# The English language's vocabulary: especially and outstandingly precise? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 1, 2015, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716 "2015-08-01T09:24:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Cartoonacy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/848f3c/32.png) [@Cartoonacy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartoonacy)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2015, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/41 "2015-08-04T22:04:49Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The fun part is that the pictograms also have meanings independent of the combination. Thus the pictograms for “Schenectady” mean (if Google translate is to be trusted) “Sri Lanka within tower.” In Frederick Pohl’s anthology _Pohlstars_, there’s a short story of his that someone found in a Chinese collection and translated back into English. The original title was _The Wizards of Pung’s Corners_, but it was retranslated back into English as _The Wizard-Masters of Peng-Shi Angle_. I never read the original story, but it had something to do with advertising. Several (fictitious) product names were written phonetically in the Chinese translation, and picked up unwanted meanings when the pictograms were translated into English. I remember that there was a breakfast cereal which was translated as “The son has approval to fasten the Buddhist nun to the hermaphrodite.” ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/42 "2015-08-05T03:05:26Z")
> [@Habeed](#): > > 1. The theory does fit a cursory glance of the evidence - it’s not just the pictograms, Asian languages do in fact have fewer words. China did in fact have many technological advances centuries before the west but never followed up on them. Are those two sentences supposed to be closely related, or only in the way we’re all related to the primordial amoeba? > [@marshmallow](#): > > An inability to appreciate or understand figurative language seems less like a personality quirk and more like something on the autism spectrum. Do the people mentioned in this thread also have difficulty with sarcasm or metonymy? Sarcasm, metonymy, any kind of figurative speech at all. Another coworker set off in a crusade to find a joke Ana would not screech about and he finally found it: a fart joke he’d gotten from his five year old. Oh, and of course anything involving fantasy at all was also rejected: any fairy tale with actual fairies, talking animals and so forth? Unacceptable! The Valiant Little Tailor was ok; about anything else, no. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/43 "2015-08-05T05:32:30Z")
> [@Habeed](#): > > . . . > > 1. A PhD scientist I know personally advanced this theory. No “PhD scientist” would make such an assertion as this : > [@Habeed](#): > > . . . to introduce another word to the language, all writers have to learn and accept a new pictogram. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/44 "2015-08-05T05:53:47Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > There is no concept that is expressible in one language that is not expressible in another. There just may not be a nice word or set phrase that sums it up. I think this is a little misleading. For example, sometimes the only way I can get an English speaker to fully understand a Mandarin term, is to explain a little bit of how Mandarin Chinese works, and maybe some background on Chinese culture. Such an explanation is of course in English, but I think it’s misleading to say that I am therefore expressing the word in English. I would personally draw a distinction between simply translating a term and giving background information. ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/45 "2015-08-05T06:22:27Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > No “PhD scientist” would make such an assertion as this : I don’t see what would preclude a PhD from making a statement like that. Now, a “PhD scientist” in linguistics, or East Asian Language/History or whatever, probably not. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/46 "2015-08-05T13:32:57Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > Such an explanation is of course in English, but I think it’s misleading to say that I am therefore expressing the word in English. I would personally draw a distinction between simply translating a term and giving background information. I guess I’m unsure what you mean. Say I speak another language and I use the word ‘spling’ and you want to know what it means. If it takes me 5 minutes and a quick overview of the mythological history of Splingvania in order to give you the proper context of the word and at the end of my spiel, you have an understanding of the meaning that is rough around the edges but essentially correct, how is that not expressing the meaning in another language? ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/47 "2015-08-05T14:00:30Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > For example, sometimes the only way I can get an English speaker to fully understand a Mandarin term, is to explain a little bit of how Mandarin Chinese works, and maybe some background on Chinese culture. > > Such an explanation is of course in English, but I think it’s misleading to say that I am therefore expressing the word in English. I would personally draw a distinction between simply translating a term and giving background information. You’re not referring to chengyu, are you? I’m curious what Mandarin terms you are thinking of. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/48 "2015-08-05T14:19:40Z")
> [@Habeed](#): > > 1. IQ testing comes in many different forms. The basic asians, whites, blacks ranking has been confirmed thousands of places. That’s impossible with valid science, as there’s no scientifically valid grouping of humans that includes ‘asians’, ‘whites’, and ‘blacks’. Sure there are all kinds of scientifically bogus tests confirming whatever the tester wants to see, but, no, science has confirmed nothing of the sort. ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/49 "2015-08-05T16:56:44Z")
> [@marshmallow](#): > > An inability to appreciate or understand figurative language seems less like a personality quirk and more like something on the autism spectrum. Do the people mentioned in this thread also have difficulty with sarcasm or metonymy? > [@Nava](#): > > Sarcasm, metonymy, any kind of figurative speech at all. Another coworker set off in a crusade to find a joke Ana would not screech about and he finally found it: a fart joke he’d gotten from his five year old. Oh, and of course anything involving fantasy at all was also rejected: any fairy tale with actual fairies, talking animals and so forth? Unacceptable! The Valiant Little Tailor was ok; about anything else, no. To do justice to my pedant friend: he’s not quite so far off in some other planet / galaxy / universe, as that. Admittedly it would seem that he has little taste for poetry, or prose fiction in general – and as for fairy tales and talking animals… (though with his being a keen proponent of the rights of, and need for good treatment of, animals; he found Richard Adams’s _The Plague Dogs_ compulsive reading). ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716/50 "2015-08-05T18:04:11Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > I haven’t checked if Coca-Cola is indeed “Bite the Wax Tadpole,” but it’s certainly not impossible for it to have a meaning when the syllables are translated this way. It’s[kind of true, but not really](http://www.snopes.com/cokelore/tadpole.asp). > [@Habeed](#): > > “many”? PM me. I’m also not making the allegation as factual. Bullshit, in other words. > [@](#): > > 1. A PhD scientist I know personally advanced this theory Suuure ‘he’ did. > [@](#): > > 1. The theory does fit a cursory glance of the evidence - it’s not just the pictograms, Asian languages do in fact have fewer words. Again, cite for this ‘fact’. > [@](#): > > 1. IQ testing comes in many different forms. The basic asians, whites, blacks ranking has been confirmed thousands of places. No, it hasn’t. The only studies that claim to do so (the Pioneer Fund Babies: Rushton, Jensen, Lynn and their ilk) have been shown time and time again to be terrible science and damn near fraudulent in their creative massaging of dubious data and outright invention of figures. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-english-languages-vocabulary-especially-and-outstandingly-precise/726716.md?page=2)