I was crossing a not-too-busy street on a not-too-busy day in Chennai.
I was having a voice conversation with ChatGPT (about the log probabilities of tokens on LLMs, if you’re curious) when I was rudely interrupted by an auto rikshaw rapidly honking at me. “Honk honk honk honk honk” in rapid succession.
Not unusual. Mildly annoying. The street was empty. The auto was empty. The traffic policeman was visible. I gave way and carried on.
A few seconds later, I heard a voice in my ear.
“It sounds like you’re in a good mood! Anything else you’d like to discuss or know more about?”
ChatGPT was still listening (perhaps to background noise) and responding. But I didn’t realize what random noise it thought put me in a good mood. Here’s what I saw on the chat window.
A client once told me, while visiting Hyderabad, that “these honks in India are a language of their own.” If ChatGPT is to be believed, the autos are laughing at us.
This is, incidentally, the very first time ChatGPT added an exclamation point to my words. I’ve never managed to achieve that so far. No matter how emphatically I spoke.
Also, I’d never have learnt this walking in the streets of Singapore. Friends have warned me about the dangers of long walks on Indian roads. Here’s an example of the lessons we learn — if only we keep our eyes and ears (and microphones) open.
Postscript
While cycling in Singapore, ChatGPT interprets the sounds very differently. At least twice, it transcribed the traffic noise into “Thank you. Thank you.” Clearly even traffic noise in Singapore is more graceful than in Chennai!
