Artificial intelligence (AI) has taken its first toll in the cumbersome Brussels administration, the portal "Politiko" writes, adding that high-tech machines that go through Eurocratic jargon at record speed have replaced hundreds of translators working for the institutions of the European Union.
In this way, as the portal points out, one of the largest and oldest departments among multilingual Brussels institutions has been reduced, which could be just the beginning since new AI tools have the potential to further replace people.
Translators are a key cog in the complex EU machinery, as every official text must be translated into the EU's 24 working languages before it enters into force.
Until a few years ago, this Herculean work was performed exclusively by humans. However, this is no longer the case, which is supported by the data of the European Commission that the translation department has decreased by 17 percent in the last ten years. The reason for this is machine translation.
Translation veterans are nostalgic for the old days, when they spent hours poring over dusty dictionaries and typing voluminous documents.
Machine translation helps translators, but it cannot replace them. Human expert confirmation will always be required
Technology saves time, translator Markus Foti, who is now the head of the EC's automatic translation department, told Politiko.
"The time I used to spend walking to the local library... in 1999 or thereabouts, looking for relevant paragraphs, I can now spend on the actual translation," he said.
However, translators insist that claims that their time has passed are greatly exaggerated. Although business is adapting to artificial intelligence, the human element remains essential, they argue.
"The world is changing, and translation will not be left out," said Spiridon Pilos, a former EC official who oversaw the introduction of translation machines in 2013.
"Machine translation helps translators, but it cannot replace them. Human expert confirmation will always be required”.
Pilos points out that "the translator always has the ultimate responsibility, and is responsible for the results", especially when it comes to important texts.
"For such urgent speeches, they still prefer a human translation, especially because of the sensitivity of the topic. Such things must not leak out," said Sheila Castilla, head of the Department of Postgraduate Translation Studies at the University of Dublin.
EU translators emphasize that their daily routine is moving towards spotting errors and adapting machine-translated texts to the EU language.
In translator jargon, this is known as “proofreading” and is becoming an increasingly important part of the job.
"I already know that I probably won't translate for the rest of my life," said a young Council of Europe translator for Politiko who spoke on condition of anonymity because she is not authorized to speak to the media. She added that proofreading will probably be the biggest part of her job in the future.
Translators also hope that the increasing use of social networks by the EU will create new opportunities.
"Most of the official EU accounts on social media are in English, but this means that some will feel left out," said the translator. "I wonder how it will change our profession,"
"The defense of multilingualism is not a popular battle - because it is expensive," Christiano Sebastiani, president of the union representing employees in EU institutions, told Politiko.
He believes that cutting translation jobs threatens to weaken the EU's multilingualism in favor of the English language.
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