I like this. It’s a matter of accessibility for many who are maybe not physically but mentally disabled, they absolutely lack access to lots of books and translating them into Simple English will open up new books and experiences for them.
Yes, most of us love the wordplay and artistry of books that are hard to read. It’s a really satisfying feature of language that it can move around so freely and artistically. But that also means that some people are basically gatekept by language from the stories this language tells. These translations don’t take away out ability to read the wordy, artsy original, they just enable other people to read the same story in a language better suited for them.
But that’s not the great Gatsby that’s the ok Gatsby
How is the first sentence hard? Is the next generation really that dense?
I love that they picked a book that is 90% nuance and symbolism for a tool that destroys nuance and symbolism…it’s like claymation Shakespeare celebrity death match.
If The Great Gatsby is a difficult book, what is something like Finnegan’s Wake or Ulysses? Actually, I am kind of interested in how AI would destroy those works.
Turn HARD books into EASY books by learning what words mean!
Reduce teen literacy levels with this one easy step!!! Teachers hate it!!!
Content/context lost in the “simplification”:
The speaker no longer feels they are in a vulnerable age. The speaker has a more formal relationship with their father. The “something” is specifically advice. The advice can change meaning depending on your perspective of it.
While it’s great as an introduction to a language, it’s NOT the same story. Not to mention, we already have things like SparkNotes from humans who have broken these stories down.
Hey Orwell look, someone finally implemented the newspeak you loved so much in 1984 !
why waste say lot word when few word do trick
“Look at that sign with a big picture of eyes. It makes me think about stuff.”
That was a “hard book”? I fear for future of humanity.
Why expand your vocabulary! Who needs to not only communicate more effectively but potentially even expressing more intangible feelings and experiences while communicating.
the literary equivalent of:
That was the sanitisation of Roald Dahl’s books, which already happened and was likely celebrated on Lemmy.
likely
You’re just straw manning without the commitment.
I’m gardening, what are you talking about.
Could you maybe give some links for the ones who didn’t get what you’re writing about, like I did?
Yeah, those edits were idiotic, all right, thanks for sharing
But I was more keen to see who celebrated those. Although, I am sure such people probably exist not only in the Dahl Estate
It was possibly on Reddit, but you can imagine the rhetoric. I actually do think it was on Lemmy. I believe I said that the Oompa-Loompas being literal African Pygmies was a bit much, and could remember feeling that way even as a young child. I think even Mr Dahl himself might have come to the same conclusion in later life.
I think many of you are quite unfair to who this might help. As an adult with dyslexia and English as my second language, this would let me have an easier time getting through literature and experience the stories as the are, not how they are written. I get that nuances and details are being lost in the conversation.
But if I still enjoy the greater story, does it really have to matter to you how I or someone else enjoys our reading?
The way the ad is presented makes it look like there’s something wrong with the original (❌) and that the mangled version is better (✅), as if it was actually improved.
The tool removed all the subtext from the original by using this very neutral, matter-of-fact language. There is actual information lost there, not just rigmarole. And that’s the example they chose to put into the ad.
LLMs will also make shit up or completely misinterpret what’s being written, I wouldn’t trust it to get through an entire book without grossly misleading the reader or flipping out. They can’t parse that much text at once right now so all interpretation of a chunk of text will have only a very broad, short and possibly wrong/irrelevant summary of what came before for context.
I don’t even want to know what this would do to something like a Pratchett novel or a textbook.
As far as accessibility tools using machine learning go, wouldn’t a text-to-speech reader app be better for dyslexics anyway?
I do not disagree with you. But i think it is up to the individual how they consume their media. And I agree with the pitfalls of LLMs, I just questioned all the super negative views of this that where upvoted when I entered this thread.
And when it comes to audio books and ai voice synthesis, they might be good tools, but does not necessarily achieve simplify the language. And also, i wish I was a better reader, not a better listener.
All fair points, my issue is mostly with how this is advertised and that I would not want to learn anything from an inherently untrustworthy LLM. Would have liked to use something with quick access to both human-made explanations and a built-in dictionary/thesaurus when I was learning English myself.
Then why not just read the summary of the plot on Wikipedia? It’s not about the nuances or the details, it’s about actually taking the book versus knowing what the plot is about. The voice of the author matters, and if you’re not getting that through a rewrite you’re not getting the book as written.
Additionally, literature is one of the most effective ways we have of bettering our feel for a language, and expanding our comprehension and ability. This is even more true for second language acquisition.
There was a famous Hungarian interpreter in the 20th Century who claimed reading books was almost all she did to acquire languages. You just skip over the words you don’t know, until after seeing it many times you get an “aha!” moment and work out what it means (and if it doesn’t come up again then maybe it’s just not that important?). She wrote about it in this book.
If you were to rewrite the text to remove the words completely you’re depriving yourself from ever being able to improve your language, all the while sapping the colour and joy out from the words.
As for dyslexia, I don’t have much experience with that but I do have with ADHD and getting distracted while reading, and have found audiobooks to be indispensable. I find them harder in foreign languages than my native, but that usually means I end up listening at 1x the speed rather than 2,5x the speed. I used to struggle getting through many books since leaving school until I could listen to them.
I just highlighted that there are some people out there that this product might give value. If someone wants to read a paraphrased simplified book, I think that should be fine. :)
If they lose out on nuances it’s on them, but maybe it sparks an interest in reading in general if the first tästeps are easier.
My real concern is that AI in its current form is not great at context and continuity. I see it similarly as translating between languages: Google can do a decent job of directly translating a phrase, even adjusting grammar a bit, but it can’t tell when it needs to explain or replace an idiom, or which details it definitely needs for symbolism and which can be safely disregarded, or detect when a word is being used in an archaic or unusual way.
So I think this would be a great project for a human with a keen understanding of literature to undertake, but honestly I think an AI paraphrasing without a large amount of editing would would give you a fairly bland and possibly confusing read.
I agree that current ai is not the saving grace some make it out to be. But as a proof of concept, there is nothing wrong with the product presented in the post.
I was all aboard the hate train, because it seems like defacing a work of art. Your points are valid and now I’m thinking it isn’t bad after all. This can make those stories more accessible, and it’s not like the original was destroyed. If you want to read the original just get it instead of this.
Had to scroll down so far to find ESL. This is a truly excellent tool for a language learner if working as intended. If it were available to create graded reading materials in many different target languages it would be worth its weight in gold.
look at the community this was posted in. opinions/votes will be coming in hot and preloaded. If this was ‘tech’ or something on mander.xyz, sure. but “fuck ai” might be a wee bit slanted.
it is a little weird though for them to post something actually good about AI and then get angry it’s doing good. I mean, even Flying Squid is on the hate-train today. Everyone is hating because either they’re selfish (like FS) or narrow-minded / prejudiced. It’s a shame.
“Fuck X” communities are the worst with toxic irrationally. BRB, gonna go start “fuck ‘fuck X’ communities”.
The context of the next passage is laughably applicable but would it be stripped?
Whenever you feel like criticizing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.
Is your username referring to a “BiPAP” and a “Pappy” (like a grandpa)? So like, “I am BiPappy”?
Or maybe even a bisexual grandpa?
Neither, “lambi” is a brand of toilet paper, and “papp” is short for “paper” in my language
Ohh, that’s an “L” and not an “I”. I haven’t thought about lambi toilet paper in a really long time
I thought PapP was a play on the word “Pappy”. I also have a medical background, so BiPAP is a common term for me. I appreciate the breakdown though
In my head though, I’ll probably still be seeing your user name along the lines of “I Am Biphasic Positive Airway Pressure Daddy”. It’s got a certain ‘ring’ to it lol
