15-10-2026, 07:53 PM
(This post was last modified: 15-10-2026, 08:02 PM by cencei.
Edit Reason: typo, again
)
Not wanna complain, but the audacious attempt to use Google Translate to make up for a complete lack of Latin knowledge would go right into the slop bucket nowadays... and it probably belongs there, to show that it's not about LLMs, but about competent usage of algorithms in general. With great power comes great responsibility...
The google algo is correcting utter nonsense into ... well, something (mostly by leaving out all nonsensical parts) and makes the user believe they are somehow magically competent. Nobody is at fault, but still we probably should stop doing that. You wouldn't sift through your substitution cipher with nothing but an Old Church Slavonic dictionary, and just list the words you found, then proclaim you deciphered the Voynich, right? Well, google translate is not even a dictionary. It's worse.
Maybe as a rule of thumb: If your translation is based on something that a magic black box (digital or cardboard) and/or Excitant Spirit told you, it might not be that reliable after all.
The google algo is correcting utter nonsense into ... well, something (mostly by leaving out all nonsensical parts) and makes the user believe they are somehow magically competent. Nobody is at fault, but still we probably should stop doing that. You wouldn't sift through your substitution cipher with nothing but an Old Church Slavonic dictionary, and just list the words you found, then proclaim you deciphered the Voynich, right? Well, google translate is not even a dictionary. It's worse.
Maybe as a rule of thumb: If your translation is based on something that a magic black box (digital or cardboard) and/or Excitant Spirit told you, it might not be that reliable after all.