. Arnold de Villeneuve Le Rosaire des Philosophes

[Illen A. Cluf]

This is great to hear. I wonder if you could point out some issues and I can see if gpt 4.0 corrects them? You can sign up for a free trial and get $5 free credit, might be able to use that to translate to modern french or english if it does better than 3.5

There are several issues I could discuss, but perhaps a separate thread should be created for that.

 

[Illen A. Cluf]

This is great to hear. I wonder if you could point out some issues and I can see if gpt 4.0 corrects them? You can sign up for a free trial and get $5 free credit, might be able to use that to translate to modern french or english if it does better than 3.5

Regarding using ChatGPT for old French text, here is a discussion I had this morning:

Me:

When you translate a passage from French to English, do you use an online translation program?

ChatGPT

I do not use an online translation program when translating passages from one language to another. Instead, I generate translations based on the text and language patterns that I have learned during my training. My translations are generated by analyzing the input text in one language and generating a corresponding text in the other language to the best of my ability. However, it's important to note that my translations may not always be perfect and may require manual review and editing, especially for complex or nuanced language, idiomatic expressions, or specialized terminology. For critical or professional translation needs, it's often recommended to use the services of a human translator or a specialized translation tool.

Me:

Have you learned how to read text in old versions of modern languages?

ChatGPT

My training data includes text from various sources, including older versions of modern languages. However, the extent to which I can accurately understand and generate text in older versions of languages depends on the availability and diversity of such data in the training corpus. I may have some knowledge of older language forms, but my proficiency in understanding and generating text in these older versions may be limited, especially if the language has undergone significant changes over time.
If you have a specific question or text in an older version of a modern language, feel free to provide it, and I will do my best to assist you with the information and translation to the best of my abilities based on my training data

 

[Philosophical]

This makes sense. I am trying to determine if GPT 4.0 would make your job simpler by producing either modern french correctly or making the english translation with less error.

The value of a human translator is not going away anytime soon and I, for one, am so appreciative of your talents.

 

[Illen A. Cluf]

This makes sense. I am trying to determine if GPT 4.0 would make your job simpler by producing either modern french correctly or making the english translation with less error.

The value of a human translator is not going away anytime soon and I, for one, am so appreciative of your talents.

It would be interesting to ask the exact same questions in version GPT 4.0.
One thing that I have always wished for is a more comprehensive dictionary of old, and middle French words as it relates to modern French. There are a few around, but they are quite sparse in content, and don't include the majority of words that I have come across.

Another thing that I have always wished for is a dictionary of phrases rather than just words. There are combinations of words (phrases) in most, if not all languages, that have a totally different, subtle, meaning than what the individual words imply. If those phraes were included in a translation program, it would render the translation much more meaningful. For example, "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" is an English phrase which has a totally different meaning than if it was translated directly, word by word, into another language.