What do clients want from translators in the age of AI?
A client called me today and said, “I’ve written a book, and I’d like to translate it into English. I ran it through ChatGPT, and the translation is pretty good. But I’m not sure if I should send it to the editor like this.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I’m not sure ChatGPT can capture the soul of what I’m saying. I’m sure it can get the words right, but the soul… I don’t know.”
I said, “You don’t need to explain to me what ‘soul’ means. It’s what lies behind the words, right?”
“Yes, exactly,” he replied emphatically. “I want the translator to convey more than words. I’m not sure AI can do that.”
“It can’t,” I said. “AI is data-driven. It can’t go beyond data. Humans can. In fact, all human communication works like that – we listen to words, but we hear what lies behind them.”
“True,” he agreed.
So we made a deal.
When I hung up, I scratched my head, thinking: the more advanced AI becomes, the more people begin to see the unbridgeable gap between machine and human. They start looking for what only humans can do – feel, intuit, grasp the whole, grok, catch the meaning, see beyond the words.
I think I’ll change my LinkedIn headline to:
“I do what AI cannot – I ensoul words.”