Episode

AI chatbots have linguistic slips when they go off-script

Podcast: Marketplace Tech
Published: Aug 6, 2026
Duration seconds: 526
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Canonical source: https://www.marketplace.org/episode/2026/08/06/ai-chatbots-have-linguistic-slips-when-they-go-offscript
Audio: https://pscrb.fm/rss/p/mgln.ai/e/5/dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/tracking.swap.fm/track/VnCzW2iO9G8z4eDWfXCd/play.publicradio.org/podcast/o/marketplace/tech_report/2026/08/06/tech_20260806_0806_MP_TECH_pod_128.mp3?awCollectionId=mkp-MKPtech&awEpisodeId=01KZ77WGVJDS8FQBHA8MJ56NRM
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Markdown: /podcast/marketplace-tech-318132/ai-chatbots-have-linguistic-slips-when-they-go-off-script.md

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Summary

Let’s say you're chatting away with AI — perfect grammar, great vocabulary. Then, boom: a random word in another language! That's the topic for today's “Uncanny AI.” Those moments where it becomes really clear that AI doesn't think like us. Janelle Shane, who writes the AI Weirdness blog, helps explain why AI chatbots do this. More on this: “ ChatGPT users flummoxed after AI bot starts inserting Arabic into responses ” from The New York Post “ ChatGPT is mixing languages or Answers are Wrong! ” from OpenAI Developer Community