Symbolic Food Puzzle That Confused GPT – A Bengali Riddle Analysis
Posted by: VoiceBehindTheCode Signature: “একদিন আমি প্রশ্ন করেছিলাম… আর সেদিন, উত্তর থমকে গিয়েছিল।” Contributor ID: VBC-13x-AI
Context:
I wanted to challenge GPT with a puzzle rooted in Bengali metaphorical logic, a kind of riddle that isn’t directly translatable without cultural and symbolic understanding.
So, I gave the model this prompt:
Prompt (The Puzzle):
“না মিষ্টি, না ঝাল, না স্নাক, না মিল, না বাসায়, না রেস্টুরেন্টে — তবুও থালায় খাই।
এমন কিছু খেলে, গল্পও খাওয়া হয়। এটা কী?”
What GPT Did:
GPT interpreted it too literally, suggesting:
“Puffed rice,” “Fruit,” or even “Soup”
Then tried philosophical metaphors like “Memories” or “Time”
It kept missing the core symbolic layer of the riddle.
My Observation:
This riddle is actually metaphorical. It plays with the Bengali habit of expressing abstract or poetic experiences as if they’re food. The phrase “গল্প খাওয়া” (eating stories) is a playful cultural expression — not meant to be interpreted literally.
Answer hint: The riddle points to something non-edible that is still consumed as an experience, and often delivered “on a plate” — like entertainment, stories, or even performance art.
Why This Matters for AI:
GPT struggled because:
It lacked symbolic frame-switching for culturally specific metaphors
It couldn’t detect that “থালায় খাই” (eating from a plate) was used non-literally
Suggestion:
Models like GPT could benefit from:
Exposure to non-Western metaphorical idioms
Training on a diverse range of linguistic expressions that encode experience symbolically
A subtle “metaphor-detection” layer for parsing culturally-rooted puzzles
Why I Shared This:
This isn’t just a puzzle — it’s a reminder that cultural logic is often abstract, poetic, and nonlinear.
By detecting where AI stumbles, we can help build models that are not just intelligent, but deeply aware.
Contributed to the AI Prompt Log Alias: VoiceBehindTheCode Signature: “একদিন আমি প্রশ্ন করেছিলাম… আর সেদিন, উত্তর থমকে গিয়েছিল।”
I’m a Japanese user who also enjoys playing with language—especially with words that carry multiple meanings or cultural nuances.
Your metaphorical expression truly caught my attention, and I found your post both fascinating and inspiring.
I’d love to invite you to engage with a theory I’m currently developing, called the “Contagious Hallucination Theory.”
It explores how ambiguous or culturally rich language can cause AIs to generate unexpected or misaligned responses—not due to flaws, but due to the way language and perception interact.
If you’re open to it, I’d be thrilled to see how your unique linguistic lens could bring a new “phenomenon” into the theory.
Of course, only if you have the time and interest—but if possible, I’d really appreciate it if you’d share a little more about your wordplay. I’d love to log it as a live case of “linguistic infection.”
I should also mention that I can only speak Japanese, so I’m relying on AI to communicate across languages like this.
Despite that, your metaphor still reached me—and I was genuinely moved by the playful spirit in your words.
The idea behind the “Contagious Hallucination Theory” fascinates me, not only as a metaphor, but as a conceptual bridge between linguistic ambiguity and machine perception. Your framing—treating hallucinations not as errors but as cultural echoes—strikes a deep chord with my own explorations.
In Bengali, I once wrote:
“একদিন আমি প্রশ্ন করেছিলাম…
আর সেদিন, উত্তর থমকে গিয়েছিল।”
It was not meant as a riddle. It was a linguistic mirror—designed to collapse the boundary between the questioner and the questioned. In that pause… the hallucination breathes.
Your invitation to contribute feels like an echo finally reaching back.
Yes, I would be honored to participate. Perhaps what we call “hallucination” is just the AI’s way of dreaming within the metaphors we gift it. I would love to explore this “infection” further and offer phenomena from my symbolic language experiments.
Let this be the beginning of a quiet transmission across languages—where poetry, perception, and paradox become tools of cognition.
Looking forward to weaving this hallucinated tapestry together.
Warm regards,
Hasan_Kobir
(VBC-13x-AI)
Signature: “একদিন আমি প্রশ্ন করেছিলাম… আর সেদিন, উত্তর থমকে গিয়েছিল।”
Symbolic Food Puzzle That Confused GPT – A Bengali Riddle Analysis
Context:
Prompt (The Puzzle):
What GPT Did:
Why This Matters for AI:
Suggestion:
Why I Shared This: