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I've seen Tao Te Ching's translation on the HN front page for several times. It seems people are interested in it. The thing with Tao Te Ching is it's too ambi

I've seen Tao Te Ching's translation on the HN front page for several times. It seems people are interested in it. The thing with Tao Te Ching is it's too ambiguous because: 1) The Chinese language is very overloaded and thus very ambiguous. 2) Classical Chinese is even more so. 3) Tao Te Ching is intentionally filled with clever puns which makes it more ambiguous. The problem with translations is the translator has to interpret source texts into specific meanings in the target languages. It's like opening Schrödinger's cat box, or unwrapping monads in Haskell and Rust, which essentially deduct multiple possibilities into a single deterministic value. If you're really into it, you probably want to learn some basic Chinese and classical Chinese (lucky they're not so different from each other), and figure out how to look up in the dictionaries. It's probably not as difficult as it sounds - all you need to do is decrypt with dictionaries. Maybe there should be a new form of digital translation, just like hovering texts on Duolingo and it will display all the possible meanings of the word/expression.

noufalibrahim 3y ago
There was a period in my life in my early 20s when I dabbled heavily in taoism. The book was a staple read for me and I tried to adjust my Outlook accordingly for a long time. Finally though, i dropped it and went back to who I was. Your comment makes me wonder if the specific translation of the book I read was a big factor.
- racktash 3y ago
  I can relate to this comment. The Tao Te Ching had a profound influence on me. Reading it was the first time I engaged on a "spiritual" level with life (I'm a fairly pragmatic and reductionist guy, perhaps to a fault). But this also wore off for me and I returned to being my usual mostly unspiritual self after a couple of years boring my friends trying to tell my friends about the Tao... Without describing it. I do feel like I have a respect for such things where before I just considered it all manipulative woo or self-delusion. I also think it paved the way to my being able to appreciate Wittgenstein's ideas (the ones I can grasp anyway). I read through a few different translations of the TTC, two of which had commentaries. Both the text and the translations had somewhat different takes. So it's definitely worth trying a few versions. Two I recommend: DC Lau's translation and Philip Ivanhoe's.
  - noufalibrahim 3y ago
    Interesting. I have always been a religious person but wandered from my own traditions for a while. Those days, my main attraction was taoism. But, like I mentioned, i dropped it.
- vitiral 3y ago
  Traditionally Taoism was a path for the old, for those who had completed their duty. Confucianism is the path for the young, for those who must fulfill their duty. One might say that fulfilling your duty without resistance is in fact following the Tao.
- booleandilemma 3y ago
  Is it possible to dabble heavily? If you're dabbling heavily are you still dabbling?
mbivert 3y ago
> Maybe there should be a new form of digital translation, just like hovering texts on Duolingo and it will display all the possible meanings of the word/expression. If anyone's interested, I've already self-promoted on a previous Tao Te Ching thread a tool/website[0] which precisely does that. I've still haven't had the time to add the Tao Te Ching though (and I've just observed one or two bugs. Oh well.) [0]: https://zhongmu.eu/book.html#c=2;w=2;b=qian-zi-wen https://zhongmu.eu/book.html#c=2;w=2;b=qian-zi-wen
- bradrn 3y ago
  There’s also [0], which has the same functionality (click the >> icon). [0] https://ctext.org/dao-de-jing https://ctext.org/dao-de-jing
  - mbivert 3y ago
    Thanks, I didn't knew about it
qwerty456127 3y ago
Same thing with the Bible - to me reading it as a single translation seems making little sense. Reading every verse in multiple versions in multiple languages, looking up multiple meanings of every word feels a whole different story. Luckily reading Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin and Old English is much easier than reading Chinese. I still feel like learning Chinese to read Taoist texts though, because they are so cool, Alan Watts inspired me to the point I can't imagine giving up this idea.
- Podgajski 3y ago
  Regarding the Bible, you should read Young’s literal translation. It blew me away how much liberties that king James version took in their interpretation.
  - guerrilla 3y ago
    Thanks for the tip. That sounds fun. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young's_Literal_Translation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young's_Literal_Translation Text: https://www.bible.com/bible/821/GEN.1.YLT98 https://www.bible.com/bible/821/GEN.1.YLT98 Audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1xjL2wFDoY&list=PLciALUPf8sIIs4cBsJ4-iArJcNMwh9om5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1xjL2wFDoY&list=PLciALUPf8s... "THE WORD OF GOD IS MADE VOID BY THE TRADITIONS OF MEN." So cool.
  - suoduandao3 3y ago
    Is there a difference between '-th' and '-s' suffixes in English? I thought 'seeth' was just an old fashioned way of saying 'sees' but now I'm wondering if this is saying something about tenses that I'm missing.
    - yorwba 3y ago
      saith is to says as says is to sez, in the sense that each spelling is an attempt to represent English pronunciation in writing and their progression tells us something about how the pronunciation changed over time, but not everyone who uses a certain spelling necessarily also pronounces the word the way one might naïvely expect based on the spelling.
Podgajski 3y ago
The ambiguity of the Dao is just the Dao being the Dao. You can not explain something which has no duality with direct words so to try to translate the meaning of “Dao” will always need puns and metaphors. Writings at point to the Dow are meant to get you to stop thinking, not to think for. They’re supposed to get you to contemplate life. But I agree, the language and cultural barriers to understanding Daoist writings as an English speaking American makes it more of a challenge. Derek Lin has done a translation which might be helpful. https://terebess.hu/english/tao/DerekLin.html https://terebess.hu/english/tao/DerekLin.html And there is also a literal translation https://www.amazon.com/Tao-Ching-Translation-Introduction-Commentary/dp/0895818523 https://www.amazon.com/Tao-Ching-Translation-Introduction-Co...
dr_dshiv 3y ago
These translations need to provide original Chinese alongside. Otherwise, it is too hard to evaluate. ChatGPT allows everyone to gain their own interpretation.
- hnfong 3y ago
  As it currently stands, ChatGPT is quite bad at classical Chinese.
  - dr_dshiv 3y ago
    I think it is great for things that have lots of translations like the Tao Te Ching. 道生一，一生二，二生三，三生万物。万物负阴而抱阳，冲气以为和。 Try it with plus. Ctexts is a great source for classical Chinese texts: https://ctext.org/ https://ctext.org/
    - hnfong 3y ago
      No, I mean, I'm native in Chinese and reasonably literate in classical Chinese, and my assessment is that ChatGPT's understanding and generation of classical Chinese leaves much to be desired. As an aside, if your reading of the Tao Te Ching does not include possibility of transcription errors, borrowed homophones (words with same sounds at the time of writing), etc. you're probably not exploring the full extent of the intended meanings of the original author(s). ChatGPT does none of that. It's possible that ChatGPT's training data includes a couple translations of Tao Te Ching, in which case I'm not sure whether that better or worse in terms of results. ctext.org is great though, no question about that. I've been using it for decades..
woolion 3y ago
I got to read, shortly after the Tao, a book that compiled for part of the texts something like 4 of the 'best'[0] translations. It was very enlightening to see how different yet similar they could be. If you think of it as semantic vectors, I would say the meaning is probably the common part between all translations. It is definitely a recommended exercise to read different ones. It's not unique to taoist texts either, as I recommend to check different translations of works such as Dante's Comedy, Beowulf, or Goethe's Faust. When there is meaning, style, sub-meanings and connotations, a translation can only convey some parts accurately. Different translations will usually make different trade-offs. [0] Note that 'best' is a term that markedly changed meaning these last two centuries, for anyone who would read more in-depth about the subject. For instance some of the earliest translators dismissed more modern taoist authors as having strayed too far from the Tradition, but the attitude changed in a few generations.
- driggs 3y ago
  This website lets you choose various translates and compare them verse by verse: https://ttc.tasuki.org/display:Code:gff,sm,jc,rh https://ttc.tasuki.org/display:Code:gff,sm,jc,rh (Select different translations to add/remove from the hamburger menu)

noufalibrahim 3y ago

There was a period in my life in my early 20s when I dabbled heavily in taoism. The book was a staple read for me and I tried to adjust my Outlook accordingly for a long time. Finally though, i dropped it and went back to who I was. Your comment makes me wonder if the specific translation of the book I read was a big factor.

racktash 3y ago
I can relate to this comment. The Tao Te Ching had a profound influence on me. Reading it was the first time I engaged on a "spiritual" level with life (I'm a fairly pragmatic and reductionist guy, perhaps to a fault). But this also wore off for me and I returned to being my usual mostly unspiritual self after a couple of years boring my friends trying to tell my friends about the Tao... Without describing it. I do feel like I have a respect for such things where before I just considered it all manipulative woo or self-delusion. I also think it paved the way to my being able to appreciate Wittgenstein's ideas (the ones I can grasp anyway). I read through a few different translations of the TTC, two of which had commentaries. Both the text and the translations had somewhat different takes. So it's definitely worth trying a few versions. Two I recommend: DC Lau's translation and Philip Ivanhoe's.
- noufalibrahim 3y ago
  Interesting. I have always been a religious person but wandered from my own traditions for a while. Those days, my main attraction was taoism. But, like I mentioned, i dropped it.
vitiral 3y ago
Traditionally Taoism was a path for the old, for those who had completed their duty. Confucianism is the path for the young, for those who must fulfill their duty. One might say that fulfilling your duty without resistance is in fact following the Tao.
booleandilemma 3y ago
Is it possible to dabble heavily? If you're dabbling heavily are you still dabbling?

mbivert 3y ago

> Maybe there should be a new form of digital translation, just like hovering texts on Duolingo and it will display all the possible meanings of the word/expression. If anyone's interested, I've already self-promoted on a previous Tao Te Ching thread a tool/website[0] which precisely does that. I've still haven't had the time to add the Tao Te Ching though (and I've just observed one or two bugs. Oh well.) [0]: https://zhongmu.eu/book.html#c=2;w=2;b=qian-zi-wen https://zhongmu.eu/book.html#c=2;w=2;b=qian-zi-wen

bradrn 3y ago
There’s also [0], which has the same functionality (click the >> icon). [0] https://ctext.org/dao-de-jing https://ctext.org/dao-de-jing
- mbivert 3y ago
  Thanks, I didn't knew about it

qwerty456127 3y ago

Same thing with the Bible - to me reading it as a single translation seems making little sense. Reading every verse in multiple versions in multiple languages, looking up multiple meanings of every word feels a whole different story. Luckily reading Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin and Old English is much easier than reading Chinese. I still feel like learning Chinese to read Taoist texts though, because they are so cool, Alan Watts inspired me to the point I can't imagine giving up this idea.

Podgajski 3y ago
Regarding the Bible, you should read Young’s literal translation. It blew me away how much liberties that king James version took in their interpretation.
- guerrilla 3y ago
  Thanks for the tip. That sounds fun. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young's_Literal_Translation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young's_Literal_Translation Text: https://www.bible.com/bible/821/GEN.1.YLT98 https://www.bible.com/bible/821/GEN.1.YLT98 Audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1xjL2wFDoY&list=PLciALUPf8sIIs4cBsJ4-iArJcNMwh9om5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1xjL2wFDoY&list=PLciALUPf8s... "THE WORD OF GOD IS MADE VOID BY THE TRADITIONS OF MEN." So cool.
- suoduandao3 3y ago
  Is there a difference between '-th' and '-s' suffixes in English? I thought 'seeth' was just an old fashioned way of saying 'sees' but now I'm wondering if this is saying something about tenses that I'm missing.
  - yorwba 3y ago
    saith is to says as says is to sez, in the sense that each spelling is an attempt to represent English pronunciation in writing and their progression tells us something about how the pronunciation changed over time, but not everyone who uses a certain spelling necessarily also pronounces the word the way one might naïvely expect based on the spelling.

Podgajski 3y ago

The ambiguity of the Dao is just the Dao being the Dao. You can not explain something which has no duality with direct words so to try to translate the meaning of “Dao” will always need puns and metaphors. Writings at point to the Dow are meant to get you to stop thinking, not to think for. They’re supposed to get you to contemplate life. But I agree, the language and cultural barriers to understanding Daoist writings as an English speaking American makes it more of a challenge. Derek Lin has done a translation which might be helpful. https://terebess.hu/english/tao/DerekLin.html https://terebess.hu/english/tao/DerekLin.html And there is also a literal translation https://www.amazon.com/Tao-Ching-Translation-Introduction-Commentary/dp/0895818523 https://www.amazon.com/Tao-Ching-Translation-Introduction-Co...

dr_dshiv 3y ago

These translations need to provide original Chinese alongside. Otherwise, it is too hard to evaluate. ChatGPT allows everyone to gain their own interpretation.

hnfong 3y ago
As it currently stands, ChatGPT is quite bad at classical Chinese.
- dr_dshiv 3y ago
  I think it is great for things that have lots of translations like the Tao Te Ching. 道生一，一生二，二生三，三生万物。万物负阴而抱阳，冲气以为和。 Try it with plus. Ctexts is a great source for classical Chinese texts: https://ctext.org/ https://ctext.org/
  - hnfong 3y ago
    No, I mean, I'm native in Chinese and reasonably literate in classical Chinese, and my assessment is that ChatGPT's understanding and generation of classical Chinese leaves much to be desired. As an aside, if your reading of the Tao Te Ching does not include possibility of transcription errors, borrowed homophones (words with same sounds at the time of writing), etc. you're probably not exploring the full extent of the intended meanings of the original author(s). ChatGPT does none of that. It's possible that ChatGPT's training data includes a couple translations of Tao Te Ching, in which case I'm not sure whether that better or worse in terms of results. ctext.org is great though, no question about that. I've been using it for decades..

woolion 3y ago

I got to read, shortly after the Tao, a book that compiled for part of the texts something like 4 of the 'best'[0] translations. It was very enlightening to see how different yet similar they could be. If you think of it as semantic vectors, I would say the meaning is probably the common part between all translations. It is definitely a recommended exercise to read different ones. It's not unique to taoist texts either, as I recommend to check different translations of works such as Dante's Comedy, Beowulf, or Goethe's Faust. When there is meaning, style, sub-meanings and connotations, a translation can only convey some parts accurately. Different translations will usually make different trade-offs. [0] Note that 'best' is a term that markedly changed meaning these last two centuries, for anyone who would read more in-depth about the subject. For instance some of the earliest translators dismissed more modern taoist authors as having strayed too far from the Tradition, but the attitude changed in a few generations.

driggs 3y ago
This website lets you choose various translates and compare them verse by verse: https://ttc.tasuki.org/display:Code:gff,sm,jc,rh https://ttc.tasuki.org/display:Code:gff,sm,jc,rh (Select different translations to add/remove from the hamburger menu)