Google translate will ensure you fail in Latin

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
It can sort of make a suitable sense, at a stretch, like, "Google Translate is the very concept of "rather silly"". :D
 

edgarbird

New Member

Location:
Carolina Meridies
Checking Google's progress after 7 years:

Sunt bonum nuntium et malum sunt per nuntium available in Google Translate non Latine. Quod bonum nuntium: major est in emendationem InterTran. Quod pessimum audierunt: sic etiam desperato.
Translated back:
There are good news and the bad news is not readily available on Google Translate. The good news is greater than the improvement InterTran. The bad news is it hopeless.

 
 

Matthaeus

Vemortuicida strenuus

  • Civis Illustris

  • Patronus

Location:
Varsovia
Would that your wife were a hero! :D
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
Google Translate makes, I think, mistakes in every language, and should never be trusted when an absolutely correct translation is needed. However, I know for having tested it that it often does a relatively good job translating from French to English and vice versa, as well as between any of these two languages and Spanish. By "relatively good job" I mean that it will generally produce something understandable, and sometimes even totally correct (when you don't ask too much of it but only, say, a few common phrases or simple sentences). So I think that, for at least some modern languages, it can be a useful tool. For example, if you need to know the meaning of a French text, it will often give you a fairly good idea of what's being said, even if there are a few grammatical and idiomatic mistakes.

For Latin, on the other hand, it's pretty much useless. If you need a translation whether from English (or French and other languages) to Latin or vice versa, it will not give you "a fairly good idea of what's being said", but will only throw up a hilarious, but utterly incomprehensible, word salad. The only exceptions are if what you ask it to translate is a well-known phrase or passage (e.g. veni, vidi, vici or quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra?) for which it has a human translation stored in its database, or if you ask it, conversely, to back-translate the translation of such a well-known passage into Latin, and it may sometimes translate a single word or extremely short and simple phrase right (but not too often... better just not to rely on it!).
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
For example, here's its translation of my above post into French. Serious mistakes are bolded.

Google Traduction fait, je pense, des erreurs dans toutes les langues, et ne devrait jamais faire confiance quand une traduction absolument correcte est nécessaire. Cependant, je sais pour l'avoir testé qu'il fait souvent un assez bon travail de traduction du français à l'anglais et vice versa, ainsi qu'entre l'une de ces deux langues et l'espagnol. Par «relativement bon travail», je veux dire qu'il produira généralement quelque chose de compréhensible, et parfois même totalement correct (quand on n'en demande pas trop mais seulement, disons, quelques phrases courantes ou phrases simples). Je pense donc que, pour au moins quelques langues modernes, cela peut être un outil utile. Par exemple, si vous avez besoin de connaître la signification d'un texte en français, cela vous donnera souvent une assez bonne idée de ce qui est dit, même s'il y a quelques erreurs grammaticales et idiomatiques.
Par contre, pour le latin, c'est à peu près inutile. Si vous avez besoin d'une traduction de l'anglais (ou du français et d'autres langues) vers le latin ou vice versa, cela ne vous donnera pas "une assez bonne idée de ce qui se dit", mais seulement un mot hilarant, mais incompréhensible. salade. Les seules exceptions sont si ce que vous lui demandez de traduire est une phrase ou un passage bien connu (par exemple veni, vidi, vici ou quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra?) Pour lequel il a une traduction humaine stockée dans sa base de données, ou si vous lui demandez, à l'inverse, de traduire en arrière-plan la traduction d'un passage aussi connu en latin, et il peut parfois traduire un seul mot ou une expression extrêmement courte et simple à droite (mais pas trop souvent ... compter dessus!).

So you see, on the whole, it's fairly good. At any rate, you would know most of what it's saying.

But into Latin, on the other hand... the whole translation is a big mistake:


Google Translate facit, puto, dum in singulis verbis et credi non oportere, cum ad rectam translatione omnino necesse est. Autem, scio autem hoc saepius expertum est id quod est bonum secundum quid de Gallica translatione officium est atque Latina e converso, tum quod inter quaelibet harum duarum linguarum Hispanica. Per "bonum secundum officium" non intelliguntur aliquid producendum fere ut in intellectu sit; et nunc etiam verum prorsus (cum vos non petere, sed solam nimium est, verbi gratia, paucis sententias communis Phrases seu simplex). Itaque puto, quod, saltem in loquelis huius aetatis adhuc est, potest esse utilis tool. Eg si vos postulo scio significatione Gallicus textu, is mos saepe dare vobis ideam de illis quae suus 'bonus satis esse dixit si illic es pauci grammaticus et obtinuit errata.
Et Latine, ex altera parte, quod suus 'pulchellus multa inutilia. Si vos postulo a translatione vel ab Latina (sive Gallico aliisque linguis) ad Latinam, vel e converso, non dare vobis 'satis bona idea est, quod suus' esse dixit ", sed modo projice eum in hilares sint, sed prorsus incomprehensibilis, verbi ACETARIA. Solum exceptiones si quaeris id transferendum est bene notum sententia seu `transitus (eg Veni, vidi, vici, aut quo usque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra?) In quibus est homo translationem repositam in database, et innixi estis super eo!).
 

Jiacheng Liu

Member

Location:
Sina


I was ready to wake everyone up at 1:43am in China since I knew that it is going to be hilarious. But this is the result of translating Latin into Chinese


“Caesar, Cleopatra, title’s father and mother.”

Guess what, I kinda get it.


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Jiacheng Liu

Member

Location:
Sina
Oh man, I got so pissed yesterday. In our English class there was a poem called “Dulce te Decorum est.” I said it means “it’s sweet and proper.”

Then someone pulled out Google Translate, saying “No no no, Google says decorum means “handsome.”” That person was in the same Latin class as me, I have no idea how they survived.





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Dantius

Homo Sapiens

  • Civis Illustris

Location:
in orbe lacteo
I mean, decorus can mean "handsome", but it's by no means the right translation at all here.
 
 

Terry S.

Aedilis

  • Aedilis

  • Patronus

Location:
Hibernia
Oh man, I got so pissed yesterday. In our English class there was a poem called “Dulce te Decorum est.” I said it means “it’s sweet and proper.”

Then someone pulled out Google Translate, saying “No no no, Google says decorum means “handsome.”” That person was in the same Latin class as me, I have no idea how they survived.





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Bent double like old beggars under sacks,
knock-kneed, coughing like hags,
they cursed through the sludge,

...then something about till on the haunting flares they turned their backs and towards their distant rest began to trudge.

Gas! Gas! Quick boys!
Brought an ecstasy of fumbling...

I remember doing that for English at school. Wilfred Owens. It was a great way to cheer up an otherwise dull day.
 

Wilfrid

New Member

Oh man, I got so pissed yesterday. In our English class there was a poem called “Dulce te Decorum est.” I said it means “it’s sweet and proper.”

Then someone pulled out Google Translate, saying “No no no, Google says decorum means “handsome.”” That person was in the same Latin class as me, I have no idea how they survived.





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"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori." The old lie.

"It is sweet and honourable to die for one's country." Wikipedia.



Not too bad.
 
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