Any Norsk Speakers Here?

[Nolan]

Nolan, that you're confused as to where you served your mission twenty years ago is not the fault of age.

I’m not confused about that, it was certainly a typo. I mixed up the two languages I was interested in learning (at the time). But, yes, now I’m very embarrassed. Do I have Alzheimer’s?

[Gunnar]

Did you serve in the Netherlands or in Norway?

Oh no, that’s embarrassing. I feel very old now. My mission was in Netherlands (Dutch speaking), but the only companion I really liked, and still talk to to this day was from Norway and I had fun learning a bit of Norwegian as well. As a missionary, I thought I was invincible and the gift of tongues was real. Sorry about that.

That you served a mission in the Netherlands and learned Norwegian in addition to Dutch because you had a Norwegian companion is a more interesting story than mine, in my opinion! Certainly there are similarities between Dutch and the Scandinavian languages. I know of a few cases where Danes mistakenly mistook newbie missionaries as speaking Danish with a Dutch accent, before they realized that they were American Mormon missionaries.

[drumdude]

Some tips for your next sock puppet:

Here's a breakdown of what makes a phrase like "Jeg er ganske rusten selv" lean towards computer translation rather than simply a poor or non-native speaker:

Characteristics of Computer Translation:

Literalness/Word-for-Word Translation: This is the biggest giveaway. Computer translation, especially older or simpler models, often translates each word directly without fully grasping the nuances of idiomatic expressions. "Rusty" in English (meaning out of practice) is an idiom. While "rusten" in Norwegian can mean physically rusty, its direct application to a skill is less common as a natural, fluid expression among native speakers. A human translator would likely choose a more common Norwegian idiom or a different, more natural way to express "out of practice."

Grammatically Correct but Unnatural Phrasing: The sentence is grammatically sound in Norwegian. There are no obvious errors in verb conjugation, noun agreement, or sentence structure. This contrasts with a poor speaker, who might make grammatical mistakes that reveal their struggle with the language's rules.

Lack of Nuance/Idiomatic Creativity: Human speakers, even non-native ones who are proficient, often try to use or adapt idioms, sometimes creatively or imperfectly. A computer translation tends to stick to the most direct, often bland, translation.

Consistency in Directness: If you saw several sentences from the same source that consistently rendered English idioms or colloquialisms in a very literal way, it would strongly suggest machine translation.

Characteristics of a Poor Speaker (Non-Native Speaker):

Grammatical Errors: This is a primary indicator. A non-native speaker might make errors in:

Verb conjugation: Incorrect tenses, agreements.

Noun gender/number: Mismatches that are specific to the target language.

Prepositions: Using the wrong prepositions is a very common non-native error.

Word order: Deviations from standard sentence structure.

Vocabulary Mismatches (beyond idioms): A poor speaker might use a word that is technically correct but doesn't quite fit the context, or they might struggle to find the right word entirely.

Pronunciation/Accent (in spoken language): This is the most obvious indicator in speech, but not relevant for written text.

Hesitation/Disfluencies (in spoken language): Pauses, "ums," "uhs," repetitions.

Direct Translation of their native language's idioms: While machine translation does this, a non-native speaker might also directly translate an idiom from their own first language into the second language, which would sound equally unnatural but might also carry a hint of their original language's specific cultural or linguistic patterns. In this case, "rusty" is an English idiom directly translated, which points to the source language being English.

Overly formal or overly informal language: Sometimes a non-native speaker struggles to hit the right register for a given situation.

Simplified sentences: To avoid errors, a non-native speaker might use very basic sentence structures.

Why "Jeg er ganske rusten selv" leans towards machine:

The sentence "Jeg er ganske rusten selv" is too perfect grammatically for a typical poor speaker struggling with Norwegian, yet the idiomatic usage of "rusten" for "rusty" (out of practice) is a direct, literal translation of an English idiom. A human, even one learning Norwegian, would likely either:

Try to find a more natural Norwegian equivalent, or

Make other, more obvious grammatical or lexical errors if they were truly "poor" at the language.

The combination of grammatical correctness with slightly unnatural idiomatic phrasing is a hallmark of current machine translation capabilities. They're excellent at syntax and basic vocabulary but still often miss the subtle, natural flow and idiomatic choices of a native speaker.

[Morley]

Some tips for your next sock puppet:

<Snip>

Beautiful!