What's everyone up to right now?

[emjay]

Beautiful sound of rain and thunder outside... this is only the second day of rain in about eight weeks of this heat wave... it's 32 degrees C in my bedroom today... highest temp so far for me. But it's already starting to feel cooler with that rain... just hope it lasts, at least for a day or two

[Joods]

KG means nothing to me.  It's jibberish.

It's just a measure of weight that the entire world uses.
Oh, except for you guys.
But what can you expect from people who don't even drive on the right side of the road. :-)

Actually, in some parts here, we utilize both sides of the road at the same time. Like last night as I was following the tow truck to the garage with the Malibu. The driver used the entire road because he's batshit crazy.

As for what I'm doing right. Now - eating lunch as I'm running last minute errands today before we head out for OBX tomorrow.

[Angrboda]

Frustrated.  Looking at various translations of the Tao Te Ching.  Occasionally, a sample of the text is offered.  Unfortunately, said sample is confined to the preface, making checking the translation impossible.

Are you able to read Chinese characters?

No, I'm not fluent in Chinese, but there are things I look for in a translation of the text, and things I prefer to avoid. It can be difficult figuring out what those are and how they should influence my preferences, but they still exist and are non-trivial, especially given the susceptibility to mistranslation of the work. (I did at one time have a dual language copy of the Tao Te Ching, but I haven't kept it. There is a translation which I'm aware of which allows you to look up the actual characters of the text in a custom glossary/dictionary, but I'm not confident that such an approach is particularly useful.)

For an example of the issues, regarding a translation of The Art Of War: (long)

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It’s clear that Mr. Gagliardi is extremely passionate about all things Sun Tzu. Through various repackaged books sold both here at Amazon and through the “Science of Strategy Institute” he set up to sell you Sun Tzu themed board games and videos, he has certainly created a virtual cottage industry of Sunzi-phernalia. In addition, he also offers personalized training packages for up to $1,500 to amp up your ability to unleash the power of Sun Tzu’s system of total and complete victory in all competitive endeavors you face, whether in the boardroom or the bedroom.

But all of this aside, how successful is Mr. Gagliardi at his most basic task: competently translating Sun Tzu’s original text, The Art of War? The answer: not very.

This book is a complete mess, with unforgivable errors in both translation and general knowledge concerning China and the Warring States era present in almost every verse. In lieu of a laundry list I will give you just a one line example where Mr. Gagliardi clearly shows that he is out of his depth in terms of translation competence. I maintain a database of 30 translations of The Art of War in English that I use to compare and contrast various efforts, and included the screenshot of the relevant verse so you can compare it to how others have approached the text.

In Chapter 11, Sun Tzu is concerned that his own soldiers might either break and run or else refuse to support the other flanks of his own army while in battle. To show how this can be remedied, Sun Tzu brings up the example of how a certain snake can provide a valuable lesson for his soldiers. As Gagliardi translates it, the line reads: “Act like an ordinary mountain snake.”

From a novice’s perspective, this could be a defensible translation choice. The original Chinese characters for this line are:

CHANG SHAN ZHI SHE

If you looked up each character individually via the internet you could definitely make a case that the line could read:

ordinary mountain (of) snake

The problem is that professional translation doesn’t work this way (a one-for-one translation of characters), and you have to understand all of the nuances applicable to how these thoughts are put together, especially when you are talking about a millennia old text written in a language vastly different than its modern equivalent. What a competent Sinologist would easily understand, but Gagliardi obviously didn’t, is that the character CHANG isn’t functioning as an adjective modifying the noun “snake,” but instead is the proper noun indicating the name of the mountain on which the snake resides. So the line should read:

“Act like the snake of Mt. Chang”

So while Gagliardi is perfectly content in his own ignorance that Sun Tzu is talking about an ordinary snake, what the text is really saying is that he needs his soldiers to be like an EXTRAordinary snake which possesses the magical ability to continue providing support to its endangered other half even after being cleaved into two separate parts.

Now if you are looking to really get beyond the basics of the translation (say like someone who is willing to shell out $1,500 for advanced personal lessons) and might be curious where this Mt. Chang is located and why it was relevant to Sun Tzu, you might be surprised. Sun Tzu never actually mentioned Mt. Chang, but instead was referring to a Mt. Heng, where this extraordinary snake supposedly lived (by the way, Sun Tzu gave the snake a name, the Shuairan, a fact that was completely missed by Gagliardi). It turns out that the oldest extant copy of the Art of War was transcribed during the Han Dynasty period. What professional Sinologists know but Mr. Gagliardi might not, is that in classical Chinese there was a prohibition on using characters that were the same as the personal name of the sitting emperor. At around the same time as we believe the earliest version of The Art of War was transcribed, Emperor Wen of Han was sitting on the throne and had a personal name of “Liu Heng” which means that “Heng” would need to be omitted from all texts. “Heng” actually means “Perseverance” and it turns out that “Chang” also carries the meaning of “Perseverance” so Mt. Heng was changed to Mt. Chang to get around this prohibition—an interesting tidbit for your next trivia night.

Of course the name change does nothing to impact your understanding of the Art of War, but does illustrate the difference between buying a copy of the The Art of War from a professional Sinologist who understands both the translation issues and can provide relevant historical and philosophical background, and the rank amateur who does this for a hobby and wants to pass off an inferior product hoping you won't know the difference. There are too many professionally done Sun Tzu translations available by qualified individuals (Ames, Griffith, Sawyer, Ivanhoe, Mair, Minford) to justify paying the same amount of money for Mr. Gagliardi’s lackluster effort.

You wouldn’t select a surgeon for your triple-bypass surgery simply because he was “passionate” about cutting people open and learned some things on the internet. You would want to select someone who has years of relevant professional experience under their belt, and just as important, board certified. Fortunately, the stakes aren't quite so high when choosing the best Sun Tzu translation, but the same principle should apply. Don't be an ordinary purchaser of this classic text, be an extraordinary one.

An Amazon Book Review
[/quote]

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[Anomalocaris]

Frustrated.  Looking at various translations of the Tao Te Ching.  Occasionally, a sample of the text is offered.  Unfortunately, said sample is confined to the preface, making checking the translation impossible.

Do you have access to a University library or through inter-library loan?

[Angrboda]

Frustrated.  Looking at various translations of the Tao Te Ching.  Occasionally, a sample of the text is offered.  Unfortunately, said sample is confined to the preface, making checking the translation impossible.

Do you have access to a University library or through inter-library loan?

I do. Thank you for the suggestion. (But of course, the translation I want to examine isn't in the system. *sigh*)

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Holy shit. Watching the rebroadcast of last night's Twins baseball game because I went to bed early. We had been behind 1-0 when I shut off the TV last night. I tune in to the rebroadcast, and we're ahead 2-1. Suddenly it's the ninth inning and the Red Sox are up, and our closer is just losing it. Two back-to-back walks with two outs and he can't hit anything but a straight fastball. The bases are loaded and anything besides the heat is getting dumped in the dirt. The count rises to 3-0, and he still hasn't found the handle. By some miracle, he hits the strike zone with a couple of fast balls to bring us to a full count. High and inside and the batter whiffs on it, saving the game. Twins win, but it wasn't pretty.

Whew. I'm glad I didn't stay up last night. I'd have never gotten to sleep after such a nail biter.

[KevinM1]

On June 18th, we had a thunderstorm. The lights flickered a few times before the power went out briefly. Unfortunately, the power surge(s) fried the compressor of my positive pressure air mattress. When I'm in bed, it's an always-on unit designed to minimize pressure (I have pressure sore issues) while still giving me ample body support for the rods in my back and plates in my hips. The storm also fried my Xbox, but that's neither here nor there.

Since then, I've been sleeping on a makeshift system. A store-bought air mattress strapped to my bed with bungie cords and a ratcheting strap. To say it's been uncomfortable is an understatement. I get 3-4 hours of sleep a night, and have been living on ibuprofen.

The state (Medicaid) finally received all of the necessary paperwork a couple days ago*. I'm hoping that my compressor is repaired or replaced in the next couple of weeks.

*We started the process on June 19th, but Medicaid kept coming back to us with requests for other forms of paperwork rather than just informing us of everything they needed from the outset. So, every time we thought things were moving forward, they would come back to us asking for something else. It's been incredibly frustrating.

[pocaracas]

Waiting for the eclipse!

[Ravenshire]

Browsing my library. Thinking about doing some reading about Taoism. Found a title I want to read, and there's an eVersion, so I go for that. Much clicking and installing later, I have two new eReaders installed, in addition to the two I already had installed, and I can now read my book. Because it's copy protected, I have to use Adobe's Digital Reader, which I'm already inclined not to like, as it seems somewhat rudimentary. In addition, my borrowing term is limited to 3 weeks, whereas in general, if no one is waiting on something I'm reading, I can renew it for a total of 9 weeks reading time. (I'm not much of a reader, so that helps.) I suppose I'll be able to check it out again immediately after the return period ends, but it's still a pain. I guess I'll have to use Evernote if I want to make notes on my reading.

Meh. Evernote free version is lacking a lot of things the paid version has, but they want $42 per year on sale for that. What other note taking software for windows do people use or recommend?

Decided to investigate TiddliWiki and MS OneNote. I had a bunch of notes in an obscure note taking tool at one time. I wonder if I can find the file or if I blew it away when I reformatted my old computer?

Hrm. Not sure TiddliWiki works on Android, or perhaps it only works from a browser on Android. So much to do.

If your local library loans ebooks through Overdrive, you'll have the option to renew, I believe, starting 48 hours before it's due back, provided the have been no holds placed.

[brewer]

My wife just sent me this. Russians guarding Trump's star on the Hollywood walk of fame that has been repeatedly destroyed. 

[Angrboda]

Browsing my library.  Thinking about doing some reading about Taoism.  Found a title I want to read, and there's an eVersion, so I go for that.  Much clicking and installing later, I have two new eReaders installed, in addition to the two I already had installed, and I can now read my book.  Because it's copy protected, I have to use Adobe's Digital Reader, which I'm already inclined not to like, as it seems somewhat rudimentary.  In addition, my borrowing term is limited to 3 weeks, whereas in general, if no one is waiting on something I'm reading, I can renew it for a total of 9 weeks reading time.   (I'm not much of a reader, so that helps.)  I suppose I'll be able to check it out again immediately after the return period ends, but it's still a pain.  I guess I'll have to use Evernote if I want to make notes on my reading.

Meh.  Evernote free version is lacking a lot of things the paid version has, but they want $42 per year on sale for that.  What other note taking software for windows do people use or recommend?

Decided to investigate TiddliWiki and MS OneNote.  I had a bunch of notes in an obscure note taking tool at one time.  I wonder if I can find the file or if I blew it away when I reformatted my old computer?

Hrm.  Not sure TiddliWiki works on Android, or perhaps it only works from a browser on Android.  So much to do.

If your local library loans ebooks through Overdrive, you'll have the option to renew, I believe, starting 48 hours before it's due back, provided the have been no holds placed.

These are Adobe format editions. Not sure that affects your point. Thanks for the info. I'll keep that in mind, but the last two books I downloaded are in Adobe Content Server Message format, which my OverDrive client doesn't recognize. I can only open them in Adobe Digital Editions.