[HN Gopher] The Irreplaceable Art of Translation
___________________________________________________________________
The Irreplaceable Art of Translation
Author : Vigier
Score : 38 points
Date : 2021-06-17 16:21 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.prospectmagazine.co.uk)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.prospectmagazine.co.uk)
| Arcorann wrote:
| I was reading an article talking about book translation and
| translation styles a couple of days ago but I can't seem to find
| it again. In the meantime, have a link to some quotes on
| localization and translation:
| https://legendsoflocalization.com/literary-translators-comme...
| bserge wrote:
| "No way can a machine replace me", said everyone ever replaced by
| a machine.
|
| Accurate translation is a rather simple matter imo, you "just"
| need a big enough database (built by humans, heh).
|
| I also prefer reading the original jokes and idioms and looking
| up their meaning myself. It's more fun.
| devetec wrote:
| Large enough dataset + some way to see context. There could be
| an ambiguous word that is only found through accompanying
| media. A multimodal AI would be needed for that task. Maybe
| something like https://blog.google/products/search/introducing-
| mum/ would be up for the task, maybe not. But you are correct,
| people say a machine can't replace them until they do.
| bserge wrote:
| Sounds like what Deepl is doing. Surprisingly accurate
| between some languages, and the translation changes depending
| on context. But it needs way more human input/corrections
| before it can be near perfect.
| elicash wrote:
| Maybe there's some threshold that computers cannot cross. But the
| constant improvements show no sign of stopping soon. I wouldn't
| bet against it, given a long enough time period.
| Animats wrote:
| _" But the constant improvements show no sign of stopping
| soon."_
|
| True. A GPT-3 type approach probably has a big enough window
| and enough data to pick up on idioms.
|
| But we have a long way to go with the Asian languages. All the
| European languages seem to machine-translate to each other
| reasonably well at this point. Chinese to English is still not
| very good.
| devetec wrote:
| Technology tends to follow a sigmoid curve. First nothing
| happens, and then it seems like the world is changing and it is
| unstoppable, and then it falls into a new normal, not changing
| much. We never know when it slows down, reaching the third
| stage, until it's happened. For all we know, this is the
| furthest we get. Personally, I don't believe that, but food for
| thought.
| 5tefan wrote:
| No two translators would find the same words. There is nothing
| like a correct translation. Language is loaded with meaning
| beyond words and written by authors living their lives in
| societies and across the ages.
| ThrowawayR2 wrote:
| > " _There is nothing like a correct translation._ "
|
| Perhaps not but, having read a lot of translated material over
| the years, there are plenty of remarkably awful translations.
| TonyTrapp wrote:
| I hope I'll never have to read a novel translated by "AI". It's
| already bad enough to see auto-translated documentation for
| Microsoft APIs and software by default, recently even auto-
| translated localization strings _in Windows itself_ , or having
| to suffer from badly auto-translated item listings on ebay and
| other websites. Please stop pretending that automatic translation
| is a silver bullet that can stand on its own.
| bserge wrote:
| Meanwhile I can't wait for the realtime voice/phone translator,
| which would be much more useful than me spending years learning
| a new language properly.
| nemetroid wrote:
| And I can't wait for flying cars.
| bserge wrote:
| Except it's not a pipe dream. IBM and I think Google showed
| something like that a few years ago.
|
| And looking at it now, Skype has something:
| https://www.skype.com/en/features/skype-translator/
|
| And Qualcomm is trying to integrate it with the hardware,
| which should reduce lag to an acceptable level:
|
| https://www.qualcomm.com/news/onq/2020/03/26/how-
| snapdragon-...
|
| Privacy advocates will have a field day with this stuff,
| though.
| nemetroid wrote:
| I'm not too worried about the lag, moreso about the
| quality of translation. It will likely be useful for
| basic conversations where the participants simplify their
| speech, which often is all you need. Or to get a rough
| idea of a more complex conversation.
|
| But it's far from obvious that we'll be able to go from
| there to anything comparable to the level of conversation
| you can have after _spending years learning a new
| language properly_.
|
| Perhaps nuclear fusion is a better comparison than flying
| cars (which arguably would be a bad idea even _if_ we had
| the tech).
| bserge wrote:
| Deepl is already so good people don't realize they're
| taking to someone with zero knowledge of their language.
|
| Shouldn't be that hard to create a voice-to-voice
| translation engine.
|
| Specifically for Europe, the idioms and jokes are the
| 20%, we're already very similar to each other even though
| many don't want to believe it.
| DizzyDoo wrote:
| For the indie computer games I make I work with a number of
| localisation freelancers and it's fantastic to see the creativity
| of people who love games and love language. My current game[0]
| for instance is a game with lots of made up monsters in it, that
| have their own made-up English names - and it's often the
| appropriate thing to do to create different monster names per-
| language that fit with their designs.
|
| Obviously necessary for Korean/Japanese/other non-latin alphabet
| languages, but my Spanish localiser does a fantastic job in this
| too. For example: Hellion -> Infernodrilo, Grondomut ->
| Cienomello, Gastroquin -> Explosapo. No, they're not direct
| translations (if that were even possible) but they fit with the
| visual design of the creatures.
|
| There's a lot of trust you have to have with the people who make
| sure a creative product retains meaning and expression in another
| region and language, but also is adapted where it needs to. It's
| also a lot of fun to see something I made enjoyed by people I
| wouldn't ordinarily be able to communicate with. Irreplaceable
| indeed!
|
| [0] -
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/654960/The_Eldritch_Zooke...
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > My current game[0] for instance is a game with lots of made
| up monsters in it, that have their own made-up English names
|
| "Hellion" doesn't really fit that theme.
| dxdm wrote:
| Why not?
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| It is not a made-up name; it is an ordinary English word.
| It's not particularly monstrous either - you'd typically
| use it to describe a child prone to misbehaving.
|
| The Spanish translation given looks like "hell crocodile",
| which is radically different than the mischievous little
| kid suggested by "hellion".
| ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote:
| "Hellion" in a fantasy setting has a different
| connotation than the meaning you refer to. They're
| represented as hellish fiery creatures in a lot of
| fantasy games.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-06-19 23:01 UTC)