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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   2606 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 17, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Is learning new languages actually worth it for adults?

I have met people who have lived in a country for years, are intelligent and have studied hard. Yet they are far from a native speaker. Those who haven't spoken their new language for years seem to lose it. Is picking up French/German/Spanish worth it? It seems like an enormous investment to develop worse language skills than the average native 12-year-old. Even when it comes to enjoying the culture in the native language, I am not even sure it would be the case. A person who learned latin and read Caesar's memoirs in the original latin would probably get less out of it due to their lacking latin than reading a translated copy.

I studied a language for 6 years in school. Along with everyone I know who hasn't studied their extra language extensively post school I can barely write a paragraph in it. Was it a giant waste of time to have Spanish or French an hour a week for 6 years when the results are lacking?

If learning a language meant learning it to the point of fluency or near native ability, I could see the point. However, most learners seem to spend countless hours learning without being able to have a conversation that doesn't require effort from both parties.

I don't think it's worth it. You already know the most common global language, and quite a few people in every country speaks it. You'll gain the ability to talk to tens of millions more French people - how valuable is this, when there are a billion english speakers you could talk to now but don't? Language learning is more like a hobby than anything else.

Also, we have to be under a decade out, from a fully functional babelfish live audio translation tool, which would obviate most of the practical utility. All of the pieces are there. I think current implementations still have significant latency problems, but latency is something a few more generations of chips and product development solve.

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