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Ad Mundo Exteriore,
Oniichan told me that there are no other translations of Ragnarok available on the web (none by a manga scanslation group, I mean), which means whatever I translate will be accepted as unofficially official by all the fans out there who are too lazy to learn Korean or buy the licensed commercial translations. Ahh! What pressure!
The licensed commercial translations are horrible by the way. I mean, I thought I was translating loosely, but the licensed version is a total copout. >_< They avoided all the difficult phrases and completely changed the dialogue. Just removed what little trust I had in American commercial releases of anime and manga.
Some thoughts on history: I think history is probably central to all the social sciences. I can't imagine studying international relations or philosophy without studying history. It's not so for economics, but economics is more mathematical than any other social science. You can probably learn math without really learning the historical development behind it, i.e. knowing "Cartesian plane" without knowing "Descartes". This is very true for my chemistry class. Henderson and Hasselbalch? Who? Nernst? What? We just remember their equations and formulae, and we feel happy. But you can't discuss Kant without discussing Hume without discussing Locke and Descartes without discussing Aristotle without discussing Plato without discussing Socrates without discussing the Pre-Socratics and Sophists...etc. Nor can you discuss international relations without referring to the flow of history. Thus, all social studies teachers at our school are history teachers. They may dabble in electives, but without being trained to teach history they would be incompetent.
Still reading Chesterton. Will be reviving the Chesterton quote of the day sometime in the near future. Chesterton, by the way, raises an interesting idea in his biography of St. Francis when he points out that the austerity of the Church during the Middle Ages was necessary to "purge" the world of the excessive hedonism of the pre-Christian Hellenic world. (I'm calling it Hellenic not Roman because it began with Greece.) He claims that paganism in its worship of nature ended up pursuing what was unnatural. (Think gladiators. Think feasting on snails that died of overfeeding on milk and honey. Think vomitoriums. Think Nero.) I don't know if I agree with his analysis, but it certainly is a nicely topsy-turvy way of looking at things. I really enjoy the way that Chesterton goes about shattering the icons of the iconoclasts. He has a perversity towards the perverse, a refusal to accept the assumptions of those who claim to deny assumptions. (He also understands the importance of historical continuity and the fact that not all change is revolution or reaction.) This is why I want to write like him. Also still in the middle of Babel Tower, but distracted by Father Brown mysteries and Hikaru no Go.
I can beat the computer with a six stone handicap without taking back any moves. I can beat the computer with a four stone handicap if I'm allowed to replay stupid moves. Not attempting three stones until I pass the four stone hurdle. The computer resigns a five stone handicap immediately which suggests that it has only one strategy in its arsenal. This hypothesis is further supported by the fact that it plays the same opening move against my even stone handicaps. I know how to beat its strategy now, but I do occasionally mess up on life and death problems, which is why I need to take back moves on the four stone handicap. (On the six stone, I beat it too quickly for my mistakes to matter.) I've realized that I've learned absolutely nothing about Go in the process—instead, I just know how to defeat the computer's strategy. I'm like those older boys in the game room from Ender's Game. I'll lose easily if I played against anyone who knew how to exploit my computer dependency. I've actually learned more from reading books and watching the "Go Go Igo!" segments that come with the anime. I also realized that playing on a 9x9 does nothing for me in terms of my greatest weakness at board games. Whether it is chess or Go or Chinese chess, I play badly mainly because I fail to build up any large-scale strategic formations. I focus on the local battle instead of seeing the board as a whole. (That's why I need to win quickly at o-mok, that five-in-a-row game. If I let the game progress too long, then I lose because of this shortsightedness.) Isn't it terribly ironic that I'm bad at large-scale strategy when I'm supposed to role-play Ender?
I don't think I can manage Hikaru no Go shounen ai. I feel like I've gotten so enamoured of subtlety that I can't manage narrating anything happening directly. How pretentiously incompetent.
...Tari
Oniichan told me that there are no other translations of Ragnarok available on the web (none by a manga scanslation group, I mean), which means whatever I translate will be accepted as unofficially official by all the fans out there who are too lazy to learn Korean or buy the licensed commercial translations. Ahh! What pressure!
The licensed commercial translations are horrible by the way. I mean, I thought I was translating loosely, but the licensed version is a total copout. >_< They avoided all the difficult phrases and completely changed the dialogue. Just removed what little trust I had in American commercial releases of anime and manga.
Some thoughts on history: I think history is probably central to all the social sciences. I can't imagine studying international relations or philosophy without studying history. It's not so for economics, but economics is more mathematical than any other social science. You can probably learn math without really learning the historical development behind it, i.e. knowing "Cartesian plane" without knowing "Descartes". This is very true for my chemistry class. Henderson and Hasselbalch? Who? Nernst? What? We just remember their equations and formulae, and we feel happy. But you can't discuss Kant without discussing Hume without discussing Locke and Descartes without discussing Aristotle without discussing Plato without discussing Socrates without discussing the Pre-Socratics and Sophists...etc. Nor can you discuss international relations without referring to the flow of history. Thus, all social studies teachers at our school are history teachers. They may dabble in electives, but without being trained to teach history they would be incompetent.
Still reading Chesterton. Will be reviving the Chesterton quote of the day sometime in the near future. Chesterton, by the way, raises an interesting idea in his biography of St. Francis when he points out that the austerity of the Church during the Middle Ages was necessary to "purge" the world of the excessive hedonism of the pre-Christian Hellenic world. (I'm calling it Hellenic not Roman because it began with Greece.) He claims that paganism in its worship of nature ended up pursuing what was unnatural. (Think gladiators. Think feasting on snails that died of overfeeding on milk and honey. Think vomitoriums. Think Nero.) I don't know if I agree with his analysis, but it certainly is a nicely topsy-turvy way of looking at things. I really enjoy the way that Chesterton goes about shattering the icons of the iconoclasts. He has a perversity towards the perverse, a refusal to accept the assumptions of those who claim to deny assumptions. (He also understands the importance of historical continuity and the fact that not all change is revolution or reaction.) This is why I want to write like him. Also still in the middle of Babel Tower, but distracted by Father Brown mysteries and Hikaru no Go.
I can beat the computer with a six stone handicap without taking back any moves. I can beat the computer with a four stone handicap if I'm allowed to replay stupid moves. Not attempting three stones until I pass the four stone hurdle. The computer resigns a five stone handicap immediately which suggests that it has only one strategy in its arsenal. This hypothesis is further supported by the fact that it plays the same opening move against my even stone handicaps. I know how to beat its strategy now, but I do occasionally mess up on life and death problems, which is why I need to take back moves on the four stone handicap. (On the six stone, I beat it too quickly for my mistakes to matter.) I've realized that I've learned absolutely nothing about Go in the process—instead, I just know how to defeat the computer's strategy. I'm like those older boys in the game room from Ender's Game. I'll lose easily if I played against anyone who knew how to exploit my computer dependency. I've actually learned more from reading books and watching the "Go Go Igo!" segments that come with the anime. I also realized that playing on a 9x9 does nothing for me in terms of my greatest weakness at board games. Whether it is chess or Go or Chinese chess, I play badly mainly because I fail to build up any large-scale strategic formations. I focus on the local battle instead of seeing the board as a whole. (That's why I need to win quickly at o-mok, that five-in-a-row game. If I let the game progress too long, then I lose because of this shortsightedness.) Isn't it terribly ironic that I'm bad at large-scale strategy when I'm supposed to role-play Ender?
I don't think I can manage Hikaru no Go shounen ai. I feel like I've gotten so enamoured of subtlety that I can't manage narrating anything happening directly. How pretentiously incompetent.
...Tari
