On Thursday, September 5, we compared the performance of ChatGPT, Microsoft Co-pilot and two online translation tools: Google Translate and DeepL when given some translation tasks…and played around with more besides.
Several Club members use ChatGPT, mainly as a writing tool and to ask questions. Elaine explained how ChatGPT had accurately transposed handwritten Old English text from a JPG image.
Here’s the image of the handwritten will:
… and here’s the text extracted by ChatGPT:
Proved at London 9th June 1843 before the Judge by the oath of James Woodman the sole Executor to whom Admon was granted having been first sworn by Commission duly to administer.
This is the last Will and Testament of me George Thomas Dettmer of 24 and a Piano Forte Maker of 24 in the Parish of St Mary Islington in the County of Middlesex being of sound state of mind dispose of and bequeath to my wife Mary Ann Dettmer absolutely all the linen woolen linen woolen bed tables bed table and other household furniture plate linen wearing apparel looking glasses, china books pictures piano fortes and working tools for her own sole use & benefit and I do hereby appoint James Woodman of No 100 one hundred pounds in the Britannia office insurance company to give and bequeath to my two daughters Maria Ann Dettmer and Eliza Dettmer and in equal parts the residue of the aforesaid sum of 100.0.0 in respect to which all debts shall be paid from my assets in the sum for my two daughters Maria Ann Dettmer and Eliza Dettmer all my estate and effects in case either of my said daughters shall depart this life before they attain the age of 21 in that case her share shall be paid to the survivor and in the meantime the interest or annual income to be placed in the savings bank or any other public fund for their sole use and benefit and I further do direct after the death of my said wife her share shall be equally divided amongst my two said daughters and I hereby appoint my friend the aforesaid James Woodman sole executor of this my last Will and Testament and I hereby revoke all other Wills by me at any time heretofore made and do declare this to be my last Will and Testament.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal George Thomas Dettmer.
Signed sealed and delivered this 22nd day of January 1843 in the presence of us,
John Underwood – Witness
Samuel Fox
Only minor corrections were required. It’s impressive!
Chris challenged Chat GPT and the translation tools with a dummy letter to the Town Hall asking for a speed limit to be imposed on the Benitatxell road. Here is a relevant paragraph and its translations.
Original English:
We are writing to request that a speed limit of 50km/hour should be established on the Ctra. del Poblenou de Benitatxell between the Cami Cabanes roundabout and the entrance to the Los Cerezos urbanisation near the golf course. This part of the road is windy. There are several turnings to urbanisations, restaurants, a garden centre and country roads and there have been many accidents. Currently, there are sections limited to 60km/hour, but other sections with no speed limit.
ChatGPT4
Nos dirigimos a ustedes para solicitar que se establezca un límite de velocidad de 50 km/h en la Ctra. del Poblenou de Benitatxell, entre la rotonda del Camí Cabanes y la entrada a la urbanización Los Cerezos, cerca del campo de golf. Esta parte de la carretera es sinuosa. Hay varias salidas hacia urbanizaciones, restaurantes, un centro de jardinería y caminos rurales, y ya ha habido muchos accidentes. Actualmente, hay tramos limitados a 60 km/h, pero otros no tienen ningún límite de velocidad.
Deepl
Le escribimos para solicitar que se establezca un límite de velocidad de 50km/hora en la Ctra. del Poblenou de Benitatxell entre la rotonda de Cami Cabanes y la entrada a la urbanización Los Cerezos cerca del campo de golf. Esta parte de la carretera es ventosa. Hay varios desvíos a urbanizaciones, restaurantes, un centro de jardinería y caminos rurales y se han producido muchos accidentes. Actualmente hay tramos limitados a 60km/hora, pero otros tramos sin límite de velocidad.
Google Translate (via a translation into Catalan)
Nos escribimos para pedir que se establezca un límite de velocidad de 50 km/hora en la Ctra. del Poblenou de Benitatxell entre la rotonda de Cami Cabanes y la entrada de la urbanización Los Cerezos cerca del campo de golf. Esta parte del camino hace viento. Hay varios giros en urbanizaciones, restaurantes, centro de jardinería y carreteras rurales y ha habido muchos accidentes. Actualmente existen tramos limitados a 60 km/hora, pero otros tramos sin límite de velocidad.
Note that ChatGPT interpreted “windy” to mean “winding”, whereas the other two tools took it to mean “subject to wind” There was a bit of a discussion about this. The content of the paragraphs and letter suggest that “windy” as in “winding” is the more likely meaning of this word in this case (which is actually what was meant). An English person who didn’t know any Spanish would not realise that the DeepL translation was wrong. This exercise illustrates that the source language must be precise and unambiguous to be sure to get a good translation. ChatGPT is trained on language use by an analysis of the huge body of text from the Internet and chooses the likely meaning from context.
Chris then looked at ChatGPT’s translations of a rather densely-written academic piece about the Iberians . The original was in Valenciano and the first prompt was “Translate this”
The Name of Iberia and the Iberians
We begin our journey by searching for the origin and meaning of the term that gives name to the culture we are studying. Why do we refer to the people who lived in this era as Iberians? Where does the term come from, and how has it been historically understood?
Originally, the name of the Iberians simply referred to the inhabitants of Iberia, which for some Greek writers marked the edge of the known world (in fact, for the Greeks, there was another Iberia located by the Black Sea, so two Iberias bordered their world). However, the ancient writers were not aware of the existence of an Iberian people in the sense of a homogeneous population with political unity. For example, for Herodotus, who wrote in the 5th century BCE, all these peoples were Iberians, and other Greek written sources identified the various populations living in Iberia as Iberians, not in an ethnic sense, but rather a geographical or cultural one.
All these written traditions and geographical descriptions were later compiled by the Romans. Strabo, born in what is now Turkey, was the author of an important geographical compilation in the 1st century BCE, in which he precisely describes the boundaries of Iberia for the Romans. These boundaries would extend even beyond the Pyrenees, possibly because the area on each side of the mountain range was identified as a culturally homogeneous region. This observation must be based on firm evidence, as archaeology identifies Iberian cultural traits, such as the language, in territories that extend north of the Pyrenees up to the Hérault River.
This is mostly accurate, though ChatGPT changed the sense in one passage, implying that Strabo wrote “for the Romans” – like some sort of commission. This not not in the original text.
Chris then prompted ChatGPT to “Re-write that for a popular magazine” Here’s the result:
The Name of Iberia and the Iberians: A Journey Through Time
Let’s kick off by exploring where the term “Iberians” comes from and what it really means. Why do we call the people who lived during this period Iberians? Where does the name originate, and how has its meaning evolved over the centuries?
At first, “Iberians” simply referred to the people living in Iberia, a region that, for some ancient Greek writers, marked the edge of the known world. Interestingly, the Greeks also had another Iberia by the Black Sea, meaning their world had two “Iberias” at its boundaries. But here’s the thing: these ancient writers didn’t think of the Iberians as a single, united people. For example, Herodotus, writing in the 5th century BCE, called all the people in this region “Iberians,” not because they shared the same ethnicity, but because they lived in the same geographic area.
The Romans later took these early descriptions and built on them. Strabo, a geographer from what is now Turkey, wrote an extensive account in the 1st century BCE that outlined Iberia’s borders as the Romans saw them. These borders stretched beyond the Pyrenees mountains, as the Romans believed the areas on both sides were culturally similar. And it turns out they were onto something — archaeologists have found evidence of Iberian cultural traits, like their language, extending all the way north to the Hérault River in modern-day France.
In short, the name “Iberian” wasn’t about ethnicity; it was about location and culture, shaped by how the Greeks and Romans viewed their world.
This version is much easier to read and gets the main ideas across while throwing out some of the details.
We then challenged ChatGPT to explain an article on a Chinese website:
It sounds sensible, especially since there was a picture of Xi Jinping in the article – but since nobody in the audience could read Chinese it could have been a complete hallucination as far as we knew!
We then asked ChatGPT to show off its Gilbertese:
Microsoft CoPilot also did a good job of this and provided references to its sources.
When we asked ChatGPT to read its responses out loud, it did so in a grating US-accented voice. We asked it “Can you change your voice to a British English one please, and say that again?” It answered: “I don’t have the ability to change my voice, but I can certainly continue writing in a more British English tone!”
We asked CoPilot if it could change its voice. The response was positive and we were amazed at the number and variety of voices you could choose from, which included accents from countries around the world. One bonus point for CoPilot! Here’s how to change the default spoken voice in Windows Edge.
To change the voice in Microsoft Edge’s Read Aloud feature, follow these steps:
Open a Webpage: Navigate to any webpage you want to be read aloud.
Activate Read Aloud: Click on the three-dot menu (⋯) in the top-right corner, then select Read aloud. Alternatively, you can use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Shift + U.
Access Voice Options: Once Read Aloud starts, a toolbar will appear at the top of the page. Click on Voice options.
Choose a Voice: In the Voice options menu, you can select from a variety of voices and accents. Adjust the reading speed if needed.
If you don’t see the Read Aloud option, make sure your Edge browser is up to date. You can check for updates by going to Settings > About Microsoft Edge.
hmm…..I wonder what it would do if I asked to read aloud a web page written in Chinese?..
Christine Betterton-Jones . Knowledge Junkie