English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

I was reading about early attempts in computer translation this morning. One such translated the idiom "out of sight, out of mind" into Russian, and got back "invisible maniac."

RegDwigнt

Now it's clear you can't label that a translation, but how can you even label that an attempt?

Robusto

11:06 AM

Google has advanced far beyond those early failures. Now the failures are still failures, but more subtle, involving much more knowledge to penetrate and much more damage when you fail to do so.

RegDwigнt

The Russian would be с глаз долой, из сердца вон.

The German is aus den Augen, aus dem Sinn.

Let's check what Google does to these.

> out of sight out of mind

It gets the Russian one right. Albeit without punctuation.

> out of sight , out of mind .

It gets the German one right. Albeit with "punctuation".

Robusto

Japanese: 去る者は日々に疎し。Google thinks that is "It is forgotten is forgotten and not familiar."

RegDwigнt

Hey at least it does get the punctuation right for once.

Progress!

So now I'm upping the ante, naturally. Ru to De to En:

> Out of sight , out of the heart

So it screws up at the Ru to De step. Why on Earth would that be.

skill patrol

RegDwigнt

It got Ru to En right, and De to En, so why not Ru to De?

It gets De to Ru right, too.

So it literally knows the expression in all the languages, and can map them all to one another absolutely always except that one time when it absolutely can't.

Robusto

11:13 AM

I made a mistake. 身近にいないとわすれさ忘れ去られる。is what gets translated as "It is forgotten is forgotten and not familiar." The shorter and more idiomatic 去る者は日々に疎し is translated as "Leave who Utoshi the day to day."

@RegDwigнt And that's the time you bet money on one or the other, no doubt.

BTW, the mad tchrist wannabe struck again early this morning.

RegDwigнt

@Robusto Don't speak, I know just what you're saying, so please stop explaining, don't tell me cause it hurts.

skill patrol

reg is not a gambler, he's too conservative :P

RegDwigнt

@Robusto tell me more about that. Who is that wannabe tchrist and where can I watch the video of the strikeout.

Robusto

Inside every crusty conservative is a gay liberal dying to get out.

RegDwigнt

Because liberals are always gay.

Robusto

11:16 AM

So is Paris.

RegDwigнt

No. Paris is shitty.

It's not quite the same thing.

I know it's hard to acknowledge or grasp.

Robusto

You never hear people talk about "gay London"; it's always "gay Paris".

And I think it's probably against the law in Russia to say "gay Moscow."

skill patrol

gay NYC?

RegDwigнt

Jun 30 '13 at 13:45, by RegDwighт

Arkady Gaidar

Arkady Petrovich Golikov (; ( — 26 October 1941), better known as Arkady Gaidar (), was a Soviet writer, whose stories were very popular among Soviet children. Life and career Gaidar was born in the town of Lgov in Imperial Russia, now in Kursk Oblast, Russia, to a family of teachers. Gaidar spent his childhood in Arzamas. In August 1918, Gaidar became a member of the Bolsheviks, volunteering for the Red Army in December of that year, still aged only 14. During the Russian Civil War, at the age of 16, he became commander of a regiment. He participated in the suppression of severa...

Robusto

Wait, do not try to claim that Russia invented Gaidar!

RegDwigнt

11:18 AM

Not Russia. One Arkady Golikov.

"Golikov" being Russian for "nakedy".

Robusto

Lies! America invented Gaydar.

RegDwigнt

The plot thickens.

Robusto

Next you'll be telling me Russia invented borscht and the gulag.

RegDwigнt

Intermezzo: great writer. Excellent books. For any age. Very few writers ever accomplish that. Intermezzo end. Huhuh. GAYDAR.

@Robusto I actually think Ukraine invented borshch. Except at that time there was no such thing as Ukraine, it was called Kiev Rus.

Ukraine being the Russian word for "outskirts, fringe area".

Robusto

@RegDwigнt From those wonderful folks who gave us Chicken Kiev.

@RegDwigнt I thought it was "territory we conquer whenever we feel like it."

RegDwigнt

11:22 AM

See how wrong you were. Glad I was around to help.

Also, everyone knows that the American English word for "territory we conquer whenever we feel like it" is "world".

Robusto

Chicken Kiev is a wonderful dish. How else can you quickly ruin a tuxedo with a jet of hot butter just by cutting into a chicken breast?

@RegDwigнt You're just jealous.

RegDwigнt

Hm. I will have to think about that and run some experiments. Good question.

@Robusto No, I am just right.

I am not jealous of conquering anything. FFS that's work dude.

Robusto

Sour grapes.

RegDwigнt

Wevs.

Between the two of us, it's not my money being transferred into Cheney's pockets as we speak, you know.

My money goes straight to the glory of the Black Sea Fleet.

I've been told they even painted a ship.

There's no need to explain how a painted ship is superior to an unpainted Cheney.

Robusto

See, it took Russia 14 years to fail in Afghanistan. We failed much faster, and are working on failing longer as well.

RegDwigнt

11:27 AM

Glib, and equally inaccurate. It took the US 14 years to coerce Russia into failing in Afghanistan.

So yeah, you wanna done it right, you gotta do it yourselves.

No news to anyone there.

Robusto

Still smarting about my "glib" characterization from yesterday, I see. Your memory for resenting things is longer than both Afghan wars put together.

RegDwigнt

It is not only longer, it is also harder and uncutter.

Robusto

Empty and honorable, the sea.

RegDwigнt

And since when exactly do you expect, or even just hope, for me not to remember the transcript by heart?

You've used it to your advantage before. BTW, still waiting for the cheque.

SmokeDetector

[ SmokeDetector ] Offensive answer detected: Ellipsis or substitution? by McSwag on english.stackexchange.com

Robusto

11:31 AM

You have a prosthetic memory. That's cheating.

RegDwigнt

Cheating would be noobsthetic.

-2

A: Ellipsis or substitution?

Ellipsis that shit, dawg. Also, geez Abra, chill fam.

TIL that I do not understand the English language.

Who is geezabra, and what is he doing to whose fam?

Robusto

Sounds like an Arabic name: geezabra.

RegDwigнt

Mutabor.

Sounds like a zebra who fucked a gazelle.

Robusto

They would if they could catch one.

Why do you think gazelles rolled for speed instead of stripes?

RegDwigнt

As opposed to a gazelle who fucked a zebra. Which would be gazebra.

Just like with tion and liger.

Robusto

11:34 AM

Short form: gazebo.

RegDwigнt

Russian short form: gazprom.

Actually no. I retract that. You didn't realize it, but "gazebo" is the better Russian short form, "ebo" being the word for "fucking".

Robusto

All Russian words mean "fucking" eventually. Or vodka.

RegDwigнt

And for the sake of completeness, this is a Russian gazelle:

GAZelle

The GAZelle (Russian: ГАЗе́ль) is a series of light commercial vehicles: trucks, vans and buses made by Russian car manufacturer GAZ. GAZelle, together with its lighter version Sobol, account for the majority of the Russian van and light truck market, has strong positions on the markets of CIS countries and rank as GAZ's most popular and successful products. In 2010-2011 the GAZelle family underwent serious upgrade. The upgraded model got the name GAZelle Business. The changes affected 20 main vehicle units and systems, including steering, brakes, gearbox, cooling system, transmission and interior...

> strong positions on the markets of CIS countries

Huhuh. They got entire cis countries now. Huhuh. With strong positions, huhuh.

Robusto

Russia put the zil in zilch.

RegDwigнt

No, Russians take the ch out of it.

There's a difference.

ZiL

About the Soviet−Russian vehicle manufacturer. For other uses, see: ZIL (disambiguation). AMO ZiL, (Russian "Zavod imeni Likhachova"), or the Moscow Joint-Stock Company "Likhachov Plant", and more commonly called ZiL (Russian: Завод имени Лихачёва (ЗиЛ)—Likhachov Plant, literally "Plant named for Likhachov") is a major Russian automobile, truck, military vehicle, and heavy equipment manufacturer based in the city of Moscow, Russia. ZiL has also produced armored cars for most Soviet leaders, as well as buses, armored fighting vehicles, and aerosani. The company also produces hand-built limousines...

Robusto

11:38 AM

Thank you for explaining my joke to me.

RegDwigнt

It was an amplifying reference for people not as versed in drivel as you and I, not a rebuttal or a chastisement. Lighten up.

Mwuahaha, I remember everything.

Robusto

I've had too much coffee this morning. If I were any lighter, I'd float away.

RegDwigнt

And three problems with that would be...?

Robusto

Someone would try to tether me.

"Try a little tetherness . . ."

RegDwigнt

Like they won't regardless.

Robusto

11:40 AM

Your stupid "How I Vishnu were here" comment has become an earworm for me. I keep humming Pink Floyd now whenever I glance at the starboard. Not a bad earworm to have, as earworms go, but distracting nevertheless.

RegDwigнt

Yeah no shit, I could have went with Elton John you know. Or Chris de Burgh. Or Daniel der Zauberer.

There's a silver lining to every Amazon cloud.

And that's time for more Google Translate!

OMFG. It got it right.

The Singularity is nigh.

Robusto

What's next, Skynet?

Jinx-ish.

RegDwigнt

Now let's see which of the 8 combos it does get wrong. Because as we found out earlier, that's what it does.

Abort, abort. All-clear, all-clear.

Rubbish is still rabbi-ish.

Robusto

Google does surprisingly well translating "The sun don't shine on the same dog's ass every day" into Japanese: 太陽は毎日同じ犬のお尻に輝きません。

But it lacks the pithy quality I was looking for in a proverb.

Also, I doubt your average Japanese would understand it in the proverbial sense.

RegDwigнt

Add some references to Buddha in strategic places.

Or Shinto, or whatever his name is.

Robusto

11:48 AM

"To get the same amount of fiber as in one bowl of Super Colon Blow, you'd need thirty thousand bowls of your regular breakfast cereal."

RegDwigнt

Interestingly, the translation of "every cloud..." into German is complete gibberish, and yet if you translate it further into Russian, or back into English, it gets you the original word for word.

So apparently they have a reserved slot for it as an idiom in every language, and map the slots correctly, it's just that for some of the languages the content of the slot is garbage.

Robusto

Maybe that's because the deutschbags don't believe in silver linings.

RegDwigнt

Alles hat ein Ende, nur die Wurst hat zwei.

Robusto

Eine wunderbare Wurst hat meine ganze Seele eingenommen.

RegDwigнt

Robusto

11:53 AM

See, there German goes again, indiscriminately genderizing nouns. You'd think sausage would be male, wouldn't you? I mean, come on.

RegDwigнt

Why would a sausage be male? It's female in every language. The word sausage is in fact female.

Robusto

Also, Jesus wore way less mascara. I'm just saying.

RegDwigнt

La saucisse.

Robusto

@RegDwigнt It isn't in English.

RegDwigнt

Exactly. And who's at fault for that?

English, that's who.

Robusto

11:54 AM

Lack of noun gender is a feature, not a bug.

RegDwigнt

Go direct your anger at books instead. Female in Russian, male in French, neuter in German, nothing in English. What the fuck.

Books is the worst.

And not the Conchita kind.

Robusto

Male in Spanish too: libro.

In for a penny dreadful, in for a pound foolish.

RegDwigнt

Which should be sufficient proof that Spanish is not English and Mexicans must not be allowed in the US.

Donald Trump approves.

Robusto

He translates "Mexican" as "rapist" . . .

You know, it is not inconceivable that he could somehow win the presidency. How's that for a scary thought?

RegDwigнt

Rap war, Rap ist, Rap wird immer sein!

@Robusto at least it would spare the regular people 50 trillion, or whatever the price tag on presidency is these days.

Robusto

11:57 AM

@RegDwigнt Looks like George Michael after a night out with Elton John.

RegDwigнt

He'd just pay it out of his Portokasse.

@Robusto you're giving way too much credit to George Michael. He looks nowhere as good after a night with anything.

Robusto

I suppose you would know.

RegDwigнt

In my capacity as Reg Dwight I sure should.

Okay two things here.

1. Who the fuck is petty cash, I've not heard of her before.

2. Why you tell me finnisch.

Robusto

Petty cash is the money that Tom Petty makes for performing. Duh.

RegDwigнt

Yeah Tom Petty was too low hanging a fruit even for me.

And I've been spending nights out with George Michael, mind you.

So anyway. What does happen if I say okay sir that is finnish indeed?

Robusto

12:02 PM

maybe you should try capitalizing it

RegDwigнt

That is what happens, children.

Now isn't that marvellous.

Robusto

That's Google's way of saying "Huh?"

RegDwigнt

Yeah, to itself. I never said it was Finnish, he did.

@Robusto nope, just run the experiment, no changes in any of the outcomes.

It doesn't even start capitalizing Petty.

Scandalous.

Robusto

drove my petty to the jetty but the jetty was dry

RegDwigнt

And good old folks were drinking jager and brei.

Now this one is more nuanced.

I guess that's what they call "lost in translation".

I also guess that's what they call sexism, since the Russian translation assumes the speaker is male, while there is no such information anywhere in the English original.

I also guess that's what they call political correctness, since the Russian information about the speaker being male is left out for the American audience.

tchrist

12:31 PM

Norah’s moods, alas, doom Sharon.

RegDwigнt

Architectural ingenuity of the day @Cerberus:

tchrist

Snow in July!

RegDwigнt

And yet impossible to confuse with Australia.

tchrist

True: traffic is on the right not the left.

RegDwigнt

Untrue: the only traffic in the picture is very much on the left.

tchrist

12:37 PM

Not from the peds’ viewpoint.

RegDwigнt

Peds don't count as traffic.

And their viewpoints don't matter. Just ask anyone on the administration.

tchrist

Whose administration?

@Cerberus Were cunae babies’ cradles?

Oh, cunabulae with a diminutive. I wonder what the prelittled version meant.

My brain is having strange crosstalk between incubate and — um something like incunabulate, which I don’t think existed until I just typed it.

skill patrol

SOO TRUE

tchrist

And incubate is a robogram of ubicante.

RegDwigнt

大量情報，不需要為這個垃圾

tchrist

12:49 PM

@skillpatrol Oh aye.

@RegDwigнt And what are you doing in Herr Mann Rorschach’s chicken coop?

RegDwigнt

Swimming and diving.

tchrist

Funny, I knew the word berceau for a French cradle, but thought the Portuguese still used cuna. I clearly need to stop reading old Portuguese: apparently they quite some time ago robbed the cradle from some French teenager and now use the calqued berço for their own cunas, which are today relegated to the poet’s corner.

RegDwigнt

Makes me wanna go berçerk.

tchrist

Did Russia have berçerkers like the Scandihoovians? It’s funny how a dominant culture spreads its linguistic seeds far and wide. I wonder what funny things they’ll find in other languages 500 years hence left over from the period of the anglophonic hegemony.

RegDwigнt

Sputniks and perestroikas. All over the place.

They'll find no detsky sady, though. Only Kindergärten.

tchrist

1:02 PM

A pereztroika is a Russian couple’s threesome with their Spanish au pair.

RegDwigнt

Perez is Russian for pepper or chili.

Or paprika.

tchrist

That would definitely make for hot sex.

I don’t know why we have a special word for paprika.

RegDwigнt

Because English suffers from lack of words.

tchrist

Have the Magyar ever been dominant?

RegDwigнt

Over themselves yes.

Thing is, their language is so hilariously rubbish, it just can't influence, much less take over, anything at all ever.

tchrist

1:05 PM

Now, why do you say that?

It has its funny bits, I realize, but I wasn’t aware this was cause for levity.

RegDwigнt

Because I am being paid by the non-fascist Hungarian opposition to say it.

As soon as the money flow stops, so shall I.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@RegDwigнt Did you know English words can't exist without their opposites? True story.

RegDwigнt

17 mins ago, by RegDwigнt

大量情報，不需要為這個垃圾

So that's why people never stop asking on ELU "what is the antonym of perestroika", "what is the antonym of sputnik", "what is the antonym of weight-lifting spouse car".

Now I understand.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

3

Q: Seeking single word denoting a word pair in which one cannot exist without the other

Years ago a friend told me about word pairs in which one word cannot exist without the other word. The example he used was "inside" and "outside". That is, "inside" cannot exist without it's necessary other half "outside". At the time he told me a name for these word pairs, which I have long fo...

single-word-requests

> inside cannot exist without its necessary other half outside

Then they want a single word that labels that wrong concept

skill patrol

How is that concept wrong?

RegDwigнt

1:25 PM

This is what I'm looking for. It's a great "tool". Any alternatives you know of? Thanks. — samwongdotcom Jun 16 at 13:24

So... is it great and exactly what you're looking for, or is it not.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@skillpatrol concepts exist independently of words. There is no word which can't exist without its opposite. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to coin the word in the first place.

You don't need a single word to have a concept.

RegDwigнt

It's so simple I am baffled people don't see it.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

It took so many comments that the site complained that I should be in chat.

I even gave an example.

RegDwigнt

You first can describe any concept in any number of words that are already there, and then, optionally, when needed, can create a dedicated word for it.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

meeting time. bbl

skill patrol

1:31 PM

Later pal

Robusto

@RegDwigнt "Poetry is what is lost in translation" —Robert Frost

RegDwigнt

Excellent. Today I wrote poetry! And here it is in all its glory:

> some

Robusto

Some poetry. You wrote some poetry. Not all poetry. Also, what is the dedicated word for not poetry?

RegDwigнt

Goethe is nervously smoking in the corner.

Robusto

That's seven words.

RegDwigнt

1:39 PM

Sorry, English does not have a word for "prose" yet.

Robusto

We need one dedicated word for anything you can name.

skill patrol

Excellent quote @Robusto thanks :)

RegDwigнt

Yeah first off, thank Robert Frost, not Robusto. Second off, this quote is being quoted here like twice a day.

Robusto

Prose doesn't cover it. Math is not poetry. Bricks are not poetry. Skillpatrol is not poetry. We need a word that covers all things like mathandbricksandskillpatrol.

skill patrol

Robusto

1:41 PM

@RegDwigнt For values of twice a day meaning never.

skill patrol

That ^^ is poetry :-)

RegDwigнt

The last time was literally just yesterday, and it was quoted by none other than fucking Nabokov.

Skill patrol missed out on Nabokov. That's not very skill, much less patrol.

Robusto

@RegDwigнt Nobody quoted Robert Frost yesterday.

Stop spreading your commie lies.

RegDwigнt

> Verse, perhaps, can be translated; great poetry is something else. Russian and English poetry do not look, sound, or behave very much alike; and by choosing to work on Pushkin's poem, in which the sheer beauty of sound is so vital a part of its effect and in which all the expressive resources of the Russian language are on masterful display, the translator may find himself casting an uneasy eye at Robert Frost's cautionary definition of poetry as 'what gets lost in translation'.

That's from yesterday. You friggin read it.

And skill patrol frickin didn't.

And that is all I'm saying.

Robusto

@RegDwigнt Heh, I wonder why the search for "Frost" didn't come up with that.

RegDwigнt

1:44 PM

Because HTML5.

Here's what searches for poetry come up with instead:

Jun 2 at 14:02, by RegDwigнt

A Mr Shiny recalls a line of Roman poetry in conjunction with a point learned about grammar.
B Mr Shiny argues that a Roman poem about gluttony is not morally offensive when it is understood in its historical context.
C Cerberus is easily able to express thoughts in Latin.
D Robusto has mastered large portions of the Roman classics.
E John Bon Jovi has a sophisticated knowledge of Roman poetry but little knowledge of Roman prose.

Robusto

So you got screwed out of a star. It's not like you haven't been starred enough. Who the fuck are you, Putin? Do you have to have all the stars?

RegDwigнt

I say, not the worst surrogate.

@Robusto what else am I supposed to wish on to follow where you are?

Robusto

BTW, try being more succinct next time. I didn't read your quote all the way through.

RegDwigнt

You lost me at W.

TL;DR

Robusto

@RegDwigнt Try wishing on Jiminy Cricket.

TL;

RegDwigнt

1:46 PM

That might take some practice.

Robusto

So? You have nothing but time.

RegDwigнt

Yeah that's what y'all young folk keep sayin.

skill patrol

You guys are too funny :D

RegDwigнt

No. We are just the right amount of funny.

Anything beyond that costs.

@Robusto synapses: John Bon Jovi has a sophisticated knowledge of Roman poetry but little knowledge of Roman prose.

Robusto

@RegDwigнt There are prose and cons to that position.

RegDwigнt

1:50 PM

What's Sarah Palin to do with prositions?

No amount of prosac helps with her.

Robusto

I was trying to find my lächerlich comment yesterday so I could quote it, but chat search doesn't turn it up. Pretty shitty search, IMO.

Does it only work with ASCII?

RegDwigнt

It twerks with DERPA.

Robusto

'twerks, 'twerks

I can't wait for twerk to die its ignominious death. But I'll probably be long dead before that happens.

RegDwigнt

Yeah you know, it still has to find its way into all dictionaries. And that's step one of twelve.

Robusto

Dictionaries are where new words go for embalming. By the time slang hits the dictionary it's probably not used much anymore.

RegDwigнt

1:55 PM

For my generation, Miley Cyrus is the reason they will never buy or touch a dictionary again. For the current generation, she is the reason they don't know what "dictionary" is.

And then Forbes or Time come along and tell me that Merkel or the Queen are somehow more influental.

Robusto

@MattE.Эллен knows what a dictionary is.

RegDwigнt

Pffffblt.

Matt E. Эллен

everything in a dictionary is true forever

RegDwigнt

Ms Merkel has affected literally zero dictionary-purchasing decisions in my life.

@MattE.Эллен TIL Qu'ran is a dictionary.

Shoulda realized that earlier.

Matt E. Эллен

I didn't say that everything that's true forever is a dictionary

RegDwigнt

1:58 PM

Well you should have. I'm just taking off the workload off you.

Those Brits are never thankful. Bloody.

Anyway, it's a foot-thick tome with tons of weird vocabulary in indecipherable script. How that ain't the very definition of a dictionary, I don't know.

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…