Can a computer write poetry?
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0:01 - 0:02I have a question.
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0:03 - 0:05Can a computer write poetry?
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0:07 - 0:09This is a provocative question.
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0:10 - 0:11You think about it for a minute,
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0:11 - 0:14and you suddenly have a bunch
of other questions like: -
0:15 - 0:16What is a computer?
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0:17 - 0:18What is poetry?
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0:19 - 0:20What is creativity?
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0:22 - 0:23But these are questions
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0:23 - 0:26that people spend their entire
lifetime trying to answer, -
0:26 - 0:28not in a single TED Talk.
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0:28 - 0:31So we're going to have to try
a different approach. -
0:31 - 0:33So up here, we have two poems.
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0:34 - 0:36One of them is written by a human,
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0:36 - 0:38and the other one's written by a computer.
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0:39 - 0:41I'm going to ask you to tell me
which one's which. -
0:42 - 0:43Have a go:
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0:43 - 0:47Poem 1: Little Fly / Thy summer's play, /
My thoughtless hand / Has brush'd away. -
0:47 - 0:51Am I not / A fly like thee? /
Or art not thou / A man like me? -
0:51 - 0:54Poem 2: We can feel / Activist
through your life's / morning / -
0:54 - 0:58Pauses to see, pope I hate the / Non
all the night to start a / great otherwise (...) -
0:58 - 0:59Alright, time's up.
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1:00 - 1:04Hands up if you think Poem 1
was written by a human. -
1:06 - 1:07OK, most of you.
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1:07 - 1:10Hands up if you think Poem 2
was written by a human. -
1:11 - 1:12Very brave of you,
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1:13 - 1:17because the first one was written
by the human poet William Blake. -
1:18 - 1:21The second one was written by an algorithm
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1:21 - 1:24that took all the language
from my Facebook feed on one day -
1:24 - 1:27and then regenerated it algorithmically,
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1:27 - 1:31according to methods that I'll describe
a little bit later on. -
1:31 - 1:34So let's try another test.
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1:34 - 1:36Again, you haven't got ages to read this,
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1:37 - 1:38so just trust your gut.
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1:38 - 1:42Poem 1: A lion roars and a dog barks.
It is interesting / and fascinating -
1:42 - 1:47that a bird will fly and not / roar
or bark. Enthralling stories about animals -
1:47 - 1:51are in my dreams and I will sing them all
if I / am not exhausted or weary. -
1:51 - 1:55Poem 2: Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate
sodas! / You are really beautiful! -
1:55 - 1:59Pearls, / harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins!
All / the stuff they've always talked about (...) -
1:59 - 2:00Alright, time's up.
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2:00 - 2:03So if you think the first poem
was written by a human, -
2:03 - 2:05put your hand up.
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2:06 - 2:07OK.
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2:07 - 2:10And if you think the second poem
was written by a human, -
2:10 - 2:11put your hand up.
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2:12 - 2:16We have, more or less, a 50/50 split here.
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2:16 - 2:18It was much harder.
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2:18 - 2:19The answer is,
-
2:19 - 2:23the first poem was generated
by an algorithm called Racter, -
2:23 - 2:26that was created back in the 1970s,
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2:26 - 2:29and the second poem was written
by a guy called Frank O'Hara, -
2:29 - 2:32who happens to be
one of my favorite human poets. -
2:33 - 2:36(Laughter)
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2:36 - 2:39So what we've just done now
is a Turing test for poetry. -
2:40 - 2:45The Turing test was first proposed
by this guy, Alan Turing, in 1950, -
2:45 - 2:46in order to answer the question,
-
2:46 - 2:48can computers think?
-
2:48 - 2:51Alan Turing believed that if
a computer was able -
2:51 - 2:54to have a to have a text-based
conversation with a human, -
2:54 - 2:57with such proficiency
such that the human couldn't tell -
2:57 - 3:00whether they are talking
to a computer or a human, -
3:00 - 3:03then the computer can be said
to have intelligence. -
3:03 - 3:07So in 2013, my friend
Benjamin Laird and I, -
3:07 - 3:10we created a Turing test
for poetry online. -
3:10 - 3:11It's called bot or not,
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3:11 - 3:13and you can go and play it for yourselves.
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3:13 - 3:15But basically, it's the game
we just played. -
3:15 - 3:17You're presented with a poem,
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3:17 - 3:20you don't know whether it was written
by a human or a computer -
3:20 - 3:21and you have to guess.
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3:21 - 3:24So thousands and thousands
of people have taken this test online, -
3:24 - 3:26so we have results.
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3:26 - 3:27And what are the results?
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3:28 - 3:31Well, Turing said that if a computer
could fool a human -
3:31 - 3:3430 percent of the time
that it was a human, -
3:34 - 3:36then it passes the Turing test
for intelligence. -
3:37 - 3:39We have poems on the bot or not database
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3:39 - 3:42that have fooled 65 percent
of human readers into thinking -
3:42 - 3:43it was written by a human.
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3:44 - 3:47So, I think we have an answer
to our question. -
3:48 - 3:50According to the logic of the Turing test,
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3:50 - 3:52can a computer write poetry?
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3:52 - 3:54Well, yes, absolutely it can.
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3:56 - 3:58But if you're feeling
a little bit uncomfortable -
3:58 - 4:00with this answer, that's OK.
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4:00 - 4:02If you're having a bunch
of gut reactions to it, -
4:02 - 4:06that's also OK because
this isn't the end of the story. -
4:07 - 4:09Let's play our third and final test.
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4:10 - 4:12Again, you're going to have to read
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4:12 - 4:14and tell me which you think is human.
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4:14 - 4:17Poem 1: Red flags the reason
for pretty flags. / And ribbons. -
4:17 - 4:22Ribbons of flags / And wearing material /
Reasons for wearing material. (...) -
4:22 - 4:26Poem 2: A wounded deer leaps
highest, / I've heard the daffodil -
4:26 - 4:29I've heard the flag to-day /
I've heard the hunter tell; / -
4:29 - 4:33'Tis but the ecstasy of death, /
And then the brake is almost done (...) -
4:33 - 4:35OK, time is up.
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4:35 - 4:38So hands up if you think Poem 1
was written by a human. -
4:40 - 4:43Hands up if you think Poem 2
was written by a human. -
4:43 - 4:45Whoa, that's a lot more people.
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4:46 - 4:49So you'd be surprised to find that Poem 1
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4:49 - 4:53was written by the very
human poet Gertrude Stein. -
4:54 - 4:59And Poem 2 was generated
by an algorithm called RKCP. -
4:59 - 5:02Now before we go on, let me describe
very quickly and simply, -
5:03 - 5:04how RKCP works.
-
5:05 - 5:09So RKCP is an algorithm
designed by Ray Kurzweil, -
5:09 - 5:11who's a director of engineering at Google
-
5:11 - 5:13and a firm believer
in artificial intelligence. -
5:14 - 5:18So, you give RKCP a source text,
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5:18 - 5:22it analyzes the source text in order
to find out how it uses language, -
5:22 - 5:24and then it regenerates language
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5:24 - 5:27that emulates that first text.
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5:27 - 5:29So in the poem we just saw before,
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5:29 - 5:32Poem 2, the one that you all
thought was human, -
5:32 - 5:33it was fed a bunch of poems
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5:33 - 5:35by a poet called Emily Dickinson
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5:35 - 5:37it looked at the way she used language,
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5:37 - 5:39learned the model,
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5:39 - 5:43and then it regenerated a model
according to that same structure. -
5:45 - 5:47But the important thing to know about RKCP
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5:47 - 5:50is that it doesn't know the meaning
of the words it's using. -
5:50 - 5:53The language is just raw material,
-
5:53 - 5:55it could be Chinese,
it could be in Swedish, -
5:55 - 5:59it could be the collected language
from your Facebook feed for one day. -
5:59 - 6:01It's just raw material.
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6:01 - 6:04And nevertheless, it's able
to create a poem -
6:04 - 6:07that seems more human
than Gertrude Stein's poem, -
6:07 - 6:10and Gertrude Stein is a human.
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6:11 - 6:15So what we've done here is,
more or less, a reverse Turing test. -
6:16 - 6:21So Gertrude Stein, who's a human,
is able to write a poem -
6:21 - 6:25that fools a majority
of human judges into thinking -
6:25 - 6:27that it was written by a computer.
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6:27 - 6:31Therefore, according to the logic
of the reverse Turing test, -
6:31 - 6:33Gertrude Stein is a computer.
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6:33 - 6:35(Laughter)
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6:35 - 6:37Feeling confused?
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6:37 - 6:39I think that's fair enough.
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6:40 - 6:44So far we've had humans
that write like humans, -
6:44 - 6:47we have computers that write
like computers, -
6:47 - 6:50we have computers that write like humans,
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6:50 - 6:54but we also have,
perhaps most confusingly, -
6:54 - 6:56humans that write like computers.
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6:57 - 6:59So what do we take from all of this?
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7:00 - 7:03Do we take that William Blake
is somehow more of a human -
7:03 - 7:04than Gertrude Stein?
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7:04 - 7:07Or that Gertrude Stein is more
of a computer than William Blake? -
7:07 - 7:09(Laughter)
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7:09 - 7:11These are questions
I've been asking myself -
7:11 - 7:13for around two years now,
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7:13 - 7:15and I don't have any answers.
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7:15 - 7:17But what I do have are a bunch of insights
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7:17 - 7:20about our relationship with technology.
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7:21 - 7:25So my first insight is that,
for some reason, -
7:25 - 7:28we associate poetry with being human.
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7:28 - 7:32So that when we ask,
"Can a computer write poetry?" -
7:32 - 7:33we're also asking,
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7:33 - 7:35"What does it mean to be human
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7:35 - 7:38and how do we put boundaries
around this category? -
7:38 - 7:42How do we say who or what
can be part of this category?" -
7:42 - 7:46This is an essentially
philosophical question, I believe, -
7:46 - 7:48and it can't be answered
with a yes or no test, -
7:48 - 7:49like the Turing test.
-
7:50 - 7:53I also believe that Alan Turing
understood this, -
7:53 - 7:56and that when he devised
his test back in 1950, -
7:56 - 7:59he was doing it
as a philosophical provocation. -
8:01 - 8:07So my second insight is that,
when we take the Turing test for poetry, -
8:07 - 8:10we're not really testing
the capacity of the computers -
8:10 - 8:13because poetry-generating algorithms,
-
8:13 - 8:18they're pretty simple and have existed,
more or less, since the 1950s. -
8:19 - 8:22What we are doing with the Turing
test for poetry, rather, -
8:22 - 8:27is collecting opinions about what
constitutes humanness. -
8:28 - 8:31So, what I've figured out,
-
8:31 - 8:34we've seen this when earlier today,
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8:34 - 8:37we say that William Blake
is more of a human -
8:37 - 8:38than Gertrude Stein.
-
8:38 - 8:41Of course, this doesn't mean
that William Blake -
8:41 - 8:42was actually more human
-
8:42 - 8:45or that Gertrude Stein
was more of a computer. -
8:46 - 8:50It simply means that the category
of the human is unstable. -
8:51 - 8:54This has led me to understand
-
8:54 - 8:56that the human is not a cold, hard fact.
-
8:57 - 9:00Rather, it is something
that's constructed with our opinions -
9:00 - 9:03and something that changes over time.
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9:05 - 9:09So my final insight is that
the computer, more or less, -
9:09 - 9:13works like a mirror
that reflects any idea of a human -
9:13 - 9:15that we show it.
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9:15 - 9:17We show it Emily Dickinson,
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9:17 - 9:19it gives Emily Dickinson back to us.
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9:20 - 9:22We show it William Blake,
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9:22 - 9:24that's what it reflects back to us.
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9:24 - 9:26We show it Gertrude Stein,
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9:26 - 9:28what we get back is Gertrude Stein.
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9:29 - 9:31More than any other bit of technology,
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9:31 - 9:37the computer is a mirror that reflects
any idea of the human we teach it. -
9:38 - 9:40So I'm sure a lot of you have been hearing
-
9:40 - 9:43a lot about artificial
intelligence recently. -
9:45 - 9:48And much of the conversation is,
-
9:48 - 9:49can we build it?
-
9:50 - 9:54Can we build an intelligent computer?
-
9:54 - 9:56Can we build a creative computer?
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9:56 - 9:58What we seem to be asking over and over
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9:58 - 10:01is can we build a human-like computer?
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10:02 - 10:04But what we've seen just now
-
10:04 - 10:07is that the human
is not a scientific fact, -
10:07 - 10:10that it's an ever-shifting,
concatenating idea -
10:10 - 10:13and one that changes over time.
-
10:13 - 10:16So that when we begin
to grapple with the ideas -
10:16 - 10:18of artificial intelligence in the future,
-
10:18 - 10:20we shouldn't only be asking ourselves,
-
10:20 - 10:22"Can we build it?"
-
10:22 - 10:24But we should also be asking ourselves,
-
10:24 - 10:27"What idea of the human
do we want to have reflected back to us?" -
10:28 - 10:31This is an essentially philosophical idea,
-
10:31 - 10:34and it's one that can't be answered
with software alone, -
10:34 - 10:39but I think requires a moment
of species-wide, existential reflection. -
10:39 - 10:40Thank you.
-
10:40 - 10:43(Applause)
- Title:
- Can a computer write poetry?
- Speaker:
- Oscar Schwartz
- Description:
-
If you read a poem and feel moved by it, but then find out it was actually written by a computer, would you feel differently about the experience? Would you think that the computer had expressed itself and been creative, or would you feel like you had fallen for a cheap trick? In this talk, writer Oscar Schwartz examines why we react so strongly to the idea of a computer writing poetry -- and how this reaction helps us understand what it means to be human.
--
Poetry test #1
Poem 1
Little Fly
Thy summer’s play,
My thoughtless hand
Has bush’d away.Am not I
A fly like thee?
Or art not thou
A man like me?Poem 2
We can feel
Activist through your life’s
Morning
Pauses to see, pope I hate the
Non all the night to start a
great otherwiseI’ll snake swirling
Vastness guess
Totally mental hamsters if I
Know I put on a year a crucial
Absolutely.Poetry test #2
Poem 1
A lion roars and a dog barks. It is interesting
and fascinating that a bird will fly and not
roar or bark. Enthralling stories about animals
are in my dreams and I will sing them all if I
am not exhausted and weary.Poem 2
Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate sodas!
You really are beautiful! Pearls,
harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins! All
the stuff they’ve always talked aboutstill makes a poem a surprise!
These things are with us every day
even on beachheads and biers. They
do have meaning. They’re strong as rocks.Poetry test #3
Poem 1
Red flags the reason for pretty flags.
And ribbons.
Ribbons of flags
And wearing material
Reason for wearing material.
Give pleasure.
Can you give me the regions.
The regions and the land.
The regions and wheels.
All wheels are perfect.
Enthusiasm.Poem 2
A wounded deer leaps highest,
I’ve heard the daffodil
I’ve heard the flag to-day
I’ve heard the hunter tell;
‘Tis but the ecstasy of death,
And then the brake is almost done,
And sunrise grows so near
sunrise grows so near
That we can touch the despair and
frenzied hope of all the ages. - Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 10:56
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Retired user commented on English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Maricene Crus commented on English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Brian Greene approved English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for Can a computer write poetry? |
Maricene Crus
Just a question:
shouldn't the subtitles for the poems be written between square brackets since they are shown in slides and not spoken?
Thank you!
Retired user
A typo at 04:13 It should read "Red" instead of "Reg"