Artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT has stirred up a lot of controversy lately for its widespread use in the academic world.
As the conversation around it gets louder, even Education Minister Chan Chun Sing referenced it in Parliament recently.
Now, ChatGPT is at the centre of yet another viral discussion, and this time, Manglish – or Malaysian English – is involved.
Source: Jonathan Kemper on Unsplash
After a user asked the chatbot to respond to a question in Manglish, it delivered — complete with colloquialisms like “lah” and “hor“.
Yesterday (16 Feb), a Malaysian Facebook user shared a screenshot of his ChatGPT conversation in a Facebook group.
Via the caption, he said that he saw it from someone else and wanted to share it as he found it interesting.
Source: Facebook
Although the OP is unknown, the screenshot shows that they started by asking ChatGPT if it can mix languages, such as Manglish or Singlish.
ChatGPT then proceeds to give a lengthy, detailed answer in standard English.
In summary, it confirms that it is able to process and generate text in multiple languages, including the aforementioned ones.
The OP then goes a step further and asks the chatbot to repeat its response in Manglish.
While its new answer is significantly shorter, ChatGPT is apparently able to capture the gist of the original response while using terms like “lah” and “hor” in the correct context.
It said, “I boleh lah process and generate text in multiple bahasa (languages)”.
The humorous exchange prompted netizens to share their own experiences in getting ChatGPT to give answers filled with dialect or colloquial terms.
One user of the Microsoft search engine Bing demonstrated that they can hold a pretty accurate Manglish conversation with its AI chatbot, which is the result of Bing’s collaboration with ChatGPT.
Source: Facebook
Apart from the usual colloquialisms, the AI chatbot could almost pass for a true blue Malaysian or Singaporean with phrases such as “faster faster” and “where got”.
ChatGPT was decidedly less successful, however, when another user requested basic Hokkien phrases to order laksa with.
Source: Facebook
In one instance, the chatbot posited “laksa chia boey” as the phrase for “laksa with more gravy/soup”. It’s actually supposed to mean “have you eaten laksa”.
Although this next request did not involve Manglish, the user did challenge ChatGPT to deliver an “emotional speech” about rojak and insert a mention of Elon Musk for the heck of it.
And we have to say, the way in which ChatGPT inserted the Tesla billionaire into the short essay was impressive.
Source: Facebook
Singing its praises about Chinese rojak, the bot wrote that eating the dish will leave one “feeling happy and satisfied — just like how Elon Musk feels after a successful SpaceX launch”.
It then ended off by saying that perhaps Musk might even “send you to Mars for having such good taste in food”.
Used in the right way and for the right reasons, ChatGPT can certainly be a helpful – and entertaining – tool.
That said, like with all other AI inventions, it is advisable to always exercise caution and evaluate its responses critically.
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Featured image adapted from @webmarbles on Unsplash and Facebook.
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