Category: Generative AI

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Maori Girl Can Speak and Write Maori

Conversational agents have been the subject of Prof. Dr. Oliver Bendel’s research for a quarter of a century. He dedicated his doctoral thesis at the University of St. Gallen from the end of 1999 to the end of 2022 to them – or more precisely to pedagogical agents, which would probably be called virtual learning companions today. He has been a professor at the FHNW School of Business since 2009. From 2012, he mainly developed chatbots and voice assistants in the context of machine ethics, including GOODBOT, LIEBOT, BESTBOT, and SPACE THEA. In 2022, the information systems specialist and philosopher of technology then turned his attention to dead and endangered languages. Under his supervision, Karim N’diaye developed the chatbot @ve for Latin and Dalil Jabou the chatbot @llegra for Vallader, an idiom of Rhaeto-Romanic, enhanced with voice output. He is currently testing the range of GPTs – “customized versions of ChatGPT”, as OpenAI calls them – for endangered languages such as Irish (Irish Gaelic), Maori, and Basque. According to ChatGPT, there is a relatively large amount of training material for them. On May 9, 2024 – one week after Irish Girl – a first version of Maori Girl was created. At first glance, it seems to have a good grasp of the Polynesian language of the indigenous people of New Zealand. You can have the answers translated into English or German. Maori Girl is available in the GPT Store and will be further improved over the next few weeks

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Irish Girl Can Speak and Write Irish

Conversational agents have been the subject of Prof. Dr. Oliver Bendel’s research for a quarter of a century. He dedicated his doctoral thesis at the University of St. Gallen from the end of 1999 to the end of 2022 to them – or more precisely to pedagogical agents, which would probably be called virtual learning companions today. He has been a professor at the FHNW School of Business since 2009. From 2012, he mainly developed chatbots and voice assistants in the context of machine ethics, including GOODBOT, LIEBOT, BESTBOT, and SPACE THEA. In 2022, the information systems specialist and philosopher of technology then turned his attention to dead and endangered languages. Under his supervision, Karim N’diaye developed the chatbot @ve for Latin and Dalil Jabou the chatbot @llegra for Vallader, an idiom of Rhaeto-Romanic, enhanced with voice output. He is currently testing the range of GPTs – “customized versions of ChatGPT”, as OpenAI calls them – for endangered languages such as Irish (Irish Gaelic), Maori, and Basque. According to ChatGPT, there is a relatively large amount of training material for them. A first version of Irish Girl was created on May 3, 2024. At first glance, she seems to have a good grasp of the Goidelic language from the Celtic family. You can have the answers translated into English or German. Afterwards, you may have to ask her to switch back to Irish. Irish Girl is available in the GPT Store and will be further improved in the coming weeks.

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Start of the AAAI 2024 Spring Symposia

The AAAI 2024 Spring Symposium Series will be held at Stanford University from March 25-27, 2024. There are a total of eight symposia. One of them is “Impact of GenAI on Social and Individual Well-being”. It will be hosted by Takashi Kido (Teikyo University, Japan) and Keiki Takadama (The University of Electro-Communications, Japan). The announcement text reads: “Generative AI (GenAI) presents significant opportunities and challenges in the areas of individual and societal well-being. While its benefits in areas such as healthcare, the arts, and education are enormous, it also requires careful consideration of ethics, privacy, fairness, and security.” On March 25, 2024, Takashi Kido opened the symposium with an interesting talk, including how ChatGPT would decide on the trolley problem. More information about the symposium is available here.

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Saving Languages with Language Models

On February 19, 2024, the article “@llegra: a chatbot for Vallader” by Oliver Bendel and Dalil Jabou was published in the International Journal of Information Technology. From the abstract: “Extinct and endangered languages have been preserved primarily through audio conservation and the collection and digitization of scripts and have been promoted through targeted language acquisition efforts. Another possibility would be to build conversational agents like chatbots or voice assistants that can master these languages. This would provide an artificial, active conversational partner which has knowledge of the vocabulary and grammar and allows one to learn with it in a different way. The chatbot, @llegra, with which one can communicate in the Rhaeto-Romanic idiom Vallader was developed in 2023 based on GPT-4. It can process and output text and has voice output. It was additionally equipped with a manually created knowledge base. After laying the conceptual groundwork, this paper presents the preparation and implementation of the project. In addition, it summarizes the tests that native speakers conducted with the chatbot. A critical discussion elaborates advantages and disadvantages. @llegra could be a new tool for teaching and learning Vallader in a memorable and entertaining way through dialog. It not only masters the idiom, but also has extensive knowledge about the Lower Engadine, that is, the area where Vallader is spoken. In conclusion, it is argued that conversational agents are an innovative approach to promoting and preserving languages.” Oliver Bendel has been increasingly focusing on dead, extinct and endangered languages for some time. He believes that conversational agents can help to strengthen and save them.

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Generative AI for the Blind

The paper “How Can Generative AI Enhance the Well-being of the Blind?” by Oliver Bendel is now available as a preprint at arxiv.org/abs/2402.07919. It was accepted at the AAAI 2024 Spring Symposium “Impact of GenAI on Social and Individual Well-being”. From the abstract: “This paper examines the question of how generative AI can improve the well-being of blind or visually impaired people. It refers to a current example, the Be My Eyes app, in which the Be My AI feature was integrated in 2023, which is based on GPT-4 from OpenAI. The author’s tests are described and evaluated. There is also an ethical and social discussion. The power of the tool, which can analyze still images in an amazing way, is demonstrated. Those affected gain a new independence and a new perception of their environment. At the same time, they are dependent on the world view and morality of the provider or developer, who prescribe or deny them certain descriptions. An outlook makes it clear that the analysis of moving images will mean a further leap forward. It is fair to say that generative AI can fundamentally improve the well-being of blind and visually impaired people and will change it in various ways.” Oliver Bendel will present the paper at Stanford University on March 25-27. It is his ninth consecutive appearance at the AAAI Spring Symposia, which this time consists of eight symposia on artificial intelligence.

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GenAI for the Blind

At the AAAI 2024 Spring Symposium “Impact of GenAI on Social and Individual Well-being” the paper “How Can Generative AI Enhance the Well-being of the Blind?” by Oliver Bendel was accepted. In his paper, the information systems specialist and technology philosopher from Zurich discusses the GPT-4-based Be My AI feature of the Be My Eyes app. He presents his own tests with the app and discusses it from an ethical perspective. The feature is one of the most important inventions in recent years for blind and visually impaired people. It allows them to describe and categorize their surroundings without outside help. However, it is troubling that the app refuses to show some objects, including famous works of art that depict nudity. This disenfranchises people because of the moral sensitivities and economic considerations of the developers. Oliver Bendel will present the paper at Stanford University on March 25-27. It is his ninth consecutive appearance at the AAAI Spring Symposia, which this time consists of eight symposia on artificial intelligence.

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Extension of the Submission Deadline

The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) is thrilled to host its 2024 Spring Symposium Series at Stanford University from March 25-27, 2024. With a diverse array of symposia, each hosting 40-75 participants, the event is a vibrant platform for exploring the frontiers of AI. Of the eight symposia, only three are highlighted here: Firstly, the “Bi-directionality in Human-AI Collaborative Systems” symposium promises to delve into the dynamic interactions between humans and AI, exploring how these collaborations can evolve and improve over time. Secondly, the “Impact of GenAI on Social and Individual Well-being” addresses the profound effects. of generative AI technologies on society and individual lives. Lastly, “Increasing Diversity in AI Education and Research” focuses on a crucial issue in the tech world: diversity. It aims to highlight and address the need for more inclusive approaches in AI education and research, promoting a more equitable and diverse future in the field. Each of these symposia offers unique insights and discussions, making the AAAI 2024 Spring Symposium Series a key event for those keen to stay at the cutting edge of AI development and its societal implications. Some symposia have extended the deadline for the submission of abstracts and papers to January 7 or even 12. More information is available at aaai.org/conference/spring-symposia/sss24/#ss01.

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Project on the Potential of Be My AI

In a recent project, Prof. Dr. Oliver Bendel investigates the capabilities and limitations of the Be My AI feature of the Be My Eyes app. This development, based on GPT-4, is in the field of visual assistance for the blind and visually impaired. The study describes and evaluates Oliver Bendel’s own tests. Additionally, there is an ethical and social discussion. The study reveals the power of the tool, which can analyze still images in an astonishing way. Those affected gain new independence and a new perception of their environment. At the same time, they are dependent on the worldview and morality of the provider or developer, who dictates or withholds certain descriptions. Despite all the remaining weaknesses and errors, it is clear that a paradigm shift has occurred. The study’s outlook suggests that the analysis of moving images will be a significant advancement. It can be justifiably claimed that generative AI can fundamentally improve and change the situation of the blind and visually impaired in various ways. The project’s results will be published in the spring of 2024.

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ChatGPT Explains Beauty

In his new project, Oliver Bendel first created images using DALL-E 3. For consistency, he structured the prompts similarly in each case, making sure to keep them as general as possible. They covered a range of topics: things, plants, animals, people, and so on. From the suggestions provided by DALL-E 3, he chose one and combined it with the prompt from ChatGPT (which serves as the interface to DALL-E 3) to create the basis of the book “AN AI EXPLAINS BEAUTY”. Oliver Bendel then engaged ChatGPT (using the image upload feature) to explain the beauty of the things, plants, animals, humans, and so on. At first, the AI was reluctant to offer insights about people, but with some encouragement, it obliged. The results of these inquiries are also documented in the little book. They represent the real sensation. Because ChatGPT can recognize and describe individual objects in the image, and this with a view to predetermined aspects. The whole project was done on November 1, 2023, including the publication. The little book can be downloaded here.

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American Smile

DALL-E 3 is an excellent image generator and at the same time full of stereotypes and biases. One very interesting phenomenon is that of the American smile, which appears again and again in the images. The idea for the little book “AMERICAN SMILE” came to Oliver Bendel when he read the blog post “AI and the American Smile. How AI misrepresents culture through a facial expression” (medium.com/@socialcreature/ai-and-the-american-smile-76d23a0fbfaf). The author – username jenka – showed a series of “selfies” made with Midjourney. Regardless of the time period or culture, people smiled in a similar, American way. Oliver Bendel investigated this phenomenon and asked DALL-E 3 to take pictures of smiling people from different eras and cultures. He also got bears and aliens to smile. In fact, with very few exceptions, they all smiled in a similar way. He documented the pictures, along with the prompts, in a little book that can be downloaded here. Bias problems in image generators are addressed in the article “Image Synthesis from an Ethical Perspective” by Oliver Bendel.