Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Bing: A twofer

Dear Bing: I accept that you can't deal with productive morphology, so повиганяємо (two prefixes! the horror!) is beyond you. But you really can't turn "with God's help" into "God". Seriously. Stop.

З Божoю допомогою повиганяємо ту нечисть! with Bing translation God poviganâêmo the vermin!

Поганяти means to drive on, to lash, to spur. Виганяти means to drive out. So повиганяти has the sense of vigorously or enthusiastically driving out. The ємо ending is the first person plural, we will drive out.

З Божoю допомогою means "with God's help". Bing's translation, such as it is, sounds like an exhortation to God: God poviganâêmo the vermin!

Google's a little better here... or is it? Their "Bozhoyu help take away that abomination!" at least preserves the 'help', though they don't recognize the instrumental case of Бог, God, and ignore the preposition. However, they still don't provide the correct form of the verb, rendering it as an infinitive complement to 'help', and making it sound like an imperative rather than an assertion.

The correct translation is: "With God's help, we will drive out the vermin!" (Or 'scum'.)
«Нас называли оккупантами». E1.ru о возвращении из Донбасса в Россию уральских добровольцев with Bing translation
'We were called by the occupiers.' E1. ru for the return of the Donbass region in Russia Ural volunteers
And then in the Russian one, Bing apparently doesn't know that verbs of naming take instrumental complements. They weren't called BY the occupiers; they were called occupiers. Also, the preposition o isn't ever "for". Ever. It's "about" or "on". And из? You can't leave that out. And в with accusative isn't "in", it's "into, to". And once again Bing completely ignores the meaning of the genitive case: of the volunteers. OF THEM.

In this one, Google's worse. They give us: "We called the occupiers." E1.ru about the return of the Donbass in Russian Ural volunteers

Yes, they get that E1.ru is reporting ON the return. But they not only also mishandle из (from) (though in their own way), they top it off by turning Russia into Russian. And they can't handle the naming-verb's instrumental either, so they just ignore it. AND turn "us" into "we"!

It's not "E1.ru for the return of the Donbass region in Russia Ural volunteers", and it's certainly not "E1.ru about the return of the Donbass in Russian Ural volunteers", it's "E1.ru ON the return FROM the Donbass (region) TO Russia OF Ural volunteers".

"They called us occupiers." E1.ru reports on the return to Russia from the Donbass of volunteers from the Ural.

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1 Comments:

At 1:49 PM, April 15, 2015 Anonymous Kathie had this to say...

In Portuguese:
"chamar" = to call [the occupiers]
"chamar DE" = to call [us the occupiers]
"chamar-se POR" = to be called by [the occupiers].

By now you seem to be accumulating enough examples that you can sort them by categories for a talk or a paper on the topic. My collection of Google atrocities now runs to 30 pages, and continues to grow with new and old errors alike (Google's people apparently can't or won't correct the latter). Meanwhile, our jobs are safe.

 

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