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Comment by tikums | Hacker News Reader

Why, thank you, I speak Russian fluently. It doesn't matter whether the text has been translated from Traditional Chinese or Sanskrit, the issue remains the same: Buddhist terminology is specific to the Buddhist tradition. You will face the same challenge, as long as the language that it is being translated to is not steeped in the same tradition.

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You have a lot to discover in original Buddhism before making statements like that. I am fascinated and struggling with help of Roerich's Tibetan-English-Russian dictionary, and I must say, there is difference in meanings, whether its sutra in Chinese or Tibetan. Ancient translators had their own problems, and direction of tradition is more like India -> Tibet -> China. So Sanskrit originals prevail, and I am yet to learn the script.

You're undermining your own argument, that Latvian is especially difficult to translate abstract texts into.

Not much, since I came to Tibetan from English, and a course in Russian delivered by Mongolian and Tibetan native speaker. I can give a funny example on how difficult it is to keep conveyance of meaning in translation.

Tibetan རང་དབང is translated to English as "independence", when in fact it is itself translation of Sanskrit स्वतन्त्रः, which is in fact "self-empowering reliance", a bit different thing.

Latvian for "independence" is "neatkarība" which itself is wrong pair, because "independence" means not being dependent, and therefore free, while Latvian word means more like "impossibility to take by force". So it might be incorrect to use it in translating Tibetan term. What may be more suitable is to use 'patvaldība', but it is more about power, than reliance.

Sorry, but I fail to see the relevance.

No proper term in Latvian can be found in this example.

> No proper term in Latvian can be found in this example [by yours truly]

FTFY.

> Latvian for "independence" is "neatkarība" which itself is wrong pair, because "independence" means not being dependent, and therefore free, while Latvian word means more like "impossibility to take by force".

"Ne" is a negation (= "in" or "not"), whereas "atkarība" is simply "dependence". Thus, (in)(dependence) is the equivalent of (ne)(atkarība). I don't see where you got it to mean "impossibility to take by force". Independence can be lost, it's not an impossibility. Source:

https://translate.google.com/#auto/en/neatkar%C4%ABba

http://www.tezaurs.lv/?w=neatkar%C4%ABba#/sv/neatkar%C4%ABba

OK. 'Atkarība' is literally state of land that one can 'atkarot', i.e. take back by force. In old money being "atkarīgs" literally means being the one whose land was taken by force. Its a Normann to Saxon situation in a way.

Interesting, the Latvian word feels like a cognate of Russian непокорённость (nepokoryonnost'), which means something like "ability to resist conquest". I wonder if kor/kar is the same Balto-Slavic root, or is this a false cognate?

More like "непокоряемость", but modern Latvians like @tikums forgot it.

The word for independence ("neatkarība") in Latvian is a calque from the German Abhängigkeit ‎("dependence")[1]. Thus, "atkarāties" and "karāties" ("to hang"). Thus, the English expression "it hangs in the balance". On balance, most of the things you've said about the Latvian language in this thread hang by a thread, and that thread is close to tear.

Please check your sources and brush up on whatever rudimentary Latvian skills you still posses. You will certainly not master the language by defaulting to what is, in essence, chauvinism. Rest assured, we can read between the lines of what you're implying ["Russian language superior! We have big words, words for everything! The best words!], but it's just not gonna fly here.

[1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/atkar%C4%ABba

Calque of German abhängig ‎(“dependent”), coined at the end of the 19th century from atkār(t) ‎(“to hang down”) +‎ -īgs (with atkārt from at- +‎ kārt ‎(“to hang”)), together with the related term atkarība.

Source: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/atkar%C4%ABgs

I am talking about the general principle of translating a text with developed and precise terminology that is steeped in tradition for which no reference point exists in the language-of-destination. Therefore, it matters very little whether we're talking about translating ancient Chinese or Tibetan texts. The challenges are similar in scale. Case in point[1]:

"This is a major reason why the Daodejing, to take a famous example, is impenetrable to a few, enigmatic to many more, and highly allusive for everyone, and has been the subject of well over 150 translations of it in English alone."

[1] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chinese-translate-interpr...

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