Google's AI Overview mistakenly featured an image of a miniature elephant fitting into a human hand alongside factual information about baby elephant size. The image was sourced from an Etsy seller who labelled it as 'impossible'. This incident highlights concerns about the accuracy and discernment of Google's AI search feature.
Are baby elephants, which weigh hundreds of pounds at birth, tiny enough to fit squarely within the bounds of a human palm? Common sense would say no — but Google's AI Overview, or the AI-generated summary of web content that now often pops up at the top of Google results pages, seems to think the answer is yes.
A Google search for 'baby elephant' returns an incongruous AI summary that, despite accurately noting that newborn elephant calves 'weigh between 200 and 364 pounds and 'stand about 3 feet tall,' inexplicably includes an obviously fake image of a teacup-sized elephant nestled into the palm of a human hand. It's smaller than a human fist! Things only get worse from there. A simple click on the image reveals that it was created by an Etsy user named DazzlingVisions, who's selling the synthetic photo — along with many other similar images depicting a variety of tiny versions of definitely-much-larger animals — as a 'digital print' for a dirt-cheap $1.69. The critter is described in an associated caption as an 'adorable/impossible baby elephant.' The Overview slip-up is a fascinating instance of Google's AI search feature blending sound information with glaring fabulism, resulting in a confusing information stew and again calling the discernment of the search giant's AI Overview — how it sources text and imagery, and what it considers reliable — into question. The Etsy seller themself, after all, noted that the elephant was 'impossible.' How did it make its way into Google's AI summary? The bizarre inclusion is the latest hiccup for Google's AI search function, which has drawn widespread ridicule and numerous controversies. Meanwhile, among plenty of other gaffes, users also found that the tool falsely referred to Barack Obama as the 'first Muslim president' — a troubling harkening back to the 2008 presidential election. In each of these varied instances, the issue seemed to come down to one very important quality: nuance. Take the example of the AI suggesting that users might consider chowing down on rocks. Its source for this very bad piece of advice was comedy articles, which the AI seemingly took at face value. As for the glue-on-pizza advice? That brain blast came from a food blog. And now, of course, we have AI Overview's embrace of 'adorable/impossible baby elephant,' which speaks once again to the AI's apparent lack of media literacy — and, by the same token, renews concerns around the search tool's usefulness. Over a year in, is Google's AI Overview making searchers' lives easier? Or is it muddying information waters, and causing more problems than it's worth
GOOGLE AI MISINFORMATION IMAGERY SEARCH ENGINE FALSE INFORMATION
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