Language and Ph.D. programs

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Wow thanks! i can't believe this is even a discussion. second langauges are critical aspects to learning about other people and the world.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?22:53, 21 March 2012

Wow, I'm shocked how few people care about, or think it's important to have quality exposure to other languages. I don't know if it's generational, but in my biased view, when you only speak English, you limit your world knowledge and reinforce the idea that English is god. Several of those articles articulate the fact that "all the relevant journals are in English", which is perhaps my point. that you do not know how to communicate with others, and expect them to communicate with you is a sad place, indeed.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?23:01, 21 March 2012

And suddenly I feel very sheepish for agreeing with him.

Star of David.png Radioactive afikomen Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.23:04, 21 March 2012

HAH.. to each their own. I think on the experts I know (mostly from TV) Lawrence Krauss, marcus De Savouy, even deGrasse Tyson all talk about learning other languages to at least communicate in those languages. And our immediate forefathers were very fluent in multiple languages. Often writing in latin and French even if they were german or english. Language opens up ways of looking at teh world, and seems integral to being a rounded person.

BUT, maybe I can agree that if it's not your cup of tea, so be it. one *should* learn, but then again I *should* have learned to spell better and to know numbers better.

But I also agree that phd programs are simply not as rigorous as they were when say, my father got his degree. I know about what he knew as a MASTERS. oh well. :-)

Having said that, i do STRONGLY agree that it's dumb to think you will be good enough in a language to read articles or original source material. Experts who spend their lives studying the art of translation will be far better at translating a work than I. and while it was fun to read Foucault in French, i got WAY WAY more from reading it in english.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?23:13, 21 March 2012

Actually, the biggest language barrier I've faced isn't between languages but between American English and English English. So much terminology is standardised internationally that with any European research group, for example a paper I read in French, reads exactly like the English but with prepositions changed and funny accents added.

Scarlet A.pnggnostic09:50, 22 March 2012

Of course, this probably only holds true for certain disciplines that rely on technical communication. Douglas Hofstadter jokes about Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem that while the original was in German, the English version may as well have been, too, for all anyone not versed in higher mathematics would understand it!

Scarlet A.pngbomination09:53, 22 March 2012
 

Funny, I totally agree with the original article. I had to take Latin and French back in my high school days. The only thing that they've given me is the ability to use obscure abbreviations and phrases and to understand a few Eddie Izzard skits. Programming languages have been far more useful because of the relation to computational cognitive models. I imagine literature written in C would be pretty terrible, though.

Nebuchadnezzar (talk)18:30, 24 March 2012

Not if you're a robot.

GodothasArrived (super crazy fun time!)18:32, 24 March 2012

what does a snippet of "c" code look like? is it mostly numbers? or lots of funny symbols or what?

I kinda wonder if it's not just a generational thing, or an American thing, this idea of not learning languages and not thinking they are important. Dad has his phd in theology, from maybe the 40s? at most, 50s, and he had to learn latin, greek, and hebrew before he even declared his major as an under grad. He knew french and german from HS.

My husband, and most europeans for that matter, of course speak english, but generally also german and italian and french. he's 42 now, so again, maybe it's no longer true, there.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:14, 24 March 2012

Some simple examples.

USians have the privilege of much of the world using English and generally not being in close proximity to other countries that use a different language (US-Mexico border excepted of course). For me personally, language has always been simple -- a matter of replacing one set of referents for mentalese (if you want to be Fodorian about it) with another. Math, programming, and statistics feel like just another language to me. Other people seem to think differently, of course.

Nebuchadnezzar (talk)19:27, 24 March 2012

Clearly there MUST be C poetry out there. I'll have to look.

Most experts say math and music are in effect, just another language, so it's not surprizing you find them easy. my hubby is an excellent math person and a pretty darned good amature music type. He probably sees them the way you do. He also thinks in picures like you. I think in words. voices, in side my head, echo, things that we said.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:32, 24 March 2012

Math has never been my forte. Although, music in a way has been able to be translated to me as another language. But not by reading it. Just by listening. I think in colored letters, and scriptured images. And music actually affects those images like a catalyst. If that made sense?

Dumpling (talk)19:54, 24 March 2012

You're not a synesthete are you?

Nebuchadnezzar (talk)19:58, 24 March 2012

...Shit. Am I? I didn't even know...everything was...pretty much on point. I mean, I knew I sounded weird when I explained to people, but I thought it was just me.

Dumpling (talk)20:12, 24 March 2012