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12 Months of Mandarin

isaak.net

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Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#191

Post by fn-mote »

TrapLord_Rhodo wrote: post #186
gljiva wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I had the impression that Chinese will likely become very useful during our lifetimes... With the momentum their economy has, I expect knowledge of both English and Chinese to become a very sought out skill

tarrifs and other measures within the US and EU seem to be going the opposite direction.

It’s very hard to see how those local barriers to entry would reverse the global trend (I might even use a stronger word, closer to juggernaut.)

TBH, automated translation is the only potential I see to reduce the massive need for Chinese language skills in the future. Already we (in the US) get (and choose to use!!) parts whose data sheets are only available in Chinese. It seems clear to me where we are going.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#192

Post by kragen »

TrapLord_Rhodo wrote: post #186
gljiva wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I had the impression that Chinese will likely become very useful during our lifetimes... With the momentum their economy has, I expect knowledge of both English and Chinese to become a very sought out skill

tarrifs and other measures within the US and EU seem to be going the opposite direction.

That's what people in the Soviet Union thought 50 years ago too, about the USA.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#193

Post by pabloescobyte »

chairmansteve wrote: post #185
TheEzEzz wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wrote my own dynamic keyboard layout to optimize typing speed while procrastinating on my dissertation. 15 years later I'm still using it. My dissertation not so much. Procrastination is (sometimes) awesome.

Dynamic keyboard layout? What is that? The keys change place?

Probably using a QMK firmware-based keyboard where you can access different layers and shortcuts.

I'm using one right now (though mine runs off ZMK which is similar but wireless) which is a split with just 42 keys. The rest--numbers, symbols, function keys, etc. are all under layers. The layout is dynamic because holding down different keys makes the layout 'change' as you do so. Holding down the left spacebar and pressing 'Z' sends 'F1' to the computer while holding down another key on the right half turns my WER/SDF/XCV keys into a Numpad, etc.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#194

Post by fn-mote »

hintymad wrote: post #157
wantsanagent wrote: post #138

I don't care about learning Mandarin, I want to find out how this guy's motivation system works and then download it into my brain. Doing a PhD and learning Mandarin as a side project ?! Doing hours of Anki practice and new note taking, some of it while running on a treadmill? There's just a crazy amount of drive (and what sounds like an epic memory) here. I don't think people consider base motivation enough when thi…

I'm guessing for someone learning a new language is relaxing and therefore helps recharging the person after hours of intense PhD work - things like enjoying daily progress, discovery of foreign culture, the euphoria of being able to read and watch new stuff...

Exactly this.

Unlike the PhD, they make daily progress on the language. Success is visible.

(Edit: ok, the truth is they were not doing this at the same time as the PhD. I still like my comment.)

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#195

Post by latentsea »

gljiva wrote: post #183
msvan wrote: post #174

I kind of see myself from ten years ago in this blog post! I also obsessively studied Mandarin Chinese in my late teens for the sheer fun of it, before doing a math undergrad. I even wrote comments on Hacker News about it a decade ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7622940 . At the time I had seemingly limitless motivation for grinding away on flashcards and other learning materials. My progress was strong and…

Interesting. I had the impression that Chinese will likely become very useful during our lifetimes... With the momentum their economy has, I expect knowledge of both English and Chinese to become a very sought out skill

Except that lots of Chinese already speak English, and their Chinese is better, so I don't ever see a large market for mandarin skills in non-native speakers on the same scale as English.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#196

Post by b112 »

pabloescobyte wrote: post #193
chairmansteve wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dynamic keyboard layout? What is that? The keys change place?

Probably using a QMK firmware-based keyboard where you can access different layers and shortcuts. I'm using one right now (though mine runs off ZMK which is similar but wireless) which is a split with just 42 keys. The rest--numbers, symbols, function keys, etc. are all under layers. The layout is dynamic because holding down different keys makes the layout 'change' as you do so. Holding down the left spacebar and pr…

Side effect, no one knows your passwords, even if they watch you type!

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#197

Post by latentsea »

hintymad wrote: post #157
wantsanagent wrote: post #138

I don't care about learning Mandarin, I want to find out how this guy's motivation system works and then download it into my brain. Doing a PhD and learning Mandarin as a side project ?! Doing hours of Anki practice and new note taking, some of it while running on a treadmill? There's just a crazy amount of drive (and what sounds like an epic memory) here. I don't think people consider base motivation enough when thi…

I'm guessing for someone learning a new language is relaxing and therefore helps recharging the person after hours of intense PhD work - things like enjoying daily progress, discovery of foreign culture, the euphoria of being able to read and watch new stuff...

Learning a new language is a stressful grind. I've studied CJK at a similar pace as this article, and it's equal parts exhaustion as it is elation. Not for the feint of heart.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#198

Post by wordpad25 »

suriya-ganesh wrote: post #177
hbn wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Controversial take but I think the state of therapy/psychiatry has become a bit of a joke over the past handful of years where people have normalized the idea that everyone needs to be speaking to a therapist. With the fact you can shop around for a therapist, and the fact that most people like being told their problems are others' faults, you have an industry that from my view has mostly just taught everyone to exte…

This is not true. Honestly, diagnosing for ADHD accelerate the improvement. It is impossible to fight if you don't know what you're fighting. It enables you to prevent repeated patterns, not chasing your tail in an endless struggle.

You are so right. People imagine everyone going to therapy to cope, but really it's being able to recognize triggers and adapt.

Everyone already does it in some ways - for example, you know you make mistakes when tired tired - you recognize you are tired this moment and decided to reschedule the important activity.

Therapy gives same tool - you recognize you are having an episode and take steps to avoid typical negative outcomes.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#199

Post by latentsea »

kentosi-dw wrote: post #12

The importance of an SRS system like Anki cannot be overstated. However I can see how this might be a burden to some when it comes to entering in your own sentences. For this, I highly recommend making use of your OS's dictation (speech to text) feature. You get to practice speaking _and_ enter sentences much quicker.

I actually think the 6 days a week of tutoring is the thing that needs to be emphasised more. That's the thing that really makes it all come together.

Particularly if you have extremely fast lookup methods like rikachan or language reactor, you can basically just recoup the time on spamming input and re-doing the lookups until they stick, while it being more fun and lower stress.

A grammar deck up to intermediate level grammar is worth smashing out as fast as humanly possible though.

Re: 12 Months of Mandarin

#200

Post by chemmail »

msvan wrote: post #174

I kind of see myself from ten years ago in this blog post! I also obsessively studied Mandarin Chinese in my late teens for the sheer fun of it, before doing a math undergrad. I even wrote comments on Hacker News about it a decade ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7622940 . At the time I had seemingly limitless motivation for grinding away on flashcards and other learning materials. My progress was strong and…

This is nuts, if i learned Mandarin, i would probably move to Taiwan, where the CoL is almost 1/4th of where I am right now. I know some other languages, but loss the will to study anymore lol.
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