AI + TRANSLATION

The Machines Have Overtaken Us! Or Have They?

And who watches over the watchmen during the transition? Some reflections from the world of translation

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Another day, another contract in my inbox. The humdrum life of the translator. Sometimes, though, seemingly tedious, run-of-the-mill, bread-and-butter texts offer intriguing insights into the nature of communication.

Or in this case, the very future of humanity itself!

OK — I’m exaggerating slightly. But the document I was sent this morning did encapsulate certain salient points about where our relationship with technology in the workplace stands right now, and where it might be heading.

So what was this revelatory screed, this latter-day Rosetta Stone? Nothing more than a straightforward commercial agreement for a B2B purchase, scarcely a page in length. Clearly worded, simply structured sentences, with none of the overly elaborate and self-contradictory subclauses of a court judgment, for example.

Precisely the kind of text that machine translation can handle perfectly well, and has been able to do for some time now. The kind of text, then, that surprises me a little when it even makes it as far as my inbox, without some eager bean-counter…