Idiom or idiot? Google's AI Overview is trying its best
Fine words butter no parsnips. A ludicrous phrase, though it's true. Or real at least, listed in the Oxford and elsewhere. Maybe you've met the proverb before, hiding in a PG Wodehouse novel. Yet imagine you haven't. What does it mean?
Fancy speech is all very well, perhaps, but it fails to deliver material benefits. Talk is cheap, in other words. Elegant waffle won't moisten your greens. Facing fresh idiom, humans play this mental game, speculating what a lip-sticked pig connotes, a milkshake duck, a rat with a gold tooth.
We base our guesswork on kindred expressions or meld the idiom's disparate ingredients into a cogent whole. Ethiopians say, 'The smaller the lizard, the greater its hope of becoming a crocodile.' I don't know the aphorism, but I reckon I could fumble my way towards an answer.
Google's AI Overview thinks likewise. Rather than admit ignorance, the software gives any mystery phrase a go, be that a Chinese wisdom or a make-believe badger like Crab Man's prank in April. Crab Man is a Bluesky avatar who learnt that AI Overview is up for defining any guff.
'You can't lick a badger twice.' That was a beta test, a fabrication tapped into Google's window with 'meaning' added to the tail. According to Overview, the proverb means 'you can't trick or deceive someone a second time after they've been tricked once'. Bingo: the machine translation as feasible as the input idiom despite both being phony.
Once social media caught wind, fake phrases proliferated, fed into Overview to see what bunkum came back. Allegedly, 'a shower a day keeps the ventriloquist away' means hygiene deters discouragement. While 'you can take your dog to the beach, but you can't sail it to Switzerland' suggests some tasks are manageable, while others are complex.
Which is true-ish, for all the gaslighting going on. Kyle Orland, senior gaming editor at Ars Technica, argues in Overview's defence, admitting 'I've come away impressed with the model's almost poetic attempts to glean meaning from gibberish, to make sense out of the senseless'.
A perfect example lies in one exchange. For starters, 'dream makes the steam' deserves to be a motto. Just as the proposed translation – how imagination powers innovation – is faultless. Compare that to the claptrap the dad offers in the Telstra ad, telling his son they built the Great Wall of China 'during the time of the Emperor Nasi Goreng, to keep the rabbits out'. If you don't know, say so.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Sydney Morning Herald
3 days ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Hate networking? Let me try and change your mind
There's a single word in the English language that makes most sane people reflexively cringe. It can immediately conjure up visions of awkward small talk, bad coffee, stale canapés and tired conference room carpets. The word in question? Networking. Now, I can feel your forehead tensing instinctively as you read that, because professional networking can be all those negative things at once. If you're not an extrovert, or dislike talking about the weather, then the idea of walking into a room full of strangers with nothing in common, except for your jobs, will rightly fill you with fear. But, whether you like it or not, networking at work is more important than ever. There's been a 28 per cent increase in Google searches for networking events globally, and building new connections can help with career growth, industry collaboration and maybe even finding your next job. It's one of those things that takes practice (and a bit of courage) to get better at, so here are six ways to become a better professional networker. 1. Make it personal It's easy to believe that networking has to involve walking into a cold room and introducing yourself to twenty new people in one sitting, but networking can be much more enjoyable if you do it one-by-one. Identify someone in your industry you think can learn from, or share knowledge with, and message them to ask for a coffee. 2. Shorter is better Everyone is busy so don't monopolise too much of people's time. If you're meeting virtually, resist the default video meeting time of one hour, and schedule it for 25 minutes instead. This will force them to get straight to the point and cut some of the unnecessary fluff.
The Age
3 days ago
- The Age
Hate networking? Let me try and change your mind
There's a single word in the English language that makes most sane people reflexively cringe. It can immediately conjure up visions of awkward small talk, bad coffee, stale canapés and tired conference room carpets. The word in question? Networking. Now, I can feel your forehead tensing instinctively as you read that, because professional networking can be all those negative things at once. If you're not an extrovert, or dislike talking about the weather, then the idea of walking into a room full of strangers with nothing in common, except for your jobs, will rightly fill you with fear. But, whether you like it or not, networking at work is more important than ever. There's been a 28 per cent increase in Google searches for networking events globally, and building new connections can help with career growth, industry collaboration and maybe even finding your next job. It's one of those things that takes practice (and a bit of courage) to get better at, so here are six ways to become a better professional networker. 1. Make it personal It's easy to believe that networking has to involve walking into a cold room and introducing yourself to twenty new people in one sitting, but networking can be much more enjoyable if you do it one-by-one. Identify someone in your industry you think can learn from, or share knowledge with, and message them to ask for a coffee. 2. Shorter is better Everyone is busy so don't monopolise too much of people's time. If you're meeting virtually, resist the default video meeting time of one hour, and schedule it for 25 minutes instead. This will force them to get straight to the point and cut some of the unnecessary fluff.
The Age
11-06-2025
- The Age
Forget pineapple, these pizza topping crimes are especially heinous
Opinion The tropical fruit evokes thousands of anguished 'mamma mias', but other ingredients deserve closer attention from the Italian food police. Do you have strong opinions about pineapple on pizza? Do you believe that getting mad about Italian food is a substitute for an actual personality? Fanatical traditionalism over Italian food is a modern trope. Self-appointed 'carbonaranieri' (Italian food police) constantly attack minor variations in any dish of Italian origin, and through doing so, hope to resurrect the glory of the Roman Empire. To the carbonaranieri, one ingredient is hated more than any other: pineapple. Italian explorer Christopher Columbus brought pineapples to Europe at the same time as tomatoes, but while one fruit is considered a cornerstone of Italian food, the inclusion of the other anywhere in the cuisine will be met with a thousand anguished 'mamma mias'. If you have decided that opposing pineapple on pizza is your religion, consider coleslaw on top of a curried ham and banana pizza proof that God is vengeful, and that He has forsaken you. In fact, pineapple on pizza is a heartwarming story of multicultural success. It was created in 1962 by Sam Panopoulos, a Greek migrant to Canada who applied flavours from Chinese sweet and sour pork to Italian pizza and named it 'Hawaiian' after an American brand of tinned fruit. It was a huge success, and now graces the menus of pizzerias worldwide. Adam Liaw's all-in pizza dough (pictured above) To the carbonaranieri, however, the very existence of Hawaiian pizza is a grave insult to the Italian people. Slavish devotion to authenticity is something I struggle to understand. Cuisines change constantly over time; you can't just pick a single moment and call it authentic. I have Chinese heritage, and Chinese cuisine has always welcomed adaptation. If you want to deep-fry ice-cream and call it Chinese food, we're all good with that. Beef and broccoli? Broccoli wasn't grown in China until the 1980s but it sounds pretty good all the same. We literally invented oranges (look it up), but we don't try to gatekeep how you eat them. I'm not sure why pineapple evokes such strong condemnation from Italian traditionalists, but there are arguably far more heinous pizza crimes out there. Here are a few that deserve closer attention from the carbonaranieri. Coleslaw Scandinavia is a world leader in the consumption of two things – coffee and frozen pizza – and the way it consumes both of them would make the average Italian weep. Sweden's Africana is topped with ham, banana, curry powder and peanuts, but that's not even the worst of it. Scandinavians love putting cold stuff on pizzas. Swedes top their pizzas with pizzasallad, a kind of chilled coleslaw. Norwegians like their pizzas with a cold garlic and sour cream sauce. If you have at any point decided that opposing pineapple on pizza is your religion, consider coleslaw on top of a curried ham and banana pizza proof that God is vengeful, and that He has forsaken you. Everything Japan does to pizza While the carbonaranieri was distracted by pineapple on pizza and cream in carbonara, on the eastern front, Japan gained territory in a relentless war to absolutely humiliate Italian food. Its most popular pizza toppings include mayonnaise, corn, tinned tuna and fish sperm. I'm not even kidding. Currently, in Japan you can order an entire pizza topped just with pickles and camembert sauce. French fries and hot dogs 'Pizza con patatine' and 'pizza ai wurstel e patatine' might sound molto Italiano, but what you are actually getting is pizza topped with French fries, and potentially also hot dog wieners. A favourite among Italian children, these home-grown adaptations might be abominations to traditionalists, but they are entirely Italian creations. Sometimes the call is coming from inside the house. America invented both Super Mario Brothers and stuffed pizza crusts. Pizza Hut's first stuffed-crust pizza was marketed in a campaign featuring Donald Trump, and just yesterday, NASDAQ listed chain Papa John's announced the world's first ever 'croissant pizza' to a conspicuous lack of global outrage. There are dozens of extremely weird US state-based pizza variations that vary from deep pastry cases filled with cheese and sausage in Chicago and burnt wafers in New Haven, to pretentious Californian varieties with toppings like 'Thai chicken', caviar, and smoked salmon. In comparison to one guy in Canada deciding, correctly, that pineapple on a pizza might be nice, the list of American pizza crimes would seem both longer and far more monstrous. Dessert pizzas The thought process for dessert pizzas is pretty much just substituting savoury ingredients for sweet ones of roughly the same shape or texture. Nutella instead of pizza sauce. Banana instead of pepperoni. It's a question of doing what can be done, rather than what should be done.
