Information automation

[Guest guest]

Bob, Marnae, and others hanging on to the language and

translation threads...

 

> Marnae's correct. Identification of compound terms is crucial to

> correct translation. In my experience helping others to learn to

> translate, failure to identify compound terms is one of the most

> common mistakes of beginners.

>

> Bob

 

Identification of compound terms is indeed

a critical aspect of reading, understanding,

interpreting and translating Chinese texts...

 

....one of many.

 

I do not disagree with the development and

use of automata and other gadgets to facilitate

access to data and information and am always

on the lookout for shortcuts and breakthroughs.

 

My earlier post was not intended to discourage

anyone from exploration. It was simply, well,

what it said, i.e., an admonition that we

consider the consequences of automating

intelligence related to Chinese medical

texts along with the consequences of automating

ignorance.

 

Jason Robertson and I were just talking

yesterday about the importance of translation

standards with respect to the actual performance

of translation work. As I have always said,

such standards...which are nothing other than

tools...are important early steps in the process.

 

But they are not the process. They are tools

that we use in performing the work.

 

This, of course, begs the underlying question:

 

What is the work?

 

The work, I believe, can be described as

learning how to think and solve problems

using a whole complement of tools and

a spectrum of modes of thought that are

reflected in a variety of medical texts

and other forms of transmission that have

been at this work for some time now.

 

For whatever it's worth, my advice to those

who examine and experiment with the various

gizmos that come and go is to assess them

in terms of whether or not they facilitate

the accomplishment of this work.

 

In my own struggles to learn the Chinese

language, I have found that I get more

benefit...i.e., more work done from

learning to write a single character

than from watching dozens of them flash

past on a computer screen.

 

But I am the first to admit that we are

all different when it comes to how we

prefer to process data and heartily endorse

the development and new tools to facilitate

the whole process.

 

Ken

 

PS. For those who are familiar with Dave

Weininger's electronic dictionary of Chinese

medicine, I just want to repeat something

that he said to me once when he was demonstrating

it to me for the first time at his kitchen

table. I asked him how he accomplished some

of the efficiencies that obviously constitute

the engine that runs the eDCM, and he replied,

" I treat a large amount of data as a small

amount of data. "