#1
Methinks its more correct to say China is LEARNING it - some things can only be learned Hands-on or by the "School of Hard Knocks".
* ION CHINA DAILY FORUM > CHINA DEFENDS ITS SURVEILLANCE OF THE DAOYUS ISLANDS, vee Nippon.
Beijing is repor planning to send more armed vessels to the disputed islands after latest incident, vee "Gunboat/Battleship Diplomacy".
* TOPIX/WORLDNEWS > JAPANESE LEADER [PM Noda] WARNS AGZ CHINESE [+ DPRK] MILITARY BUILDUP.
Japan regards the situation in NE Asia as increasingly tensive = "challenging", wid both Rising China + North Korea as its biggest MilPol concerns.
Again, China wants sovereignty oer the Daoyus [Japan = Senkakus] + access rights to former vassal kingdom OKINAWA [Ryukyu Kingdom], NOT ONLY FOR TRADE + NATIONAL MODERNIZATION BUT ALSO TO PROTECT ITS DESIRED PLA BASES ON FUTURE POST-REUNIFICATION TAIWAN.
#2
I just started reading Glenn Beck's new book about the Federalist papers. The second paper, "translated" into current English, is about the value of sea power. Hamilton wrote it, I think. I'd go get it, to be sure, but it's upstairs....
Posted by: Bobby on the road ||
03/20/2012 22:03 Comments ||
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#3
Roger That! It'd be be a tough slog, only to return back downstairs only to crash...
#4
The Original Argument - The Federalists' Case for the Constitution, Adapted for the 21st Century. Chapter 3 - Paper No. 11 - How the Union Will Foster Commerce and a Navy by Alexander Hamilton.
Al said, "The rights of neutrality will only be respected when they are defended by an adequate power. A nation, despicable by its weakness, forfeits even the privilege of being neutral."
Many things have changed since the 1790's, but not human nature.
Posted by: Bobby on the road ||
03/20/2012 22:44 Comments ||
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#5
I stand corrected for being too presumptuous, snarky and vain.
#2
I remember when LtCol West made a remark about something happening to Muhammad after Khadijah's death...this guy brings it up to. I've read through the quran but as I have heard it is not in chronological order I couldn't discern a sequential worsening of dogma from the golden-rule-mode to the talibunnie fruitcake philosophy.
#3
I think about that time Mo was also kicked out of Mecca (I believe it was right after or around the time of the Satanic Verses - False Prophets had a tendency to be put to death back then) and made his way to Medina.
#4
Those who profit most from Islam are the Imams. Then all males. Women don't stand a chance. Especially if Islam is widespread in the local population.
So why are so many on the left so open armed about accepting Islam into their communities?
1) They left feels invincible in their own power and feel by being accepting of "fringe groups" they are adding to their own power and the Islamists can be controlled.
2) But when the agitation (violence) begins by the ever growing Islamic segment the left will not be able to overcome it and eventually that society will be forced to submit unless considerable counter violence is unleashed to expell the Islamists.
That is one of the dangers leftists bring upon the nations they influence.
Posted by: Black Charlie Bonaparte7194 ||
03/20/2012 16:20 Comments ||
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#1
Bull-SHIT! China was (and still is) crippled by multilingualism. I know people who can speak five languages and it doesn't make any difference as to their intelligence level. They can just speak more languages, is all. If I need to communicate, hire a translator. The benefits of everyone speaking ONE common language are enormous.
What about dialects? I will tell you for a fact Southern US English is quite different than Northern Midwest, both of which are different than US University English or US Media English.
#3
Having one common language, like having one common currency, does indeed make daily life flow more easily and efficiently at the macro level, gromky. Hiwever, the article addresses what's going on inside an individual skull.
About twenty percent of Americans live in a household where more than one language is spoken, and even more have to learn the language of the neighborhood. How many of us have picked up a working knowledge of Spanish just to be able to walk down the street? Even I know what pendejo means! Not to mention how many times I've been caught out in Cincinnati speaking in German with the trailing daughters.
Speaking more than one language enriches one's life and is an enjoyable mental exercise. But there is a reason so much of the world uses English as a lingua franca.
#5
It doesn't make you smarter, but it does make you better educated. There is a difference.
Also, it matters *what* languages you speak. I believe that one of the reasons for the success of the English speaking world is the richness and flexibility of the English language.
My kids learn Latin, Chinese and -- because he keeps begging me to teach it to him -- German. Right off the bat it helps with their English grammar, spelling and composition. My oldest has just been accepted to an ivy school at age 16.
#6
Ours is the only industrialized culture in the world where people consider themselves educated without learning a second language. And for an country that depends on foreign trade, we are woefully ignorant of geography.
The headline is a bit silly (most headlines are), but the article generally makes sense. No BS here, Gromky. When you stimulate one area of the brain, the stimulation spills over into adjacent areas of the brain as well. I've had to pay special attention to these things because we have a houseful of Aspergers kids, and we have used music and languages not only for their own sake, but for the other skill sets that occur in the same brain area.
#7
Re #1: Ribbentrop was an accomplished multi-linguist AND considered a first-class dummy by his own people. Language skills have nothing to do with intelligence. Period.
#8
I last took German in high school in 1966. In 2008, I was admiring the ceiling of the castle of mad King Ludwig in Bavaria, (Germany) when the word "grossartige" popped into my head.
We were traveling with a couple who lived in Germany for several years, and I asked what grossartige was. She had to look it up, and the second synonym was "fantastic". I had remembered the German word from 40 years previous, but forgotten its English equivalent.
Strange thing, the mind, especially the language part!
Posted by: Bobby on the road ||
03/20/2012 12:46 Comments ||
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#9
Bobby, THAT'S ME TOO!! 1966 high school German was the last I took, still remember a little. The funniest thing though was when I went to work for a German company.
We went out for a drink on a trip to Krautville an I asked him the correct pronunciation of "dark beer". The waiter came up and my boss (born and raised in Heidelberg) says to him "Two dark beers." (I almost hit him ;^)
It seems that almost everyone around Waldorf (SAP HQ) speaks English BECAUSE it is such a multi-national company. English is EVERYONE'S second language.
#11
Most people would prefer Americans remain ignorant of their geography. Our way of learning is pretty thorough.
I picked up a little German from my father when I was a kid. After two world wars, it seemed like a citizen's duty. Got to jr hi about 1957. Tried a little kraut on a guy supposed to be the German teacher. He put up his hands. Probably not the first time.
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
03/20/2012 13:50 Comments ||
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#12
"Oh, I forgot to ask, does knowing ABAP, COBOL, Fortran, Pascal and Basic (4 dialects) count?"
According to George Gilder, yes.
"Ours is the only industrialized culture in the world where people consider themselves educated without learning a second language."
We don't have the need here--not for travel and not for business. So if you don't count 2 years of high school Spanish (and you shouldn't count that) and people who grew up in bilingual households, you are left with a group who almost certainly have studied. But without a need for it, there are plenty of well educated people who have not learned a second language.
#13
AlanC: There is the discipline of thinking logically that comes from trying to spell out how to do things to a computer that comes with any programming language. However, it is said that the concepts and programming methodology to program LISP well actually aid people in thinking. I've had several situations where I could not code the solution in Basic, but had to code it in Lisp and back translate to Basic to get it to work.
#15
Most other industrialized nations (meaning Europe) speak more than one language because they are tiny and have to deal with their neighbors. That is not necessarily an asset, just a fact.
I don't doubt a lot of intelligent people know more than one language but I do doubt it was the language skills that made them intelligent. Seems like someone got that backwards.
#16
Now, what really helped me learn French better in Graduate school than in undergraduate was my knowledge of how to define and analyze Computer programming languages and how to translate programs written using them into executable code. Programming language theory, alongside Backus-Naur Form as a language to define programming languages, not only helped me understand some programming languages, but a subset of French was defineable as well. I was told, when I visited France afterwards, that I spoke it okay, but much too fast.
What REALLY puzzled them was that they couldn't place WHERE from france I COULD have been from: I was sometimes from normandy, sometimes from Strasbourg, sometimes from Paris. When I explained to them that my First quarter french teacher spent his language year in Bretagne, the second spent it in strasbourg, and the third was a fussy, precise Dame from Paris, they nodded and smiled in deep understanding.
My mom, though born and raised in Haiti, always sounded as if she came off the Docks of Tours: utterly classic and pure French. Turns out her dad forced his kids to pronounce their french from the France's version of the BBC, and all newscasters in france practically are born or lived in the Indre-et-Loire district.
#19
Smarter? Smart is realizing there is frequently a big difference between intelligent and educated. Smarter is knowing that and that there is an even larger different between intelligence and wisdom.
But learning a second language is fun, good mental exercise, and stimulating.
Also helps settle certain school kids down when they know you can understand their Spanish!
When Husband's French failed in Geneva two summers ago, and the shopkeepers/waiters/friendly persons from whom we asked directions didn't speak English, my Spanish worked. Go figure.
#22
One definition of smarter is using your brain more effectively. In other words, acting closer to one's potential. Mr. Wife loves to tell people I'm smarter than he is. But he is a very quick and broad thinker, makes connections others don't see, remembers everything, and is very, very practical. So his useful intelligence is worth much more as the world counts such things.. He also has studied French, German, Spanish and Arabic...and art.
Me? I've studied Hebrew, German, Spanish, Flemish (which is not proper Dutch, as my mother is fond of pointing out), and just enough French to slip quickly into English. ;-). I find that different languages contain a slightly different world view or philosophy. Flemish/Dutch is earthier than English, for instance, which was rather startling for me, but no doubt salutary...and made me see my very ladylike mother in an entirely new light.
#25
It doesn't surprise me that bi-linguals are better able to apply multiple solutions to the same general problem, which is essentially what the studies show.
This isn't evidence they are smarter, or more capable.
I have lived in a number of different countries and never had the need to learn the language beyond a few words for taxi drivers and the market.
I still travel quite a lot in Asia. These days its rare to find a taxi driver who doesn't speak some English.
My view is that the only language skill that matters in the modern world is a good mastery of English.
Unfortunately, I see an increasing deterioration in English skills as people get younger.
"She was very much, as we would say, left wing. She [created] a very, very good impression. She seemed to be very bright, very respectful of others," said Gaia Servadio, a writer and historian who has worked with Asma on several art projects.
"It's a very nasty regime... Thousands of people have been killed. So it's very difficult to say: poor woman. She certainly should have found a way to talk."
But she's very left wing, so when Pencilneck's killed all the opposition there'll be some reason for her to be welcomed back into the best circles...
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
