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this post was submitted on 03 Apr 2024
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Everyone uses the word "hallucinate" when describing visual AI because it's normie-friendly and cool sounding, but the results are a product of math. Very complex math, yes, but computers aren't taking drugs and randomly pooping out images because computers can't do anything truly random.
You know what else uses math? Basically every image modification algorithm, including resizing. I wonder how this judge would feel about viewing a 720p video on a 4k courtroom TV because "hallucination" takes place in that case too.
Whenever people say things like this, I wonder why that person thinks they're so much better than everyone else.
Normie, layman... as you've pointed out, it's difficult to use these words without sounding condescending (which I didn't mean to be). The media using words like "hallucinate" to describe linear algebra is necessary because most people just don't know enough math to understand the fundamentals of deep learning - which is completely fine, people can't know everything and everyone has their own specialties. But any time you simplify science so that it can be digestible by the masses, you lose critical information in the process, which can sometimes be harmfully misleading.
Or sometimes the colloquial term people have picked up is a simplified tool for getting the right point across.
Just because it's guessing using math doesn't mean it isn't hallucinating in a sense the additional data. It did not exist before and it willed it into existence much like a hallucination while being easy for people to catch onto quickly as not trustworthy thanks to previous definitions and understanding of the word.
Part of language is finding the right words to use so that people can quickly understand topics even if it means giving up nuance but absolutely it should be based on getting them to the right conclusion even if in a simplified form which doesn't always happen when there is bias. I think this one works just fine.