I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
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@grammargirl
I prefer "bullshit" to "hallucination". It gets much closer to what's really happening, and it gives users a much better idea of how to deal with it. -
I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
@grammargirl Tools are useful, but they are never a substitute for human judgement. It's like people who write something and accept corrections from spell check without thinking about what the words mean.
The most powerful tools are most powerful in the hands of those who can validate correctness quickly. We're still responsible for validating all facts, regardless of source. We can't outsource critical thinking to machines, which do not think at all.
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The word "hallucination" isn't going away — it's a widely used industry term — but we need to explain it better for beginners:
"Hallucination" is just a fancy word for "confidently makes mistakes":
"Remember: AI hallucinates, and you need to confirm all facts" should be something like "Remember: AI confidently makes mistakes, and you need to confirm all facts" or "AI tells you things that are wrong in a way that sounds completely believable. Confirm all facts!"
@grammargirl
Hallucinations can only happen to a mind. An LLM has no more mind than a slot machine.The people making this stuff fell in love with their own convincing automatons, so attributed ‘hallucination’ as happening to their little babies.
It’s a much different thing if you say ‘this brainless machine is constantly making errors and spitting incorrect data’.
If you say that, it means back to the drawing board: this demo tech has failed.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
@grammargirl "Delusion" would have been better, but the ship has sailed.
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@grammargirl Hm. It’s not always obvious if a person you are talking to is hallucinating, depending on what their hallucinations are and what they say.
I get their point, just am sad on the mental illness rep side.
@queenofnewyork @grammargirl
I think the film "A Beautiful Mind" brought home to me just how real hallucinations are to those who are experience them.
Which I hadn't previously appreciated. -
The word "hallucination" isn't going away — it's a widely used industry term — but we need to explain it better for beginners:
"Hallucination" is just a fancy word for "confidently makes mistakes":
"Remember: AI hallucinates, and you need to confirm all facts" should be something like "Remember: AI confidently makes mistakes, and you need to confirm all facts" or "AI tells you things that are wrong in a way that sounds completely believable. Confirm all facts!"
@grammargirl
The industry named its own mistakes ‘hallucinations.’
Hallucinations is a forgiving term.
‘Delusions’ would be more accurate. -
@grammargirl
I prefer "bullshit" to "hallucination". It gets much closer to what's really happening, and it gives users a much better idea of how to deal with it.@VATVSLPR @grammargirl you’re backed up by academia https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-024-09775-5
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
@grammargirl As a mental health nurse, I would say delusions would be a more accurate term than hallucinations. I would also point out as someone else said that unless you are trained to do so, you may not know someone is experiencing hallucinations. Many who experience them chronically are quite good at presenting as if they aren't.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
"Confabulation", although that is still anthropomorphism and implies agency which doesn't exist.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
I've been "opposed" to that (to the extent that it ever makes sense to oppose established language usage) from the start, favoring "fabrication".
All LLMs fabricate sentence-like objects which invite the user to hallucinate some meaning into them. Users then react to how they feel about the meaning that they themselves have imposed.
If one recognizes that all of the outputs are fabrications and that some fraction of them may be useful, one can go sanely about one's business.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
@grammargirl @Cdespinosa I propose the term “botsplaining”
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@grammargirl I don’t think we need to accept it just yet. The word is deceptive—intentionally so. What needs to be explained is this: chatbots and LLMs can't "hallucinate” because they have no minds or senses. They routinely depart from factuality because that's how they’re programmed: to generate plausible streams of text without regard to reality. (https://around.com/dont-trust-them/)
the consistent trend of anthropomorphizing badly written programs, and the machines the programs run on, is used to make tech CEO's as a religious ruling class.
they create these facsimiles of truth and reality then prop themselves up as the sole interpreters and arbiters. like any religious hierarchy.
they're relying on humans ingrained need to assign importance to random objects and events and an interpreter to hand out judgement in return for taking all their money.
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The word "hallucination" isn't going away — it's a widely used industry term — but we need to explain it better for beginners:
"Hallucination" is just a fancy word for "confidently makes mistakes":
"Remember: AI hallucinates, and you need to confirm all facts" should be something like "Remember: AI confidently makes mistakes, and you need to confirm all facts" or "AI tells you things that are wrong in a way that sounds completely believable. Confirm all facts!"
@grammargirl these folks are stealing language to whitewash a con. In my opinion.
Hallucination is a deviation from the normal way healthy human minds work. The confident incorrectness presented by the companies shilling AI is working as designed.
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The word "hallucination" isn't going away — it's a widely used industry term — but we need to explain it better for beginners:
"Hallucination" is just a fancy word for "confidently makes mistakes":
"Remember: AI hallucinates, and you need to confirm all facts" should be something like "Remember: AI confidently makes mistakes, and you need to confirm all facts" or "AI tells you things that are wrong in a way that sounds completely believable. Confirm all facts!"
@grammargirl But what actually is the point of using it if I have to confirm all facts? Can’t I just skip the middleman?
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The word "hallucination" isn't going away — it's a widely used industry term — but we need to explain it better for beginners:
"Hallucination" is just a fancy word for "confidently makes mistakes":
"Remember: AI hallucinates, and you need to confirm all facts" should be something like "Remember: AI confidently makes mistakes, and you need to confirm all facts" or "AI tells you things that are wrong in a way that sounds completely believable. Confirm all facts!"
@grammargirl like when medical people call someone "confused", AI "hallucination" is a more precise term than common parlance. it basically means the bot couldn't find a plausible answer and is for some reason blocked from saying "I don't know", so it makes stuff up.
that's a bit different from "confidently makes mistakes" becuase it's "confidently making stuff up entirely".
I have no idea what would be a good replacement for "hallucinate" in this context, I agree that it feels deceptive as is though.
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@grammargirl I don’t think we need to accept it just yet. The word is deceptive—intentionally so. What needs to be explained is this: chatbots and LLMs can't "hallucinate” because they have no minds or senses. They routinely depart from factuality because that's how they’re programmed: to generate plausible streams of text without regard to reality. (https://around.com/dont-trust-them/)
IMO "confabulation" is more accurate than "hallucination" because the former indicates a lack of intent. Given that LLMs are not sentient, they lack intention. At most, they are reflexively responding to a reward function that optimizes towards producing text roughly resembling the pattern of their training data, but that's different from intent.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
@grammargirl I have a general dislike to use terms related to human cognition for anything AI does. There are already enough loonies out there who think a system throwing way too many dice could be their friend or is anything more than the dice. We need other/better terms for that.
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I've never been opposed to the word "hallucinating" for describing how AI makes mistakes ... until now.
I just talked to someone who thought AI hallucinations would be obvious because it would be obvious if you talked to a *person* who was hallucinating.
In other words, they equated "hallucination" with "sounds wacko" and accepted AI output as true because it sounded level headed.
1/2
@grammargirl I oppose the term because it implies that LLMs are conscious, and occasionally have “experiences” that aren’t true, instead of being just text-generating software that outputs incorrect information.
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The word "hallucination" isn't going away — it's a widely used industry term — but we need to explain it better for beginners:
"Hallucination" is just a fancy word for "confidently makes mistakes":
"Remember: AI hallucinates, and you need to confirm all facts" should be something like "Remember: AI confidently makes mistakes, and you need to confirm all facts" or "AI tells you things that are wrong in a way that sounds completely believable. Confirm all facts!"
@grammargirl I agree it’s not going away. I still find it constructive to point out it’s misleading, though, because it’s a good framing device for talking about what these technologies are and are not actually doing.
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@grammargirl But what actually is the point of using it if I have to confirm all facts? Can’t I just skip the middleman?
@feisty_lemming It depends on what you're using it for. If you're fact checking, it can be faster to put in a document and say something like "Fact check this piece. Show your sources," which gives you a list of links to click and check. It's faster than putting each thing you want to check into Google and then sorting through the links (and now the AI slop too). It will also surface relevant links you may have missed that don't show up in the first 10 or 20 on Google.
