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DeepL’s CEO: Algorithms won’t completely replace human translators
Thread poster: Hans Lenting
Tom in London
Tom in London
United Kingdom
Local time: 18:44
Member (2008)
Italian to English
Progress Jan 8, 2020

Guofei_LIN wrote:
Children of the future will be grateful, just as we are grateful for the technology progress in the last two centuries that enable us to lead a more enriched life, even if a lot of professions were sacrificed along the way.


Certainly there has been progress (for example in medicine) as compared to 100 years ago- but I think Katalin was making a different point.


Katalin Szilárd
Alison Jenner
 
Katalin Szilárd
Katalin Szilárd  Identity Verified
Hungary
Local time: 19:44
English to Hungarian
+ ...
Present Jan 8, 2020

Guofei_LIN wrote:

Katalin Szilárd wrote:

I'm wondering what they will say in this dystopic future to their children, grandchildren or even totally unknown younger people?


[Edited at 2020-01-08 10:36 GMT]

[Edited at 2020-01-08 11:06 GMT]

Children of the future will be grateful, just as we are grateful for the technology progress in the last two centuries that enable us to lead a more enriched life, even if a lot of professions were sacrificed along the way.


Guofei_LIN if you are a human with human soul and mind you should see that the children of the present are not grateful already for the greedy past of those who were thinking like that. Things looked bright till this hyped insanity started after 2009.


 
Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL
Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL  Identity Verified
United Kingdom
Local time: 18:44
Member (2004)
English to Italian
@Hans Jan 8, 2020

MT can be useful for translators... for sure... the problem is not using it, it's what it's used for and from whom... it's a bit like Trados at the beginning... always marketed to the agencies as a tool to save money, not as a tool to help translators doing a better job...


But I'm not sure whether this isn't conflicting with his business model.


You are not sure?


 
Katalin Szilárd
Katalin Szilárd  Identity Verified
Hungary
Local time: 19:44
English to Hungarian
+ ...
This is something different Jan 8, 2020

Guofei_LIN wrote:

.... just as we are grateful for the technology progress in the last two centuries that enable us to lead a more enriched life, even if a lot of professions were sacrificed along the way.


As I said previously (more times) this is not like the previous technological progresses because this time it involves the whole humanity and all professions. So why do you speak about sacrificing some or a lot of professions Guofei_LIN? If you are a real human and if you live in this world with open mind, you must see that all professions could be sacrificed like that... blue collars, white collars, even CEOs or politicians.. anybody's professions...
What kind of bright future is that and for whom or what?
I don't think that any human wants to live in an inhuman world...

We translators were the trial profession group.
The next professions should learn from this lesson. Otherwise humanity will be lost.
Actually I think our profession (we translators) are not lost yet either.

They sell these technological advancements by programmed bots: "They do not replace you, but they help you". This is a lie! If we allow this, basically these people will make humans "devoluted" (opposite of evolution) and probably extinct due to greediness. Did these people think further? What kind of children they will have when those kids won't have to do anything? They don't have to think, work, create or even play? Because algorithms and bots and robots will do these. If this insanity is not stopped, the future generations of humans will be like potatoes. Maybe worse...

And those who are real humans (not programmed bots and algorithms) and are able to see the danger of these hypes should do something about it: speak their mind in public to stop this insanity.
Because it seems due to the rush for money and rush for power these human CEOs and investors, inventors lost touch with reality...

We should help them to get out of this insanity.

[Edited at 2020-01-08 15:42 GMT]

[Edited at 2020-01-08 16:07 GMT]

[Edited at 2020-01-08 19:00 GMT]


 
cll
cll
Local time: 18:44
English to Spanish
automation is inevitable Jan 8, 2020

Translators are not the only ones affected by automation, other professions have seen this happen to them. Even software developers will soon be replaced by software tools that will be capable of the full development-bugfix-development cycle without direct human intervention.

I personally, in principle, welcome all tools that automate toil, because I believe human value is to be added where a machine cannot do a decent job. If a machine can translate something correctly (and MT does
... See more
Translators are not the only ones affected by automation, other professions have seen this happen to them. Even software developers will soon be replaced by software tools that will be capable of the full development-bugfix-development cycle without direct human intervention.

I personally, in principle, welcome all tools that automate toil, because I believe human value is to be added where a machine cannot do a decent job. If a machine can translate something correctly (and MT does a very good job in some languages, some domains and some applications), I am not going to fight for the privilege of doing the same thing myself. It would be silly - my time is important, i'd rather spend it doing something a machine cannot do. But, obviously, if ultimately our livelihood ends up disappearing, I expect the governments to have a plan for it - the solution is not asking to stop development of automation (humans are by nature inventors, creators, we like making tools that automate/simplify our daily tasks). The only possible solutions is to get ready for a very different world, where humans will have a lot of time in our hands, and we need to ask our governments and policy-makers to start implementing policies for a world where people will be largely unemployed: adjustments to our economic system (at world level), sorting out income inequalities (making sure that part of the profits made by technology giants revert to society not to just to their pockets), and social policies that will tackle the inevitable social turmoil as more and more jobs become irrelevant - for example, a universal basic income has been suggested.

I am a big fan of AI, I cannot help it, and I understand how it is destroying jobs (not only in translation). It's just I believe the strategy is not bad-mouthing MT, but rather demand social protection together with the other hundreds of job profiles that will become irrelevant soon, and also think of ways where we can benefit too, at least get our piece of this cake - all those profits that Google, DeepL, Amazon etc make with their MT services are built on human translations/post-edits. Of this copyright, you and I don't see a penny. So, pushing for a technology/tool that allows us to track every single thing we translate once it is released into the wild, so that we know when it has been re-used to train engines for profit, is something we should be asking for! So technology here would be on the translator's side

Finally, I recommend reading "Humans need not apply", by Jerry Kaplan, for a really good take on the wide topic of technology unemployment and possible solutions.

CLL
Collapse


 
Katalin Szilárd
Katalin Szilárd  Identity Verified
Hungary
Local time: 19:44
English to Hungarian
+ ...
@CLL Jan 8, 2020

cll wrote:

Translators are not the only ones affected by automation, other professions have seen this happen to them. Even software developers will soon be replaced by software tools that will be capable of the full development-bugfix-development cycle without direct human intervention.

I personally, in principle, welcome all tools that automate toil, because I believe human value is to be added where a machine cannot do a decent job. If a machine can translate something correctly (and MT does a very good job in some languages, some domains and some applications), I am not going to fight for the privilege of doing the same thing myself. It would be silly - my time is important, i'd rather spend it doing something a machine cannot do. But, obviously, if ultimately our livelihood ends up disappearing, I expect the governments to have a plan for it - the solution is not asking to stop development of automation (humans are by nature inventors, creators, we like making tools that automate/simplify our daily tasks). The only possible solutions is to get ready for a very different world, where humans will have a lot of time in our hands, and we need to ask our governments and policy-makers to start implementing policies for a world where people will be largely unemployed: adjustments to our economic system (at world level), sorting out income inequalities (making sure that part of the profits made by technology giants revert to society not to just to their pockets), and social policies that will tackle the inevitable social turmoil as more and more jobs become irrelevant - for example, a universal basic income has been suggested.

I am a big fan of AI, I cannot help it, and I understand how it is destroying jobs (not only in translation). It's just I believe the strategy is not bad-mouthing MT, but rather demand social protection together with the other hundreds of job profiles that will become irrelevant soon, and also think of ways where we can benefit too, at least get our piece of this cake - all those profits that Google, DeepL, Amazon etc make with their MT services are built on human translations/post-edits. Of this copyright, you and I don't see a penny. So, pushing for a technology/tool that allows us to track every single thing we translate once it is released into the wild, so that we know when it has been re-used to train engines for profit, is something we should be asking for! So technology here would be on the translator's side

Finally, I recommend reading "Humans need not apply", by Jerry Kaplan, for a really good take on the wide topic of technology unemployment and possible solutions.

CLL



Maybe you didn't read or understand my posts. As I wrote previously: in this current automation hype not the loss of jobs is the biggest and ultimate danger, but the loss of humanity: human intelligence, human creativity, human logic, human mind and soul. Only a human with sound mind is capable of understanding the meaning and consequences of this, a bot does not have a mind and soul.

[Edited at 2020-01-08 21:00 GMT]

[Edited at 2020-01-08 21:02 GMT]


Tom in London
Alison Jenner
Janet Muehlbacher
Angus Stewart
Tanami
Neco3104
 
cll
cll
Local time: 18:44
English to Spanish
creativity and humanity won't be lost by automation Jan 8, 2020

From my point of view, it is the opposite. Automation and technology are exclusively human products, and they come from our creativity and our intelligence. It is precisely the tasks that machines can do, the ones that by definition are below our capacities as human beings. If you had to translate manually the same word a million times, rather than autopropagate with a button, this would take you interminable hours of yor time, and you would hate it, because it is something that gives you 0 lear... See more
From my point of view, it is the opposite. Automation and technology are exclusively human products, and they come from our creativity and our intelligence. It is precisely the tasks that machines can do, the ones that by definition are below our capacities as human beings. If you had to translate manually the same word a million times, rather than autopropagate with a button, this would take you interminable hours of yor time, and you would hate it, because it is something that gives you 0 learning opportinities and allows 0 creativity input. You'd rather spend that time creating something new, sleeping, learning esperanto, or playing badminton. Machines are good at predictable, repetitive tasks, the ones that actually kill creativity and demotivate people. I agree that *bad* use of tchnology has the potential to dehumanize us, and already is in some cases, but this can be regulated and that is what should be striving for - regulation and responsible use, rather than trying to stop human natural hunger for invention and creation. This is futile - that would be trying to negate human nature. As a species, we will never stop learning and making mistakes, and building on our previous creations. It's just who we are.Collapse


 
Guofei_LIN
Guofei_LIN  Identity Verified
Australia
Local time: 04:44
Chinese
I welcome progress in machine translation Jan 9, 2020

Katalin Szilárd wrote:
Guofei_LIN if you are a human with human soul and mind you should see that the children of the present are not grateful already for the greedy past of those who were thinking like that. Things looked bright till this hyped insanity started after 2009.


By "2009", are you referring to the time that Deep-L company was set up? I don't know enough about this particular company (I do know their Linguee which I find very annoying, and in my opinion, Linguee and Wikidiff are the two most useless and yet annoyingly obtrusive websites for language learners/translators.) to make comments about their individual situation, but in general, I welcome any progress in machine translation.

Up to today, translation has been an expensive service available only to the rich and powerful, and as I understand, translators in this forum are vowing to make this even more expensive and unaffordable by working only for the clients with deep pockets.

I hope in the future, average people can easily access information (even those seemingly pointless and irrelevant information) in other languages and not have to depend on governments/big companies to decide what should be made available to them. Currently there are some totalitarian governments who control public opinion and people's mind and thoughts through controlling contents in a language. Talking about what kind of world we don't want our children to live in!


cll
 
Hans Lenting
Hans Lenting
Netherlands
Member (2006)
German to Dutch
TOPIC STARTER
PEMT won't enrich our professional life Jan 9, 2020

Guofei_LIN wrote:

Children of the future will be grateful, just as we are grateful for the technology progress in the last two centuries that enable us to lead a more enriched life, even if a lot of professions were sacrificed along the way.


Professional translators will always be needed. Let's start with that. And let's talk about PEMT:

Even if not perfect, machine translation (MT) is now becoming reliable enough to support the translation industry. As a result, more and more professional translators post-edit the output of an MT system. This leads to large quantities of MT translated data that are transformed into perfect translations by fixing MT errors. Within this process, translators have to deal with repetitive and annoying MT errors as well as with the inability of the MT systems to adapt to new domains and styles. Both aspects have an enormous impact on translators' work.


Source: https://www.gala-global.org/ondemand/automatically-correct-mt-errors-human-post-edited-data

There are both assumptions in this quote ('Even if not perfect', 'becoming reliable enough') as plain facts ('translators have to deal with repetitive and annoying MT errors', 'inability of the MT systems to adapt to new domains and styles').

If PEMT would be our professional future, IMHO this cannot be qualified as 'a more enriched life'.

With PEMT the amount of source segments doubles:

  • You have to interpret every source segment.
  • You have to interpret every MT suggestion for that segment.
  • You have to decide whether to delete the suggestion or to adapt it.


So the amount of brain load increases heavily while it's not focussed on creativity, which is one of the nicest aspects of our profession.

I agree to what Giovanni wrote here:

Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL wrote:

we can do our bit...

by refusing to accept MTPE jobs...


Joëlle Bouille
 
Janet Muehlbacher
Janet Muehlbacher  Identity Verified
Local time: 19:44
German to English
+ ...
Guofei-LIN, a vast number of translations Jan 9, 2020

aren´t for people with "deep pockets". Many are ordinary everyday documents, CVs for example, and are easily affordable.

 
Guofei_LIN
Guofei_LIN  Identity Verified
Australia
Local time: 04:44
Chinese
MTPE Jan 9, 2020

Hans Lenting wrote:
If PEMT would be our professional future, IMHO this cannot be qualified as 'a more enriched life'.

No. I'm not talking about enriched life for translators, but for the general public who consumes translation.


With PEMT the amount of source segments doubles:
...
So the amount of brain load increases heavily while it's not focussed on creativity, which is one of the nicest aspects of our profession.

I agree to what Giovanni wrote here:

Giovanni Guarnieri MITI, MIL wrote:

we can do our bit...

by refusing to accept MTPE jobs...

I think it is irrelevant whether we refuse it or not. We are in a transitional stage. In future, MTPE jobs will be handled by in-house staff who are not professional translators but who are experts in the subject matter, and this development in technology is a powerful tool that is going to enable and empower them. Up to now, they have been involved only as the final reviewers of translators' work and I presume a lot of them do not have a happy experience working with translators. This is their chance to get back at those annoying translator prima donnas who always think they know better.

Situation will be further exacerbated by a dwindling supply of talented translators. Previously a large chunk (at one time this was 100%) of the worldwide translation budget pie went to human translators. Big corporations are not here to provide a free service, they have their covetous eyes on a big chunk of this pie. And after they have taken a dainty bite, what is left for the professional translators whom they declare they do not intend to replace will not be enough to support a dedicated professional army of translators, just like what is left of the forest in today's world is not enough to support a healthy wild life cycle.


Jorge Payan
 
Guofei_LIN
Guofei_LIN  Identity Verified
Australia
Local time: 04:44
Chinese
Yes, but Jan 9, 2020

Janet Muehlbacher wrote:

aren´t for people with "deep pockets". Many are ordinary everyday documents, CVs for example, and are easily affordable.


Yes, but just like in the days when internet charges were exorbitant, one could also argue that, even in those days, average people could still afford an occasional treat of online information without having to have a deep pocket. However, the world won't be what it is like today if our understanding of affordability remains at that level.

[Edited at 2020-01-09 11:51 GMT]


 
Katalin Szilárd
Katalin Szilárd  Identity Verified
Hungary
Local time: 19:44
English to Hungarian
+ ...
Meanwhile on the site... Jan 9, 2020

the biggest question is recently: the new outlook of the Kudoz system.
If somebody scrolls back to my previous posts in this thread can understand what I was talking about...



[Edited at 2020-01-09 11:53 GMT]


 
Hans Lenting
Hans Lenting
Netherlands
Member (2006)
German to Dutch
TOPIC STARTER
@Guofei_LIN Jan 9, 2020

Guofei_LIN wrote:

I'm not talking about enriched life for translators, but for the general public who consumes translation.


Why would you exclude us? After all, we're part of the public too.


In future, MTPE jobs will be handled by in-house staff who are not professional translators but who are experts in the subject matter, and this development in technology is a powerful tool that is going to enable and empower them. Up to now, they have been involved only as the final reviewers of translators' work and I presume a lot of them do not have a happy experience working with translators. This is their chance to get back at those annoying translator prima donnas who always think they know better.


I do not think that many clients are annoyed by translators. In-house staff has better things to do than to translate (development, sales, technical support etc.). They are only too happy that they don't have to struggle to translate themselves.


 
Guofei_LIN
Guofei_LIN  Identity Verified
Australia
Local time: 04:44
Chinese
The brave new world Jan 9, 2020

Hans Lenting wrote:
Why would you exclude us? After all, we're part of the public too.

My comment was in reference to your remark that "If PEMT would be our professional future, IMHO this cannot be qualified as 'a more enriched life.' "
However, if we are talking about our future as consumers of translation in our role as members of the public, consuming translation outside our working languages, instead of as producers of translation talking about 'our professional future', then, yes, we are all part of that public.

I do not think that many clients are annoyed by translators. In-house staff has better things to do than to translate (development, sales, technical support etc.). They are only too happy that they don't have to struggle to translate themselves.

I guess that depends on individual experience. When I was working as a translator, clients often sent my translation to some Chinese speaker within their organization to review my translation, and that guy often felt the need to make unnecessary revisions, even introducing errors into my translation. I guess in the brave new world future, that guy could just review Deep-L's work instead of having to deal with translators like me because I often would reject their proposed changes.

[Edited at 2020-01-09 15:20 GMT]


 
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DeepL’s CEO: Algorithms won’t completely replace human translators






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