Google to translate text untouched by human hands.

[Dennis Baron]

There's a new post on the
Web of Language:

"Google to translate text untouched by human hands."

Google, the company that became a household word by searching  
websites without actually reading them, wants to translate text  
untouched by human hands, or by the human voice. It is working on a  
program that will translate a text instantly into any language.   
Unlike translation machines that must be programmed to recognize both  
grammar and vocabulary in order to translate anything, Google’s e- 
translator requires no linguistic knowledge at all. ... The computer  
won't be distracted by the meaning of a word.  Instead, it will  
determine that certain words are statistically more likely to occur  
with other words.....

Of course, not too many texts don’t turn on nuance and style.  Laws  
and contracts, formulaic though some of their language may be, are  
subject to endless disputes over interpretation.  Business documents  
have to be exact in any language.  Religious texts, often purporting  
to be the divine word made clear and manifest, spark debates that  
steer quickly away from polite to warlike.  .... Even apparently  
obvious meanings turn out to be subtle and slippery.  The shopping  
list is a good example.  Simple strings of words like “bread, milk,  
cereal, some fruit if it looks nice, something for Wednesday?” seem  
to be totally forthright, but they too turn out to be heavily coded:  
what kind of bread? wheat or rye? Wonder Bread or 27-grain?...  One  
person’s “nice fruit” is another’s “you know I don’t eat that.”  And  
what’s supposed to be happening on Wednesday? ...
We will all look forward to the Googler’s debut, but I for one won’t  
be surprised if the translations that it produces become the fodder  
for jokes and parodies or lawsuits in the same way that we make fun  
of or litigate the many mistranslations generated by humans.  At  
least the machines won’t come away with hurt feelings when we laugh  
at them.  Wait, machines don’t have feelings yet, do they?


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Dennis Baron
Professor of English and Linguistics
Department of English
University of Illinois
608 S. Wright St.
Urbana, IL 61801

office: 217-244-0568
fax: 217-333-4321

www.uiuc.edu/goto/debaron

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www.uiuc.edu/goto/weboflanguage

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