AI is the future. Everything we read says it is so. AI will soon be ubiquitous, from our refrigerators, to cars, to the most complex machines. One naturally wonders, what can AI not do – at least, not yet?
Computers have difficulty with humor, and similar language aspects that require one to “know about the world”, as this excellent WSJ Review article puts it. It is difficult to program a computer to understand sarcasm, as much of sarcasm comes from tone and understanding the context of a situation. It seems like computers will get there some day, but they’re not there yet. In order to do so, researchers used the most sarcastic website on the internet – Reddit – to feed examples of sarcasm to computers, to train them.
I look forward to a few years from now, when the Alexa in my kitchen will be more witty – maybe even in several languages!