So would you say that GPT-2 has Comprehension of “recycling” but not Comprehension of “in favor of” and “against”, because it doesn’t show even the basic understand that the latter pair are opposites?
Something like that, yes. I would say that the concept “recycling” is correctly linked to “the environment” by an “improves” relation, and that it Comprehends “recycling” and “the environment” pretty well. But some texts say that the “improves” relation is positive, and some texts say it is negative (“doesn’t really improve”) and so GPT-2 holds both contradictory beliefs about the relation simultaneously. Unlike humans, it doesn’t try to maintain consistency in what it expresses, and doesn’t express uncertainty properly. So we see what looks like waffling between contradictory strongly held opinions in the same sentence or paragraph.
As for whether the vocabulary is appropriate for discussing such an inhuman contraption or whether it is too misleading to use, especially when talking to non-experts, I don’t really know. I’m trying to go beyond descriptions of GPT-2 “doesn’t understand what it is saying” and “understands what it is saying” to a more nuanced picture of what capabilities and internal conceptual structures are actually present and absent.
Something like that, yes. I would say that the concept “recycling” is correctly linked to “the environment” by an “improves” relation, and that it Comprehends “recycling” and “the environment” pretty well. But some texts say that the “improves” relation is positive, and some texts say it is negative (“doesn’t really improve”) and so GPT-2 holds both contradictory beliefs about the relation simultaneously. Unlike humans, it doesn’t try to maintain consistency in what it expresses, and doesn’t express uncertainty properly. So we see what looks like waffling between contradictory strongly held opinions in the same sentence or paragraph.
As for whether the vocabulary is appropriate for discussing such an inhuman contraption or whether it is too misleading to use, especially when talking to non-experts, I don’t really know. I’m trying to go beyond descriptions of GPT-2 “doesn’t understand what it is saying” and “understands what it is saying” to a more nuanced picture of what capabilities and internal conceptual structures are actually present and absent.