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NY Times debate about learning languages

 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room Post Reply
20 messages over 3 pages: 13  Next >>
Hekje
Diglot
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United States
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Speaks: English*, Dutch
Studies: French, Indonesian

 
 Message 9 of 20
31 January 2012 at 3:52am | IP Logged 
Learning another language isn't about mechanically translating word-for-word into your
native tongue. Very often, it entails restructuring how you think and perceive the world.
This process requires a great deal of humility and patience.

For my part, I find it very interesting how the language I'm currently studying (Dutch)
naturally frames concepts differently than my native English. An early surprise was that
"I like it" is typically expressed in Dutch as, "I find it nice." A quiet distinction but
still a meaningful one, no?
2 persons have voted this message useful



mrwarper
Diglot
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 Message 10 of 20
31 January 2012 at 5:10am | IP Logged 
Michael K. wrote:
...economist and former Harvard president Lawrence Summers saying that English is the global language and that anyone who needs to know something in another language could just use a machine translation.

I'm sure no one on this forum is surprised that the 6 debaters all reject this notion

Actually, after my experiences at uni, I'm not surprised either that an individual that shows such exceptional ignorance, stupidity and narrow-mindedness (judging from that quote alone -- sorry but that really hit me) could become president of one of the most prestigious universities in the world.

It's depressing how little that says about the current state of things, how knowledge isn't really valued even where you'd suppose it should be put above everything else.
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Acut
Tetraglot
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 Message 11 of 20
31 January 2012 at 5:19am | IP Logged 
mrwarper wrote:
Michael K. wrote:
...economist and former Harvard president Lawrence Summers saying that English is the global language and that anyone who needs to know something in another language could just use a machine translation.

I'm sure no one on this forum is surprised that the 6 debaters all reject this notion

Actually, after my experiences at uni, I'm not surprised either that an individual that shows such exceptional ignorance, stupidity and narrow-mindedness (judging from that quote alone -- sorry but that really hit me) could become president of one of the most prestigious universities in the world.

It's depressing how little that says about the current state of things, how knowledge isn't really valued even where you'd suppose it should be put above everything else.


I think Summers couldn't be more mistaken. English is indeed a global language. But even someone with the least notion about google-translating something knows that machine translations fail. "Traduttore, Traditore" - every translator is a cheater, no translation can fully encompass all the subtleties in human language that make it *human*.

Not intending to create a ad hominem fallacy and getting side-tracked, but he has shown his narrow-mindedness before, when he said women were not as apt as men in science. I am not surprised to see another nonsense coming from him.

Edited by Acut on 31 January 2012 at 5:20am

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wv girl
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 Message 12 of 20
31 January 2012 at 12:06pm | IP Logged 
Acut wrote:

Not intending to create a ad hominem fallacy and getting side-tracked, but he has shown his narrow-mindedness
before, when he said women were not as apt as men in science. I am not surprised to see another nonsense coming
from him.

I second that! When I saw that it was Summers who had put forth this idea, I couldn't help but remember what he'd
said about women and science and felt disinclined to spend any more time pondering his views.


4 persons have voted this message useful



zenmonkey
Bilingual Tetraglot
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Germany
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 Message 13 of 20
31 January 2012 at 12:38pm | IP Logged 
Acut wrote:
I think Summers couldn't be more mistaken.

Please look at what he actually said, the issue with paraphrased quotes, is that much like automated translation today it is inexact and gets the fine details of the sense wrong.

And as to what he said about women is also often mis-quoted
Quote:

On Jan. 14, 2005, Harvard University President Lawrence Summers unwittingly brought the simmering debate about women’s representation in science careers to a full boil. In a keynote speech at a conference on diversity, Summers hypothesized that the shortage of women in certain disciplines could be explained by innate differences in mathematical ability. “There is relatively clear evidence that whatever the difference in means—which can be debated—there is a difference in the standard deviation and variability of a male and female population,” he said. Thus, even if the average abilities of men and women were the same, there would be more men than women at the elite levels of mathematical ability—and also, though Summers didn’t say this, at the lowest levels as well.

The mass media—and, surprisingly, many academics—completely missed Summers’ point about variability. For example, in the Los Angeles Times, David Gelernter, a computer scientist at Yale and occasional conservative commentator, wrote: “[Summers] suggested that, on average, maybe women are less good than men at science….” Well, no, he didn’t. But in the public debate, that is how his statement was interpreted.


Edited by zenmonkey on 31 January 2012 at 12:43pm

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zonius
Triglot
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Israel
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 Message 14 of 20
31 January 2012 at 1:21pm | IP Logged 
Michael K. wrote:
Lawrence Summers saying that English is the global language and that anyone who needs to know something in another language could just use a machine translation.


This is a serious misrepresentation of what the man actually said. The correct quote was posted by zenmonkey and is very different. In fact it is hard to disagree with the original statement that it is less clear that "the substantial investment necessary to speak a foreign tongue is universally worthwhile".

In other words it's obviously worthwhile for members of this forum or other language aficionados, or people deeply interested in foreign culture. Like it's said in the article, "there is no gainsaying the insights that come from mastering a language". But it's the fact that it's possible to function in specific areas (such as business or science, to name a few) using only English. And to those who are only interested in dealing in these areas the heavy investment of foreign language study is probably not worth the effort.
1 person has voted this message useful



Michael K.
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 Message 15 of 20
31 January 2012 at 1:40pm | IP Logged 
It isn't a misrepresentation but a misinterpretation and a misunderstanding.

I only saw the blurb for the quote but not the actual quote, and reading through the debate it seemed like that is what he said.

Sorry.
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tommus
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 Message 16 of 20
31 January 2012 at 6:20pm | IP Logged 
zenmonkey wrote:
Please look at what he actually said,

Thanks for that clarification and insight. Clear thinking by HTLAL members like you helps make this forum a great place. This insight probably puts you at the "elite level" of the distribution curve, at the top end (^_-)




Edited by tommus on 31 January 2012 at 6:21pm



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