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Multilingual LLMs dont have a clear boundary between languages. They will appear to have one since they maximize likelihoods, so asking something in English wil

Multilingual LLMs dont have a clear boundary between languages. They will appear to have one since they maximize likelihoods, so asking something in English will most likely produce an English continuation, etc. In other circumstances they might take a different path (in terms of output probability decoding) through other character sets, if the probabilities justify this.

johnnyApplePRNG 1y ago
I understand that but how often/common could it possibly be to mix in a single bengali word/phrase like that into a larger english one? Perhaps it's more common in the parts of the world where bengali and english are more commonly spoken in general? Why so much bengali/hindi then and why not other languages?
- epa 1y ago
  There are many users in India training these models. There is also a lot more content out there the models are consuming.
  - groby_b 1y ago
    And not to forget, many (most?) Indians are bilingual. Multilingual speakers tend to skip languages within conversation if both parties are fluent -> training material includes those switches.
daeken 1y ago
This has been really interesting to me. I've been learning Spanish for a while and will mix un poco español en my sentences with ChatGPT all the time, and it's cool to see the same thing reflected back to me. It's not uncommon for a response to be 75% in English with 25% Spanish at the beginnings and ends especially. All of my conversation titles are in Spanish because I always start them with "Hola", so whatever model sets the title just assumes Spanish for it, regardless of what the rest of the message is.
- outside1234 1y ago
  I’m so glad I am not the only one that does this!
- pixl97 1y ago
  I was on a vacation in the last week and was waiting at a restaurant for a while. The lady behind me was seemingly switching between english and spanish every few sentences which caught my attention. I can only assume the person on the other side was a bilingual also. Someone in their family had a medical emergency and was in the hospital. What's interesting is it seemed like the sentences talking about medical stuff were in very good english, and the spanish sentences were about other things (I can't interpret very fast at all). With the speed and fluency of their conversation it seemed like there was not any cost on their part using either language.
  - tstrimple 1y ago
    Language is incredibly interesting to me. Especially when it’s blended or becomes its own pidgin dialect. Multilingual societies are fascinating.
  - tehlike 1y ago
    I am bilingual. My phrases switch to the language I learned them on very easily. Computer terms are almost always English. A lot of idioms I learned in my adult life are going to stay English, even if a Turkish equivalent exists and I later learned about them.
    - BrandoElFollito 1y ago
      I am bilingual as well, my children are trilingual. I find out that it is way easier for me to translate to or from English (not a native speaker) to any of the languages I am bilingual in, than between these languages. It is very hard for me to listen to one, and speak the other.
      - tehlike 1y ago
ASalazarMX 1y ago
I usually interact with LLMs in English. A few weeks ago I made a Gemini gem that tries to consider two opposite sides, moderator included. Somehow it started including bits of Spanish in some of its answers, which I actually don't mind because that's my primary language. I assumed it knew I speak Spanish from other conversations, my Google profile, geolocation, etc. Maybe my English has enough hints that it was learned by a native Spanish speaker?
hiAndrewQuinn 1y ago
There have been a nonzero number of times that asking Gemini about something in Finnish about the demoscene or early 1990s tech has returned much more... colorful answers than what I saw with equivalent questioning in English.
- Vilian 1y ago
  Colorful answers?

johnnyApplePRNG 1y ago

I understand that but how often/common could it possibly be to mix in a single bengali word/phrase like that into a larger english one? Perhaps it's more common in the parts of the world where bengali and english are more commonly spoken in general? Why so much bengali/hindi then and why not other languages?

epa 1y ago
There are many users in India training these models. There is also a lot more content out there the models are consuming.
- groby_b 1y ago
  And not to forget, many (most?) Indians are bilingual. Multilingual speakers tend to skip languages within conversation if both parties are fluent -> training material includes those switches.

daeken 1y ago

This has been really interesting to me. I've been learning Spanish for a while and will mix un poco español en my sentences with ChatGPT all the time, and it's cool to see the same thing reflected back to me. It's not uncommon for a response to be 75% in English with 25% Spanish at the beginnings and ends especially. All of my conversation titles are in Spanish because I always start them with "Hola", so whatever model sets the title just assumes Spanish for it, regardless of what the rest of the message is.

outside1234 1y ago
I’m so glad I am not the only one that does this!
pixl97 1y ago
I was on a vacation in the last week and was waiting at a restaurant for a while. The lady behind me was seemingly switching between english and spanish every few sentences which caught my attention. I can only assume the person on the other side was a bilingual also. Someone in their family had a medical emergency and was in the hospital. What's interesting is it seemed like the sentences talking about medical stuff were in very good english, and the spanish sentences were about other things (I can't interpret very fast at all). With the speed and fluency of their conversation it seemed like there was not any cost on their part using either language.
- tstrimple 1y ago
  Language is incredibly interesting to me. Especially when it’s blended or becomes its own pidgin dialect. Multilingual societies are fascinating.
- tehlike 1y ago
  I am bilingual. My phrases switch to the language I learned them on very easily. Computer terms are almost always English. A lot of idioms I learned in my adult life are going to stay English, even if a Turkish equivalent exists and I later learned about them.
  - BrandoElFollito 1y ago
    I am bilingual as well, my children are trilingual. I find out that it is way easier for me to translate to or from English (not a native speaker) to any of the languages I am bilingual in, than between these languages. It is very hard for me to listen to one, and speak the other.
    - tehlike 1y ago

ASalazarMX 1y ago

I usually interact with LLMs in English. A few weeks ago I made a Gemini gem that tries to consider two opposite sides, moderator included. Somehow it started including bits of Spanish in some of its answers, which I actually don't mind because that's my primary language. I assumed it knew I speak Spanish from other conversations, my Google profile, geolocation, etc. Maybe my English has enough hints that it was learned by a native Spanish speaker?

hiAndrewQuinn 1y ago

There have been a nonzero number of times that asking Gemini about something in Finnish about the demoscene or early 1990s tech has returned much more... colorful answers than what I saw with equivalent questioning in English.

Vilian 1y ago
Colorful answers?