Intelligent life.

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Alain De Vos said:
Note , there is a very good and gentle book about general relativity.
Peter Collier : A most incomprehensible thing.

A good book on tensors is,
Pavel Grinfeld:Introduction to tensor analysis and the calculus of moving surfaces
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0eJXttPRZI&list=PLlXfTHzgMRULkodlIEqfgTS-H1AY_bNtq
Click to expand...
This is not a video to grasp the idea of a tensor. to undrestand it you need to approach from an abstract point of view -- vector spaces ( tensor is actually a vector ) This is the video series which would help:https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRlVmXqzHjUQARA37r4Qw3SHPqVXgqO6c
Of course a higher level of chewing that matter would be differential geometry. but that video was the only one helped me to quckly get the idea of a tensor
 
Alain De Vos said:
Do you believe there is intelligent life beyond the earth. Why or why not.
Personally i think but they are to far away to make contact.
Click to expand...
I think the more salient question is, is there intelligent life here on Earth? Looking at the state of affairs on multiple issues, we have good reason to think not.
 
Alain De Vos said:
Do you believe there is intelligent life beyond the earth.
Click to expand...

Tallest_Purple_commanding.webp


I believe it's possible :p
 
Speaking of extraterrestrial intelligent life, I read this when I was young.
Now that I've looked into it, it seems that what I read was a translation of something that had been censored in the Soviet Union.
 
Charlie_ said:
Speaking of extraterrestrial intelligent life, I read this when I was young.
Now that I've looked into it, it seems that what I read was a translation of something that had been censored in the Soviet Union.
Click to expand...
Well, the Cinema section of the Wikipedia page mentions 2 movies actually made in Soviet Union, based on that book. So I'm kind of surprised - just how did you reach the conclusion that the book was censored in Soviet Union?

Original Polish text of that book is actually fairly easy to translate into Russian or Ukrainian. An English translation does lose quite a bit of the original punch and humor, esp. when trying to make the same point. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Untranslatability for a decent explanation of the issue.
 
Charlie_ said:

ソラリスの陽のもとに - Wikipedia

ja.wikipedia.org ja.wikipedia.org
It appears that a censored version and a fully translated version have been published.

Edit: According to Wikipedia, the deleted portion is just under 10% of the total
Click to expand...
Censored AND fully-translated versions have been published? hmm, that's just not adding up for me. One way that would be accomplished if the censored version was published first, and then, some time later, the fully-translated version.

And the publication would kind of have to be in the same market (Japan in your case, just going by the fact that you're referencing the JP wikipedia page).

Another thing I'd like to point out: Sometimes, translatability issues between languages do result in unintentional omissions of content. That is not the same as censorship. Japanese (and other Asian languages, as well) do have this issue with European languages. To wit: A Haiku (Japanese-style poem) is usually written with just 3 fairly short vertical lines. Depending on how it's written, there can be a dozen or more different meanings in every character! And if you try to use English language to CORRECTLY communicate the same thing - good luck fitting all the words on one page!

Just because a language has a compact expression (like Japanese or Chinese), that does NOT equal censorship. It's like translating brainfuck into Visual Basic.NET .

BTW, the English wikipedia page mentions that the author's family only approved a translation of that book in 2011, because the translator did a decent job on the Polish-English translation that actually captured the original spirit and message adequately. Previously published translations were a disappointment to the author.
 
It says that the censored version and the complete version were published by the same publisher in Japan.
I read the old version.
The new version is still available for purchase.
It seems you want to make it a translation issue, but doesn't it say that it was also deleted from the Russian version of Wikipedia?

Edit: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/4150120005/
The back cover of the new edition says it is a complete translation.

ソラリスの陽のもとに (1977年) (ハヤカワ文庫―SF) | スタニスワフ・レム, 飯田 規和 |本 | 通販 | Amazon

Amazonでスタニスワフ・レム, 飯田 規和のソラリスの陽のもとに (1977年) (ハヤカワ文庫―SF)。アマゾンならポイント還元本が多数。スタニスワフ・レム, 飯田 規和作品ほか、お急ぎ便対象商品は当日お届けも可能。またソラリスの陽のもとに (1977年) (ハヤカワ文庫―SF)もアマゾン配送商品なら通常配送無料。
www.amazon.co.jp
This is the older version, but people who have read both have written that it was deleted or altered.
 
Charlie_ said:
It says that the censored version and the complete version were published by the same publisher in Japan.
I read the old version.
The new version is still available for purchase.
It seems you want to make it a translation issue, but doesn't it say that it was also deleted from the Russian version of Wikipedia?
Click to expand...
Re-reading the Russian version of that Wikipedia article, I was able to glean a few things:
  • There was an 'abbreviated translation' in 1962 into Russian. This is not the same as censorship. If you are familiar with Cliffs Notes, those are like a shorthand summary of a novel. That's what an 'abbreviated translation' is. Basically, somebody just translated a Cliffs Notes version of the novel. In such cases, of course some content would be left out. But no, that's not censorship. Abbreviated summary of content does compound the translation issue, and makes it into a game of broken telephone.
  • The 2002 movie that was made in US, based on that book - that one did have the theme of love/romance missing. The author of the book was not happy about that. He did tty to explain that love/romance was merely a background against which the rest of the action was supposed to be. Whether or not that omission amounts to censorship - that is frankly debatable. When trying to determine the technical feasibility of including some visual in a movie or not, some things do end up falling off the table, just because you can't cram everything into a 90-minute movie.
Since we're debating on whether the book was censored or not, let's get on the same page about what even amounts to censorship. I think that Wikipedia has some good explanations.

BTW, it's not that uncommon to have second or even third translations of books.
 
astyle said:
There was an 'abbreviated translation' in 1962 into Russian.
Click to expand...
That's not the part I'm referring to.
Why did you think that was the part?
It doesn't make sense.

Edit: I haven't read it, but apparently the translator, Mr. Numano, provides a detailed explanation of how the content was deleted from the Russian version in the afterword of the complete version.
According to Numano, nearly 40 pages of 400-character manuscript paper have been deleted across three chapters:
"Monsters," "Thinkers," and "Dreams," and he describes the deleted sections as "important passages that convey the work's rich imagery and broad ideological perspective."
 
Charlie_ said:
That's not the part I'm referring to.
Why did you think that was the part?
It doesn't make sense.
Click to expand...
I thought that was the part, because I don't see anything about deleting stuff from the Russian translation of the Wikipedia page.

I guess I did not understand what you were trying to tell me.

Are you trying to tell me that there was supposed to be a Russian translation that was actually banned in Russia / USSR ? Or are you trying to tell me that there was a Russian translation that was not mentioned on the Russian wikipedia page (but supposed to be) ?

Or are you trying to tell me something else altogether? what are you trying to tell me?
 
Am I mistaken?
(I'm editing my previous post.)
ru.wikipedia.org

Солярис (роман) — Википедия

ru.wikipedia.org ru.wikipedia.org
Code: 
В первом русском переводе романа имелись изменения в заключительной главе «Древний мимоид» — был выброшен диалог Кельвина и Снаута о природе Океана как «ущербного бога», который неспособнен осознать множественность людей, их свободную волю к самостоятельным поступкам, который не может предугадать последствия своих действий, отличить действительность от фантазий[6].

Edit: It seems that Mr. Numata's comments are also included in the commentary book for the TV program.
I can't read the original, but there are many articles online that mention it.

Edit: In the first place, it's not me who is calling it censorship, but Wikipedia and many other online book reviews.
There is no mention of translation issues at all.
Astyle is the only one that talks about translation.

I first wrote, "I've looked into it.".
I'm not the one claiming it's censored.
If you claim it's not censorship, why not refute it on a review site and edit Wikipedia?
 
Fake? Deliberate misinformation? As usual a blurry grainy picture, you can hardly make it out... I don't usually bother with these kind of reports but this one was slightly more interesting.

The chances of this thing coming from off-world are, shall we say, 'astronomically' low. But in that case... what the hell IS it? It's not a seagull, that's for sure!
And what about that bloody tictac? And the jellyfish... and that silver orb thing...:oops:

I need a shot of that bulgarian cognac... 😁

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GueHhT1jV0
 
blackbird9 said:
Fake? Deliberate misinformation?
Click to expand...
Distraction :p (depending on who's reporting it)

Don't we have satellites and stuff in space everywhere that'd surely notice something in-bound or randomly flying around off-planet?

Intelligent life would probably scan from afar too or make themselves known; why would they be "discrete" flying around in isolated obvious-looking silver orbs occasionally rarely being captured on grainy video? :p Passenger airplanes cover the skies with radar/visual 24/7. Random stuff can't reasonably be flying around on earth discretely, and it likely couldn't get to Earth without someone or something detecting it.

We have telescopes, ISS, and apparently enough inter-planetary interest to have a government entity called "Space Force"; grainy short video is too-easy :p
 
Charlie_ said:
Am I mistaken?
(I'm editing my previous post.)
ru.wikipedia.org

Солярис (роман) — Википедия

ru.wikipedia.org ru.wikipedia.org
Code: 
В первом русском переводе романа имелись изменения в заключительной главе «Древний мимоид» — был выброшен диалог Кельвина и Снаута о природе Океана как «ущербного бога», который неспособнен осознать множественность людей, их свободную волю к самостоятельным поступкам, который не может предугадать последствия своих действий, отличить действительность от фантазий[6].

Edit: It seems that Mr. Numata's comments are also included in the commentary book for the TV program.
I can't read the original, but there are many articles online that mention it.

Edit: In the first place, it's not me who is calling it censorship, but Wikipedia and many other online book reviews.
There is no mention of translation issues at all.
Astyle is the only one that talks about translation.

I first wrote, "I've looked into it.".
I'm not the one claiming it's censored.
If you claim it's not censorship, why not refute it on a review site and edit Wikipedia?
Click to expand...
OK, I read what you're referring to. And my reaction to that is, "Whose decision was it to omit that dialogue in the last chapter? Why was that dialogue omitted? (And not something else?)"

Sometimes, translators do take creative liberties when translating books.

"Creative liberties" means stuff like embellishments/explanations, additions and omissions of content, etc. Wikipedia does not seem to mention the reasoning behind that omission. Wikipedia does mention that the author was unhappy with some translations because they did not capture his message properly. Sometimes, creative liberties are necessary, because the very concept does not exist in the target language, and the very plot breaks up and stops making any sense in the target language.

Sometimes, such omissions can amount to censorship if the decision was made by someone in position of authority to enforce political correctness - like the head editor of a publishing house or above. Because of that, I'm now curious about exactly which reviews you saw that claimed that the omission of the aforementioned dialogue amounts to censorship. Can you please link to some of those reviews?

And - I know i'm repeating myself, but on Wikipedia, there's several mentions of the author being unhappy with the translations of the book - yep, this is because of translation issues. That is definitely mentioned in the English and Russian versions of the pages. Just re-read the "English Translation" section of the wikipedia page you linked to earlier in this thread: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solaris_(novel)#English_translation
 
I can't talk about English translations, I read "Solaris" in Serbian translation so long ago (in my early teens ~'83/'84) that I can't clearly remember, but I'm almost positive that this dialogue was included, if for nothing else, just by how huge impression it left on me and made me see life a bit differently. Only other book that left such impression on me at that age was "City" by Simak.
 
Charlie_ said:
Edit: I haven't read it, but apparently the translator, Mr. Numano, provides a detailed explanation of how the content was deleted from the Russian version in the afterword of the complete version.
According to Numano, nearly 40 pages of 400-character manuscript paper have been deleted across three chapters:
"Monsters," "Thinkers," and "Dreams," and he describes the deleted sections as "important passages that convey the work's rich imagery and broad ideological perspective."
Click to expand...

Now that I'm seeing the edits in previous posts, a logical conclusion for me is that the Japanese version is a translation of the Russian translation of the Solaris novel.

I'm just trying to piece the story together here. It really sounds like the Japanese translator was translating from the 1976 'complete' translation. And even in Russian translation from original Polish, there was confusion about whether the 'Ocean' character's gender is male or female! And I've read in lots of places about how in Japanese language, gender determination situation is even worse, and you really have to rely on context to determine if the conversation is about a man or a woman! Even a typical Japanese name like 'Kaoru' can mean a man's name or a woman's name! It's that bad.

When it's this hard to even determine the gender of the character in question, parts of the plot have to be discarded in translation just so that the story makes any sense. Yeah, I know this is a fantasy novel, but even those have storytelling rules.

Yeah, rich imagery from a novel can get lost due to translation issues like gender determination. Working around those issues is like trying to make a low-level, low-latency network between machines with big endian architectures and little-endian architectures - something will get lost due to that basic difference.

Those 40 pages that the Japanese translator claims were dropped in the Russian 1976 'complete' translation - there's no mention of anything related to that (on the Russian-language wikipedia page). There was a mention that a Polish reviewer tried to basically grep through that book for sexually explicit words, even though the very idea of that search was completely inappropriate for the book's plot/story:
1757708051667.png


To confirm the disappearance of those 40 pages that are supposedly missing in the the 'complete' Russian translation, you'd pretty much have to find and understand the Polish-language original. When there's confusion about whether a character is even a man or a woman, creative liberties are sometimes a crutch used by translators and editors so that the story is at least coherent and consistent.

I know that translators do take pride in their work, but the deeper I dive into this, the more I am getting the impression that the Japanese translator's conclusion (that the omission of those 40 pages in 3 different chapters, in the Russian 1976 'complete' translation, amounts to censorship) is premature.
 
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