Algorithms and AI don't just show us reality — they warp it in ways that benefit platforms built to exploit people for profit, says etymologist Adam Aleksic. From ChatGPT influencing our word choices to Spotify turning a data cluster into a new musical genre, he reveals how new technology subconsciously shapes our language, trends and sense of identity. "These aren't neutral tools," he says, encouraging us to constantly ask ourselves: How am I being influenced?(After the talk, Aleksic sits down with Elise Hu, host of TED Talks Daily podcast, to discuss how he became interested in language and its evolution — from writing on leaves, clay and stone to AI models like ChatGPT.) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. Is AI changing the very way we talk?
Chapter 2: Is AI changing the very way we talk?
Etymologist and content creator Adam Oleksik sounds the alarm on how AI tools are influencing our behavior, down to our very word choices. He encourages us to remember that these emerging tools are not neutral and how they are possibly rewiring the very underlying patterns of our thoughts and why.
Afterward, I sat down with Adam to go beyond his talk and learn more about what sounding human even means anymore. The tools we'll need to build as we continue down this rapidly changing path and more. Stick around after his talk for our conversation.
How sure are you that you can tell what's real online? You might think it's easy to spot an obviously AI-generated image, and you're probably aware that algorithms are biased in some way. But all the evidence is suggesting that we're pretty bad at understanding that on a subconscious level. Take, for example, the growing perception gap in America.
We keep over and overestimating how extreme other people's political beliefs are, and this is only getting worse with social media, because algorithms show us the most extreme picture of reality. As an etymologist and content creator, I always see controversial messages go more viral because they generate more engagement than a neutral perspective.
But that means we all end up seeing this more extreme version of reality, and we're clearly starting to confuse that with actual reality. The same thing is currently happening with AI chatbots, because you probably assume that ChatGPT is speaking English to you. Except it's not speaking English, in the same way that the algorithm's not showing you reality.
There are always distortions, depending on what goes into the model and how it's trained.
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Chapter 3: How are AI tools influencing our word choices?
Like, we know that ChatGPT says delve at way higher rates than usual, possibly because OpenAI outsourced its training process to workers in Nigeria, who do actually say delve more frequently.
LAUGHTER
Over time, though, that little linguistic over-representation got reinforced into the model even more than in the workers' own dialects. Now that's affecting everybody's language. Multiple studies have found that since ChatGPT came out, people everywhere have been saying the word Delvemore in spontaneous spoken conversation.
Essentially, we're subconsciously confusing the AI version of language with actual language. But that means that the real thing is ironically getting closer to the machine version of the thing. We're in a positive feedback loop with the AI representing reality, us thinking that's the real reality, and then regurgitating it so that the AI can be fed more of our data.
You can also see this happening with the algorithm through words like hyperpop, which wasn't really part of our cultural lexicon until Spotify noticed an emerging cluster of similar users in their algorithm. As soon as they identified it and introduced a hyperpop playlist, however, the aesthetic was given a direction. Now people began to debate what did and did not qualify as hyperpop.
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Chapter 4: What does it mean that AI tools are not neutral?
The label and the playlist made the phenomenon more real by giving them something to identify with or against. And as more people identified with hyperpop, more musicians also started making hyperpop music.
All the while, the cluster of similar listeners and the algorithm grew larger and larger, and Spotify kept pushing it more and more because these platforms want to amplify cultural trends to keep you on the app. But that means we also lose the distinction between a real trend and an artificially inflated trend. And yet this is how all fads now enter the mainstream.
We start with a latent cultural desire, like maybe some people are interested in matcha or labubu or Dubai chocolate. The algorithm identifies this desire and pushes it to similar users, making the phenomenon more of a thing. But again, just like how ChatGPT misrepresented the word Delve, the algorithm is probably misrepresenting reality.
Now more businesses are making labubu content because they think that's the desire. More influencers are also making labubu trends because we have to tap into trends to go viral.
Chapter 5: How does ChatGPT affect our perception of language?
And yet, the algorithm is only showing you the visually provocative items that work in the video format. TikTok has a limited idea of who you are as a user, and there's no way that matches up with your complex desires as a human being. So we have a biased input. And that's assuming that social media is trying to faithfully represent reality, which it isn't.
Instead, it's only trying to do what's going to make money for them. It's in Spotify's interest to have you listening to Hyperpop, and it's in TikTok's interest to have you looking at the boo-boos because that's commodifiable. So once again, we have this difference between reality and the representation of reality, where they're actually constantly influencing one another.
But it's incredibly dangerous to ignore that distinction because this goes beyond our language and our consumptive behaviors. This affects the world we see as possible. Evidence suggests that ChatGPT is more conservative when speaking the Farsi language, likely because the limited training texts in Iran reflect the more conservative political climate in the region.
Does that mean that an Iranian ChatGPT user will think more conservative thoughts? We know that Elon Musk regularly makes changes to his chatbot Grok when he doesn't like how it's responding, and that he uses his platform X to artificially amplify his tweets. Does that mean that the millions of Grok and X users are subconsciously being trained to align with Musk's ideology?
we need to constantly remember that these aren't neutral tools. Everything that ends up in your social media feed or in your chatbot responses is actually filtered through many layers of what's good for the platform, what makes money, and what conforms to the platform's incorrect idea about who you are.
When we ignore this, we view reality through a constant survivorship bias, which affects our understanding of the world. After all, if you're talking more like ChatGPT, you're probably thinking more like ChatGPT as well. Or TikTok, or Spotify, but you can fight this if you constantly ask yourself, why? Why am I seeing this? Why am I saying this? Why am I thinking this?
And why is the platform rewarding this? If you don't ask yourself these questions, their version of reality is going to become your version of reality. So stay real.
Don't go away just yet. Stick around. My conversation with Adam is coming up right after a short break with word from our sponsors.
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Chapter 6: What is the impact of algorithms on cultural trends?
Congratulations on your talk. How are you feeling now that you're done?
Feeling good.
Tell us what made you so curious about language in the first place and how you got hooked?
Yeah, wow. Etymology in particular, I always like to tell people, it comes from the Greek word etumos, meaning truth. So you look at etymology and you're actually studying truth. You're studying how humans understand the world, how we relate that to other people. In sophomore year of high school, I read this etymology book. I got super into it.
And then I just started like really studying it more for myself. I started a little website in high school. I studied linguistics in college. And then I was graduating with a linguistics degree. And I was like, well, what do I do now? So I started making linguistics content and then actively sort of studying the language of the social media space as I was in it.
And then wrote a book, Algo Speak, on how social media is changing language. And then that ended up getting me the TED Talk.
Is there a problem with social media changing language? Because our language has always evolved. This is a living and dynamic thing, right? English or any other language in the world. So is there anything wrong with it?
No, and our language has always evolved around the constraints of a medium, right? Before we had written history, we would rely on oral tradition. We would tell stories through rhyme and meter. And then we started writing things down. The places that used leaves to write things down developed curly scripts because that was better for the leaves.
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Chapter 7: Are we losing connection to individual dialects and culture?
And the places that used...
clay and stone to write things down develop rigid scripts so again the medium is literally shaping language we have chapter books we have the internet internet allows for this written replication of informal speech it's again kind of a paradigm shift in how we speak and i think algorithms are that new paradigm shift ai is a new paradigm shift we're in this like really fast-paced moment where our language is rerouting around these new mediums we're interacting with
Yeah, you mentioned fast-paced. As an etymologist, how are you managing the speed at which things are changing?
Yeah, well, it's really good for me that I am kind of studying things in the open. I make videos about phenomena I'm observing. And then I get, like, tagged in videos where people are using new words. It's sort of crazy in that sense. But I also have to be in it. I scroll TikTok for research.
Right.
But you have to be in the milieu to really know what you're studying. Everything's contextual. There is an aesthetic that words are evolving through. There are communities that words are evolving from. You have to understand at least like a little bit about internet culture to know about these communities because there's so much depth to them.
Right. And it strikes me that everything is changing. Like we're talking just within a matter of days, a trend can emerge and then be gone and then be considered passe or old, which is at a much faster cadence and speed than, say, academia, where language was traditionally researched and linguistics was studied.
What do you feel like are some trends this year in language that have come up and have really hit the zeitgeist that you have to explain the most?
Yeah, wow. Well, we're definitely on the tail end of Sixth Heaven. I feel like most people understand by now that that's this nonsensical interjection coming from meme communities, originally parodying clip farming.
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Chapter 8: What role do language and media literacy play in our lives?
But there's been so much going on. Yesterday, I made a video about Locanuanly, and I guarantee you by the time that this podcast airs, that word will already be passe. But it's like a combination of low-key and genuinely, and it's like true in a muted way. Oh, low-kenuinely. Yeah. Okay. It's not going to stick.
It's like a meme word, but that's exactly kind of illustrating how quickly these words come and go. I really doubt that'll be around beyond like a month.
Okay. I'm trying to go through what I'm hearing in my house that sounds like nonsense because I have a 13-year-old and a 10-year-old and an 8-year-old.
No matter how much you think you know, they know more. So I have friends who are middle school teachers. Sometimes they let me sit in on their middle school classrooms, and that's where you really learn the culture. And then like Gen Z older people parody their language, and then it becomes brain rot. But it starts with Gen Alpha.
Yeah, I do like being called chat, though, instead of mom.
Chat is funny. And that's definitely a phenomenon that's gotten way more popular this year. I definitely started seeing that around 2023, sort of as like a general vocative, what do we think, chat, you know? And yeah, it sort of reflects the rise of streaming culture. And I've seen a lot of words come out of Twitch spaces. Back when Riz was popular, that came from Twitch.
Oh, okay. So when I'm referred to as chat, it's from like a live streamer typically saying like, hey, don't forget to subscribe.
Yeah, it's addressing an unknown audience. You know that there is an audience, you don't know who's in the audience. Chat is a catch-all. There's a sort of collective unity to it. And then there's also a sort of, yeah, the strange dynamic of digital surveillance where we really don't know who's going to see a message, where it's going to be distributed. It Even on the surface level.
So right now this will go somewhere. But then what if it goes viral? And then that will then go in directions you don't know. That's also what 6-7 was parroting at the core of it because it comes from this joke that you could go viral by saying 6-7. So people said 6-7 to go viral. It was a little self-referential. It was a nod to itself.
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