expected unexpected situations, but the industry's attention to AI simultaneous interpretation exceeded their expectations.
There is no way. Who told me that before the various media clamored for AI simultaneous interpretation to make human simultaneous interpretation unemployed. Now that you have overturned the car, the interpreters naturally want to vent their unhappiness. As someone joked in a WeChat screenshot - it turns out that they still need humans.
AI and people are supposed to cooperate with each other. Human-machine should become a set of coupled systems, suitable for AI to do, to AI; There is no need to yell at everyone not to learn foreign languages because of the progress of machine translation; there is no need to deny the role it can play in the translation industry because of the mistakes of AI translation. Humans and AI should complement each other. This tidbit at the Boao Forum once again made a national popular science of "humans and machines".
AI translation is not perfect, but please allow it to see more of the world and give it a chance for trial and error. Humans don't have to belittle themselves. Language is so broad and profound, and the beauty of language cannot be displayed by machines alone.
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