I mean, I can't say for sure, but if we take Derrida's ideas I'm talking about in this thread as a guide, the question kind of doesn't make sense. There is no such thing as an "untranslatable" concept, because words don't have specific meanings that come from outside of their historical (and other) contingencies. You are always translating, in some sense.
That is, it's not even clear that the unit of "x language" is the right unit to consider for translating. "différance" is not a standard French word, so even someone who does natively speak French wouldn't immediately understand it, though it might be easier for them since they know things that are closer to its understanding. Jargons form sub-languages. To take it back to programming for a moment, the sentence "I built this web application in Python" is an English sentence, using only English words, that even many children could understand in a grammar and vocabulary sense. But it may not make any sense to them unless they understand that "Python" in this context means a programming language and not a snake, and even if they do understand that it's a programming language, they may not understand the implications of that as well as someone who is a developer.
Like, even if we did say "sorry philosophy must be done in English," if I said "oh you know how D&G said 'Multiplicities are rhizomatic, and expose arborescent pseudomultiplicities for what they are'? Well, I was thinking about that, and..." you would still likely need 'translation' for, I'm guessing, four of those eleven words. It's pretty much halfway to "Les multiplicités sont rhizomatiques, et dénoncent les pseudomultiplicités arborescentes" and is unique enough of a sentence that even though I haven't read Mille Plateaux in French (because again my French is basically non-existent), I was able to grab the original quote pretty quickly. You'd also maybe not recognize "D&G" and may need expansion on that, even if grammatically you would understand it as some sort of subject of the sentence that produced the quote.
I guess at this point I turn into a cliche and find french philosophy not that interesting.
It seems to me that (those damned barrel-dwelling philosophers) ask all the questions backwards, as if their goal is to eventually gain an adequate non-understanding of something.
Besides ambiguity and context dependence "I built this web application using Python" also has a translatable meaning. You might need to translate "python" to "my computer" or "built" to "construit." You will have a hard time without pre-existing notions of computers or web applications. The sentence is translatable though.
A lot of things don't exist if you look too closely, but appear as you zoom out. There is no such thing as "species" in nature. It's a classification created by people. Language. Yet, it does describe something that nature abides by sometimes. It exists, even if it isn't discrete.
To each their own :) I don't find the analytic project compelling, generally. Good thing there's lots of room!
> also has a translatable meaning
Yes. My point is that everything is "translatable." There is nothing that cannot be translated.
> There is no such thing as "species" in nature. It's a classification created by people.
Yes, this is a fantastic example, and actually pretty close to my favorite French guy's heart. Maybe you've got some continental in you after all. ;) (I think you're arguing that a continental person would argue that species don't exist, but many at least wouldn't. They would exactly argue that it's a system created by people, that is sometimes useful, and sometimes not.)
I think you might be misunderestimating. The terms are loser leaves the internet. No quarter.
I didn't mean to imply either position by continentals. I don't really know enough about this stuff to have such a specific stereotyping. Also, as an irishman I fart in a specific general direction on anglo-french disputes.
I picked species naively. It's just a good example of "exists yet doesn't." I assumed we can all agree that it exists, yet doesn't. I don't see what the problem is, philosophically. Both the word species and the phenomenon are approximations. That kind of "problem" is abundant. Money is that. Language is that. Etc.
The problem can be approached from a lot of ways philosophically. Geeky, information-centric understandings. Classical, plato-esque idealism. None of these are incompatible and I don't really see what problem we're trying we're trying to solve. Some stuff isn't stuff. When was this not known?
I mean, I can't say for sure, but if we take Derrida's ideas I'm talking about in this thread as a guide, the question kind of doesn't make sense. There is no such thing as an "untranslatable" concept, because words don't have specific meanings that come from outside of their historical (and other) contingencies. You are always translating, in some sense.
That is, it's not even clear that the unit of "x language" is the right unit to consider for translating. "différance" is not a standard French word, so even someone who does natively speak French wouldn't immediately understand it, though it might be easier for them since they know things that are closer to its understanding. Jargons form sub-languages. To take it back to programming for a moment, the sentence "I built this web application in Python" is an English sentence, using only English words, that even many children could understand in a grammar and vocabulary sense. But it may not make any sense to them unless they understand that "Python" in this context means a programming language and not a snake, and even if they do understand that it's a programming language, they may not understand the implications of that as well as someone who is a developer.
Like, even if we did say "sorry philosophy must be done in English," if I said "oh you know how D&G said 'Multiplicities are rhizomatic, and expose arborescent pseudomultiplicities for what they are'? Well, I was thinking about that, and..." you would still likely need 'translation' for, I'm guessing, four of those eleven words. It's pretty much halfway to "Les multiplicités sont rhizomatiques, et dénoncent les pseudomultiplicités arborescentes" and is unique enough of a sentence that even though I haven't read Mille Plateaux in French (because again my French is basically non-existent), I was able to grab the original quote pretty quickly. You'd also maybe not recognize "D&G" and may need expansion on that, even if grammatically you would understand it as some sort of subject of the sentence that produced the quote.