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I don't even like the word "hallucination", because it's an anthropomorphism, further suggesting/misleading into an impression that LLMs have anything to do wit
by rollcat 2y ago
I don't even like the word "hallucination", because it's an anthropomorphism, further suggesting/misleading into an impression that LLMs have anything to do with how a human would reason.
Fancy autocomplete. Useful, yes. Powerful, definitely. But it's just another tool, limited in applications the same way a hammer is - this is the part that many humans seem to struggle accepting.
- beezlebroxxxxxx 2y agoThe use of "hallucinate" is also my gripe. Philosophy of language, and Wittgenstein in particular, has more specific words for the output insofar as they mean anything to humans: "senseless" or "nonsense".
- SpicyLemonZest 2y agoBut I don't think those terms are accurate. If I say "John Doe was born in 1987", that's a perfectly sensible sentence, even if I don't actually know when he was born and even if it turns out he was actually born in 1971. A nonsense sentence would be something like "John Doe cat five green explicate" or "h4stga3jkui7rutjdyrst".
- beezlebroxxxxxx 2y agoI don't understand your point. You've just re-presented one difference between sense and nonsense in philosophy of language. We might call that first phrase wrong or an error or inaccurate if that was the case. We don't need to use a word like "hallucinate" for your second phrase --- we can just call it nonsense. "Hallucinate" is far more inaccurate and confusing. It paints a false picture that melds 2 distinct things, as you've described, which need not happen at the same time: errors and nonsense.
- Iulioh 2y agoI think the term forst originated with the dream-like images of google deepmind, these were really similar to human visual hallucinations, i guess the term stuck
- leptons 2y agoIt's unfortunate, but it is what it is. When a human hallucinates, that is due to the brain operating out of spec. When an LLM "hallucinates", it's performing exactly as intended, it just has delivered a nonsensical result which is the consequence of the tech behind the LLM.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 2y agoYou aren't going to like this, but don't insult the hammers.
- dloss 2y agoInstead of "hallucinating" I would have preferred the term "bullshitting" -- in the Harry G. Frankfurt sense of not caring about the truth of one's utterances. But it's too late for that. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-024-09775-5 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-024-09775-5
- beezlebroxxxxxx 2y agoUsing "bullshit" would be interesting, but to me would introduce a backdoor anthropomorphism to describe the output. The picture is still too human. Isn't Frankfurt's concept of bullshit made up of 2 parts: 1) a distinction between lying and telling the truth, AND 2) the absence of caring about either when speaking when normally it's assumed present? Part 1 seems to apply, but part 2 wouldn't. It doesn't make sense to talk about GPT "caring" about its output beyond anthropomorphism. No one talks about their computer caring about having correct or accurate output and neither is it assumed. People would think your imagining a demon in the box. Really, it's even odd to say "GPT lied" outside of very specific circumstances.
- HarHarVeryFunny 2y agoI think "bullshitting" fits better than "hallucinating" - just keep spitting out words rather than admit ignorance, but maybe the best human analogy is freestyle rapping where one has to keep the flow of words coming regardless! Maybe we just need to coin a new word for it - "LLM-ing" perhaps ?!