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Yet another journalist who doesn't understand how languages actually work. Other languages aren't just "English with different words and syntax". A single word
by pluma 11y ago
Yet another journalist who doesn't understand how languages actually work.
Other languages aren't just "English with different words and syntax". A single word can have dozens of different meanings, the set of different meanings of a word needn't be the same across languages. And even if you know the context the meaning doesn't have to be unambiguous. A perfect translation would need to recognize plausible ambiguities and retain them across languages.
Language is not code. Language is an expression of thoughts in a form that builds upon vaguely defined tokens. It's amazing that human language communication works this well at all given how ambiguous and faulty it actually is in practice.
- astrodust 11y agoEven English isn't English as innuendo and alternate meanings cloud understanding of it constantly. Even the simple phrase "I'd hit that" means any number of things depending on the speaker and the context. This doesn't even touch on how sometimes British English needs to be "translated" to American English, like in the case of Harry Potter being adapted with many words changed. Likewise it's almost impossible to express the nuance of something like "that's so fucking fucked" in a language lacking a word of similar versatility. I'd argue there's no such thing as a "perfect translation". That's why people who translate novels have a considerable amount of work to do to pick, from all possible translations, the one that best represents the tone and intent of the original author. I still think it's possible to come up with a passable translation automatically in real-time. It's inevitable.