Rosio Pavoris

I finished these ages ago, but I never got around to reviewing them.
John Allen Paulos is the guy who wrote Innumeracy, as I’m sure you’ll remember.

Once Upon A Number: The Hidden Mathematical Logic of Stories talks about the relation between statistics and storytelling, in a rather loose sense. He discusses the difference between information and meaning, and how logic and language hang together.
It’s hard to describe, obviously, but quite entertaining to read. It’s sprinkled liberally with random math problems, and along the way he also talks about how probability affects religion, which was a nice unexpected bonus (Paulos, like most intelligent, educated people, is an atheist).

The book’s only about two hundred pages, but it’s definitely worth picking up. It’s not as good or important as Innumeracy, but still quite awesome.

A Mathematician Plays the Market (one edition is titled “A Mathematician Plays the Stock Market”, for some reason) is a completely different book. It describes Paulos’ real-life experience with the stock market, and how he lost a significant sum of money in the WorldCom debacle in 2002, due to a combination of poor planning, bad luck, and ignoring his own advice.

He explores the psychological driving forces behind human decision-making when it comes to probability in general, and how they apply to the stock market itself.
Along the way, he explains some things about how the stock market itself works, and why stock market analysts are a boil on the face of society, and economists are mostly idiots.
Well, maybe he didn’t intend to say that, but it’s quite clear from his writing.

Of course, there are the usual mathematical problems as well, but significant parts of them (as well as his plot suggestion for a movie centered around probability) have just been lifted from Once Upon a Number, which was disappointing.
Still, it’s a very interesting book, and it’s one that should be required reading for anyone planning on buying some stock.

Langue d’oc might annoy me almost as much as Québécois does.

People should have just stuck to Latin.

According to several dictionaries, “alas” is derived from the Latin lassus, which they translate as “wretched” but my dictionaries give as “fatigued” (which is more likely, considering which other modern words lassus has inspired).
I always thought it (and the related Dutch helaas and French hélas and whatnot) was derived from eiulo, meaning “I bemoan” (from the verb eiulare; possibly through some other form, like eiulatus), which seems more sensible.
Now I’m confused and it annoys me.

I’m probably more bothered about etymology than most people.

Ratzinger is a moron, ignorant of science and hiding behind his god of the gaps (while denying doing so), blissfully unaware that all of those gaps have been adequately filled for many many decades at this point. His treatise has all the usual fallacies, and manages to add a new one:

“Both popular and scientific texts about evolution often say that ‘nature’ or ‘evolution’ has done this or that,” Benedict said in the book which included lectures from theologian Schoenborn, two philosophers and a chemistry professor.

“Just who is this ‘nature’ or ‘evolution’ as (an active) subject? It doesn’t exist at all!” the Pope said.

Ladies and gentlemen, it’s the argument from lyrical ambiguity.

Anyway, none of this is new, but I just wanted to link to that because of the thing that bothered me the most about that article: the expanding of ö into oe.
I realise it’s standard usage, but come on. Schöpfung is a word I can parse. Schoepfung just looks ridiculous.

It’s even worse in “Schönburg”, though.
Schön is German for beautiful.
Schoen is Dutch for shoe.

If your keyboard can’t handle ö, please just use copy/paste. If you’re restricted to using ASCII (and I’m not sure why you would be, but I guess it’s possible), how about “o:”? It looks ridiculous, but not as ridiculous as expanding it.

(In aliam blog inveniebam, sed nominem oblitus sum. Si tua esset, dice.)

Arkansas House to Argue Over Apostrophes
LITTLE ROCK — Call it Arkansas’ apostrophe act — or, as Rep. Steve Harrelson would have it, “Arkansas’s apostrophe act.”

Harrelson filed a resolution Tuesday to declare the correct possessive form of the state as “Arkansas’s.” The resolution carries no legal weight, Harrelson acknowledged, but said a family friend who works as a historian asked him to carry the grammar fight to the floor.

Harrelson has a blog, and a while ago he talked about this.
I normally don’t do the superfluous “s” thing for possessives (I think it’s actually incorrect in Dutch), but in this case, I’d make an exception purely because the final “s” in Arkansas is silent.

Apparently people agree with that reasoning, since the resolution passed unanimously.
Who said state legislatures have too much time on their hands?

(Via Language Log.)

A recent resurgence of interest in The Vagina Monologues of people near me combined with stories like these combined with lists like these combined with a passing interest in tag clouds have inspired me to do some codin’ and produce the Vagina Tag Cloud Experiment.

The idea is that you enter your favorite euphemism for “vagina”, and it stores in a database table somewhere how many times that word has been entered before, and it displays that in a weighted list type of thing.
Mouse-over a word to see how many times that euphemism has been entered. You can enter as many words as you like, and enter a word as often as you like.

Font-size right now is ceil(sqrt($size)*60)%, because I wasn’t entirely sure what to make that. Enter a few terms, to see how it scales.
If you want to make this a proper survey type experiment, tell a few friends!

(I am aware of the fact that the CSS sucks. If anyone wants to write me a new CSS file, feel free.)

Update: I’m not using POST instead of GET. This is intentional. I like the idea of people being able to pass on links like vagina.php?word=hoo-ha to their friends, XSS and CSRF aside.
Maybe it needs a moderation system, where new entries need to be approved first. At the very least, 28 votes shouldn’t be that big.

Updater: Fine, fine, I’m using POST instead of GET. GET now just prefills the form thing, and the words in the cloud are links to the thing with the GET preset.
Font-size is now ceil(log($size+1)*50)%, pending better suggestions.

(This post won’t interest you if you aren’t Flemish or Dutch.)

In 1991, Samson & Gert released “Tien Miljoen”. I’m sure you remember the chorus:

Had je tien miljoen wat zou jij dan doen
een feestje bouwen en je geld op doen?
Ik kocht liters limonade, honderd kilo chocolade
om aan iedereen uit te delen!

Had je tien miljoen wat zou jij dan doen
een feestje bouwen en je geld op doen?
‘k Zou een kermis laten maken,
en ik schreeuwde van de daken,
kom maar allemaal met me spelen!

In it, they discussed what they’d do if they had 10 million (Belgian francs, presumably). A funfair and a party with lemonade and a hundred kilos of chocolate seemed to be the conclusion.
Now, almost sixteen years later, Gert Verhulst has amassed rather more than 10 million, and someone decided to take him up on that promise.

The fair already exists in the form of Plopsaland (which I maintain was more fun when it was still Meli-Park). Keeping it open for free could be quite expensive, but it isn’t without precedent. Chocolade Jacques (now part of Callebaut) offered to provide the chocolate for free, and lemonade isn’t exactly expensive.

And indeed, in January, Gert agreed!

This makes me happy.

(If you wanted to go, you’re too late. The thousand available spots filled up really quickly (and 500 of them went to handicapped kids, apparently), and at any rate, this story is a month old. I just heard about it, and I wanted to share it anyway.)

French is the only language rap sounds good in.
(It’s funnier if you speak French, of course, but it’s not necessary. There’s a translation here, if you’re interested.)

(Via Cornu.)

Because everyone needs a bit of Fry and Laurie.

In unrelated news, I now have bookshelves. I’m not allowed to put them together for another few days because my sister still has exams, though.

Some random links:

Diebold sucks. But then, we knew that already. Why bother having elections at all if you’re going to hold them like that?

Language Log and Language Hat tell me het Woordenboek der Nederlands(ch)e Taal will be put online in its entirety soon, of which I approve. It’s the largest dictionary in the world, dontchaknow.

If you live in the UK, send your MP a copy of The God Delusion. It may yet save your democracy. (Via RichardDawkins.net.)

And finally, Larry Moran passes on a bit of wisdom regarding Iraq, courtesy of everyone’s favorite creationist troll.

Here’s the deal Jim. In order to have an effective force in fighting guerilla and urban wars in Arab countries we need actual combat veterans seasoned in that type of warfare leading the unseasoned troops. Use your head, Jim. Now we have an effective force led by NCOs who know how to survive urban and guerilla wars in Arab countries. And Bush managed to build that force without losing 58,000 American lives as were sacrificed in Vietnam but rather limited the losses to 3,000. Use your head for something other than a place to put your hat, Jim. We needed a veteran ground combat force for the Middle Eastern theater. Now we have one. Now what happened to Russia in Afghanistan won’t happen to us.

Isn’t that brilliant?

Today is the last day of Internet-ional Delurking Week, and so far, we haven’t seen too many strangers delurking. Come on, kids.

Discussion is still going on in the comments of the “Why I am opposed to religion” post. Come join in.

And some random links:

Language Log has a bit about English being a Celtic language with Germanic words. Quite interesting.

GrrlScientist has a pretty shocking climate map of the US.

Sandwalk’s Larry Moran talks about evolution in a way the kids can understand.

Finally, badger. This is a Eurasian one. American ones aren’t as pretty.
Eurasian badgers are the largest carnivores indigenous to the UK, dontchaknow.

Gate2Home, browser-based keyboard emulator.

This site enables you to write in your language wherever you are in the world, with an online onscreen keyboard emulator.
The main purpose of this site is to let everyone who gets stuck without the ability to write/type/search the internet in their own language be able to do just that (usually travelers/tourists or anyone in front of a foreign computer).

I don’t travel a lot, but I like being able to type in Japanese or Hebrew or what have you without having to fuck around with my keyboard settings. I proclaim this to be a Good Thing.
Though the Japanese thing doesn’t seem to do katakana or Kanji.

(Via Language Hat.)

A few days ago, the word spoon came up in #pharyngula, and this got me thinking. It was interesting to me, because the word is so radically different in the few languages I could readily translate it into.
In English, it’s spoon. In Dutch, it’s lepel. In French, it’s cuillère. And Skatje told me that in Norwegian, it’s skje (Bokmål) or skei (Nynorsk).

Turns out that the English goes back through Old English spōn to Proto-Germanic spūnuz, meaning “chip” or “splinter” (and ultimately to the Proto-Indo-European spe-, meaning “length of wood”). In Medieval Dutch, spon meant “wooden spatula”. It’s conceivable that the English had the same meaning, and it changed a bit over time. The first recorded use of the word to refer to the eating utensil was apparently around 1300.
Scots Gaelic spàin has the same root, but that came through Old Norse spónn. Also compare the modern Dutch word spaander.

Dutch lepel and German Löffel go back to the Germanic root *lap-, which refers to licking. Compare this to the English verb to lap.

French cuillère, Spanish cuchara, and Portuguese colher, and Italian cucchiaio all go back to the Latin coclear or cochlear, also already meaning “spoon”. This is not to be confused with the English word cochlear, the adjective form of cochlea, which is from Latin coc(h)lea, meaning “snail”.
Knowing the Romans, they probably stole their word from the Greeks. Modern Greek is Greek for spoon is χουλιάρι (khuljári) or κοχλιάριο (kokhliário). I don’t have an Ancient Greek dictionary, unfortunately.

(As an aside, another Latin word for spoon is lingula, which is the diminutive of lingua, meaning “tongue”. I thought that was cute.)

The Scandinavian languages seem to get their word from somewhere else still. The Danish ske, Norwegian skei or skje, and Swedish sked are clearly all closely related, but I haven’t been able to figure out where they’re from, mostly because I don’t speak any of those languages.

Azerbaijani qaşıq and Turkish kaşık in the Turkic languages seem to be related to Bosnian and Serbian kašika in the Slavic languages, but not (very closely) to Croatian žlica, even though Bosnian, Serbian, and Croatian are apparently all considered dialects of the Serbo-Croatian language.
Instead, Croatian seems to follow most other Slavic languages: Czech lžíce, Polish łyżka, Slovak lyžica, Slovene žlica, and Russian and Ukrainian lóžka.
Compare also Estonian lusikas and Finnish lusikka, in the Finno-Ugric language family.

It’s all very fascinating.

Ho ho ho!

Edit: Alright, fine.

“Pappa, how do you spell ’steam train’?”
“Like it sounds.”
“Tuff tuff tuff?”

Happy now? ;.;

Japan truly is superior.

German, this time!
I don’t actually speak German, I’m afraid. I had a few years of it in high school, sure, but not in any real way. It’s an official national language of Belgium’s (besides Dutch and French), but almost nobody speaks it (except in the tiny area that Germany was forced to give us after WW1) or expects anyone to.

Still, the Ode to Joy has been Europe’s official anthem since 1972 (well, the 4th movement to Beethoven’s 9th symphony; “Ode to Joy” actually refers to just the poem), and it’s always been one of my favorites.
German can’t be that hard, if you know Dutch~

Freude, schöner Götterfunken Tochter aus Elysium, Wir betreten feuertrunken, Himmlische, dein Heiligtum! Deine Zauber bindet wieder Was die Mode streng geteilt; Alle Menschen werden Brüder, Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt. Wem der große Wurf gelungen, Eines Freundes Freund zu sein; Wer ein holdes Weib errungen, Mische seinen Jubel ein! Ja, wer auch nur eine Seele Sein nennt auf dem Erdenrund! Und wer’s nie gekonnt, der stehle Weinend sich aus diesem Bund! Freude trinken alle Wesen An den Brüsten der Natur; Alle Guten, alle Bösen Folgen ihrer Rosenspur. Küsse gab sie uns und Reben, Einen Freund, geprüft im Tod; Wollust ward dem Wurm gegeben, und der Cherub steht vor Gott. Froh, wie seine Sonnen fliegen Durch des Himmels prächt’gen Plan, Laufet, Brüder, eure Bahn, Freudig, wie ein Held zum Siegen. Seid umschlungen, Millionen! Diesen Kuß der ganzen Welt! Brüder, über’m Sternenzelt Muß ein lieber Vater wohnen. Ihr stürzt nieder, Millionen? Ahnest du den Schöpfer, Welt? Such’ ihn über’m Sternenzelt! Über Sternen muß er wohnen.

Joy, beautiful divine spark Daughter to Elysium, We enter, drunk on fire, Heavenly, your sanctuary! Your magic reconnects What fashion strictly divided; All men become brothers, Where your benign wing stays. Whoever succeeds in the great try, To be a friend’s friend; Whoever won a lovely woman, Adds his jubilation! Yes, whoever calls even one soul His in the entire world! And whoever cannot, he steals Weepingly away from this bond! Joy drink all beings At the breast of Nature; All the good ones, all the evil ones Follow in her trail of roses. She gave us kisses and vines, A friend, proven in death; Pleasure was given to the worm, And the Cherub stands before God. Glad, Whose suns fly Through the Heavens’ glorious plan, Praise, brothers, your path, Joyful, like a hero to victory. Be embraced, millions! This kiss for the whole world! Brothers, beyond the tent of stars A loving father must live. Do you bow down, millions? Do you sense the Creator, world? Look for him beyond the tent of stars! Over the stars he must live.

“Freude” itself translates to “happiness”, really, but “joy” is most often used because it’s shorter. It’s also related to the Dutch “vrede”, which means “peace”.

Elysium is, of course, from Greek mythology. It’s a part of the Underworld, where the heroic and virtuous find their final resting place.

“Feuertrunken” literally means “firedrunk”. It’s a cool word.

“Heiligtum” means “sanctuary”. “Heilig” is “sacred” in both German and Dutch. “Himmlische” (”heavenly”) is modifying “Heiligtum”, I’m pretty sure, in a disjunction.

“Brüder” (”brothers”) is the plural of “Bruder”. German is odd.

Note “Eines Freundes”. Genitive case. It translates to “of a friend”.

Also note “Weib” (”woman”). I’m pretty sure everything that applies to the Dutch “wijf” (as explained in the Opblaaskrokodil translation) applies here as well. Just “woman” would be “Frau”.

The “Zelt” in “Sternenzelt” literally means “tent” or “pavillion”, but it’s often translated as “canopy”. I left it as “tent” because I think that’s funnier~
“Über” literally means “over”, but we get the idea.

Yeah. It gets religious at the end. Friedrich Schiller, who wrote the Ode to Joy (An die Freude), was probably a Freemason.

I do have the entire thing, but it’s almost twenty minutes long, so I’m not uploading that. Instead, have a short bit from the start until “steht vor Gott”. It’s the best part, anyway, ‘cept for the finale.

That wasn’t too hard. If any German-speaking people want to correct any part of my translation, feel free.
Eventually, I’d also like to do something in French, maybe.

As requested, again by Terras, de Kabouterdans~
MP3 provided at the end, if you like it buy the CD, and so on.

Iedereen goed opgelet,
want dit is je grote kans.
Luister goed naar wat ik zeg,
want hier komt de Kabouterdans.
Elke jongen kiest nu eerst
een kaboutermeisje uit.
Neem haar vast bij de hand
en doe een stap vooruit.

(”Kom Kwebbeltje, geef me maar een hand.”
“Oh ja, Klus!”
“Hé, zeg, ik wil met Kwebbel dansen.”
“Ah neen, he zeg, ik was eerst! Zoek jij maar een ander kaboutermeisje.”
“Maar hier zijn geen andere kaboutermeisjes!”
“Ik zal ’s iets zeggen, hé Lui, jij mag straks met mij dansen.”
“Daar gaan we!”)

Chorus
Draai een keer in het rond!
Stamp met je voeten op de grond!
Zwaai je armen in de lucht!
Ga nu zitten met een zucht!
Stap nu rond als een gans!
Zo gaat de Kabouterdans!

(”Kom Lui, jij mag nu met mij dansen.”
“Dansen, ik word daar zo moe van, van dansen. Ik dans niet meer mee. Ik ga slapen.”)

Ja, dat ging al reuzegoed,
Maar we zijn nog lang niet klaar.
Wij doen gewoon die dans opnieuw,
maar twee keer na elkaar.

Chorus x2

(”Zeg Kwebbeltje, vind je niet dat ik mooi kan dansen? Ja, dat is normaal, he. Ah ja, ik ben als het ware de beste danser van heel het kabouterdorp!”)

Jullie dansen echt heel mooi,
Ploppertjes, geloof me maar!
Daarom doen we ‘t nog een keer,
nu drie keer na elkaar!

Chorus x3

Translation’d:

Everyone pay attention,
because this is your big chance.
Listen carefully to what I say,
because here comes the Dwarfdance.
Every boy first picks
a dwarf girl.
Take her by the hand
and take a step forward.

(”Come on Kwebbeltje, give me your hand.”
“Oh yes, Klus!”
“Hey, I want to dance with Kwebbel.”
“Oh no, I was first! You find another dwarf girl.”
“But there are no other dwarf girls here!”
“I’ll say something, Lui. You can dance with me later.”
“There we go!”)

Chorus
Turn around once!
Stomp your feet on the ground!
Wave your arms in the air!
Now sit down with a sigh!
Now walk around like a goose!
That’s how the Dwarf Dance goes!

(”Come Lui, you can dance with me now.”
“Dancing, it makes me so tired, dancing. I’m not dancing anymore. I’m going to sleep.”)

Yes, that went very well already,
But we haven’t finished yet.
We’ll just do that dance again,
but twice in a row.

Chorus x2

(”Say Kwebbeltje, don’t you think I’m a good dancer? Yes, that’s normal, eh. Yes, I’m the best dancer of the entire dwarf village, as it were!”)

You really dance very well,
Plopperlings, believe me!
That’s why we’ll do it again,
now three times in a row!

Chorus x3

“Goed opgelet” literally means “well attention-paid”. The use is idiomatic.

“Kabouter” is probably hard to translate. It’s been translated as dwarf, gnome, and leprechaun, mostly. They’re generally depicted like the Scandinavian nisse or tomte, AFAICT, with beards and pointy hats. They’re usually a few inches tall.
Gnome (especially of the garden variety) probably comes closest, but I associate “gnome” with D&D too much.

“Kaboutermeisje” is a compound word, because Dutch is fond of long words. Not as much as German, but close.
“Meisje” means girl. It’s technically the (irregular) diminutive of “meid”, which means “maid” or “maiden”. “Meid” is now almost always used to refer to the servant cleaning lady type person, and “meisje” is one of very few diminutives to be a dictionary form.

The conversation between the singing requires some background to understand.
The song is sung by characters of the show Kabouter Plop, named after the main character. Plop is the guy doing the singing.
The other three characters on the show (well, initially; they added a few later) are the guys Klus (”Chore”) and Lui (”Lazy”), and the girl Kwebbel (hard to translate; “Mouth”, with the understanding that it’s someone who talks a lot). “Plop” doesn’t actually mean anything.
Klus asks Kwebbel to dance, and Lui complains. Later on, when Kwebbel asks Lui to dance, he’s too tired to. Some of the more awkward bits of dialogue here are their catchphrases.

“Reuzegoed” is a compound word. It literally means “giantgood”. Een reus is a giant.
Something that is giant is almost always made into a compound word (”reuzekonijn” for “giant rabbit”, and whatnot). The literal adjective “giant” doesn’t really exist in Dutch.

“Als het ware” literally translates to “as it were”, though because the subjunctive no longer exists in Dutch, most people tend to assume it means “as the true thing”, which is technically possible. That’s not the case, though.

“Ploppertjes” is what fans of the show are called. It’s the diminutive plural of “Plopper”, which doesn’t actually mean anything. Well, besides “one who plops”, with the understanding that “plop” isn’t a word in Dutch.

Wooh.
I’m not sure how many people are enjoying this translating thing, but I like doing it because it makes me think about the languages I use every day. Try it~

As promised, today I’ll translate some Latin. The bit I’ll translate is from Gaius Julius Caesar’s Commentarii de Bello Gallico. More precisely, the first chapter of the first book.

All Roman Emperors called themselves Caesar, but this guy is the Caesar you’re thinking of. Commentaries on the Gallic War (notice Latin has no articles) was written after he had spent nine years waging war in Gallia (pretty much modern France without the Provence, Belgium, and part of Switzerland), and pretty much describes what he’d been up to.
I picked this particular passage because it’s pretty famous, pretty short, and very straightforward (Caesar wasn’t a poet), and it has that bit about Belgians. I tried to translate reasonably literally, except for the bits I wasn’t sure of.

Onwards. Read the rest of this entry »

I thought I’d give Dutch a rest for a bit, and instead translate some Latin. Before I do that, though, I feel I need to say something about how Latin and English differ, specifically with regards to declension and conjugation.
Dutch, for all its complexities, is actually really similar to English. Latin, less so.

Declension

As you may know, Latin has six grammatical cases. Simplified, these are:

Nominative, for subject; vocative, to address someone; accusative, for object; genitive, to indicate possession; dative, for indirect object; and ablative, for separation, or to indicate the means by which an action is performed.

There’s more to this, of course, but they spent, what, four of the six years teaching us about the intricacies of this, so I won’t try to address it all in a single post.
Exactly how these cases are expressed depends on the declension and the gender of the word involved, and there are scores of exceptions. More details are here, if you’re interested.

Grammatical cases have pretty much disappeared in English (except in some very rudimentary idiomatic forms), but languages like German still have them. They take some getting used to, but they aren’t as annoying as you’d think.
(Some people like to add the locative as a seventh case, but we were always taught it was a special form of the genitive.)

Conjugation

Regarding verbs and their conjugation, too, Latin is somewhat more complex than English.
Like English, it has three persons (first, second, and third) and two numbers (singular and plural), but it has a total of six tenses (plusquamperfectum [I had done], perfectum [I have done], imperfectum [I did], praessens [I do], futurum simplex [I will do], and futurum exactum [I will have done]), three moods (indicative, imperative, and subjunctive), two voices (active and passive), and two aspects (perfective and imperfective).

Daunting?
Well, yes. It’s actually more complicated than it sounds, even, and further complicated by the fact that few languages still have a real subjunctive mood. French has it, but not to the extent Latin does. Which is a pity, because it’s a pretty versatile thing to have.

Fortunately, you don’t really need to understand much about this. I’ll explain the more interesting bits as we run into them. If you really want to know, though, you can find more information here.

Now that that’s out of the way, I think we’re ready to translate a brief passage. I think Caesar’s Commentarii de Bello Gallico is a good place to start, being both famous and relatively simple.
We’ll do that tomorrow. Or later today.