{"id":27545,"date":"2017-10-25T10:01:51","date_gmt":"2017-10-25T15:01:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/?p=27545"},"modified":"2017-12-05T21:27:20","modified_gmt":"2017-12-06T03:27:20","slug":"translations-go-bad-bad-things-can-happen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/2017\/10\/25\/translations-go-bad-bad-things-can-happen\/","title":{"rendered":"When translations go bad, bad things can happen"},"content":{"rendered":"

The gift shop had a key chain with a miniature hominid skull (KNM-ER 1470) on it. I saw the price tag, and it looked very expensive. I’m not sure if it looked expensive because I had just arrived in-county and had not yet adapted to the local currency, or if was because I had just spent the last 10 months living in an economy where you could literally purchase ownership of a prisoner for about five bucks (ransom? human trafficking? maybe there isn’t much of a difference). In any event, the price looked high, so I turned to the cashier and said, in a language that we both knew and that should have allowed a mutually intelligible conversation, “This useless object just grabbed me and threw me violently to the ground!” <\/p>\n

She was a bit shocked by that statement. We discussed it further, and then she was amused. Yes, we were speaking the same language, but our dialects were from regions well over 1,000 miles apart and across two countries. I had said, in my own dialect, “The price on this thing strikes me as a bit high.” Which, in her dialect, meant that I was viciously attacked by the hominid key chain.<\/p>\n

Apparently, there is a way to say “Good Morning” in Arabic that translates into Hebrew as “Aiieeeeeeeee!!! Kill them all, attack!!!!!” or words to that effect.<\/p>\n

A Palistinian man used his own version of the phrase “good morning” in a facebook postt, and the Israel police, for some reason watching his facebook page, used Facebook’s automatic translation system to produce a misleading translation. I exaggerate slightly above. An idiom for “good morning” was translated into “Hurt them” in Hebrew, and “Attack them” in English. The comment, “good morning,” was associated with a posted pic of the man leaning against his bulldozer at a construction site in the West Bank.<\/p>\n

From Haaretz<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The automatic translation service offered by Facebook uses its own proprietary algorithms. It translated \u201cgood morning\u201d as \u201cattack them\u201d in Hebrew and \u201churt them\u201d in English.
\nArabic speakers explained that English transliteration used by Facebook is not an actual word in Arabic but could look like the verb \u201cto hurt\u201d \u2013 even though any Arabic speaker could clearly see the transliteration did not match the translation.<\/p>\n

But because of the mistaken translation the Judea and Samaria District police were notified of the post. The police officers were suspicious because the translation accompanied a picture of the man alongside the bulldozer, a vehicle that has been used in the past in hit-and-run terrorist attacks. They suspected he was threatening to carry out such an attack and the police arrested him. After he was questioned, the police realized their mistake and released the man after a few hours.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Let’s see if we can replicate this with Google translate.<\/p>\n

Good morning in English is<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nin Arabic.<\/p>\n

which in turn is
\n\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

in Hebrew.<\/p>\n

Either one translates to “good morning” in English.<\/p>\n

Clearly, Facebook should start using Google Translate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The gift shop had a key chain with a miniature hominid skull (KNM-ER 1470) on it. I saw the price tag, and it looked very expensive. I’m not sure if it looked expensive because I had just arrived in-county and had not yet adapted to the local currency, or if was because I had just … Continue reading When translations go bad, bad things can happen<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27550,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5030],"tags":[15,4907,5020],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/TranslationMishap_Greg_Laden_Blog.png?fit=257%2C477&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5fhV1-7ah","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27545"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27545"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27545\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27557,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27545\/revisions\/27557"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}