Hi fellow listers !

Upon recommendation from Art Bahrs;-), I recently tried the simultaneous
translation facility at http://babelfish.altavista.com. Here are some
results :

Original text in English :

We made a promise we swore we'd always remember,
No retreat, baby, no surrender.

Translation into French (Babelfish) :

Nous avons fait une promesse que nous jurons que nous nous rappellerions
toujours, aucune retraite, bebe, aucune reddition.
Personal note : A fairly decent word-for-word tanslation, which I rate 95 %
correct.
Translation back into English :

We made a promise that us swearwords that we would remember always, no
retirement, baby, no rendering.
Personal note : Hmm... we're getting a bit off the original lyric. Do you
native English language experts can understand what it means ?
Now, let's try some multi-step process :
Original text in French (Excerpt from the Citizen's Rights Declaration,
1789) :
Les hommes naissent libres et egaux en droit, et le restent tout au long de
leur vie.
Translation into English (my own):
Men are born free and equal in right, and remain so throughout their life.
Translation into English (BabelFish):
The men are born free and equal in right, and remain it throughout their
life.
English into German (Babelfish):
Die Manner sind im Recht getragenes freies und gleich und bleiben es
wahrend ihrer Lebensdauer.
Personal note : I'm far from fluent in German, but this is beginning to get
hard to understand. Any German-speaking listers are invited to comment.
German into English (BabelFish):
The men are in the right carried free and and remain it during their life
span.
And, finally, back into French (BabelFish):
Les hommes dans le droit sont portes librement et et restent lui pendant
leur duree.
Which, as you may suspect, does not mean anything.
Art, I had real fun trying this facility. But, to be honest, if I ever
translate my technical papers from French into English, I'm pretty sure
I'll do it by myself.
Have fun !
Christian "will translate his technical papers into English himself... one
day ..." Lheureux