March 29, 2024, 05:07:24 AM
Forum Rules: Read This Before Posting


Topic: Valuable chemistry languages  (Read 4465 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline makesyourjrock

  • New Member
  • **
  • Posts: 3
  • Mole Snacks: +0/-0
Valuable chemistry languages
« on: November 02, 2013, 11:45:06 PM »
Hey my university requires a couple semesters of a foreign language and I plan on a career of chemistry research. Does anyone have any input for what languages might be valuable?
Thanks

Offline curiouscat

  • Chemist
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Posts: 3006
  • Mole Snacks: +121/-35
Re: Valuable chemistry languages
« Reply #1 on: November 02, 2013, 11:55:07 PM »
German.

Offline Arkcon

  • Retired Staff
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Posts: 7367
  • Mole Snacks: +533/-147
Re: Valuable chemistry languages
« Reply #2 on: November 03, 2013, 07:00:48 AM »
German.

Unless that's your native language, in which case that hardly counts as "foreign."  Heh.  Seriously 'tho, this requirement is outdated.  Maybe in the 1960's, many important documents weren't yet translated, particularly from German.  However, a few decades of requiring students to "take a foreign language for a science degree" has resulted in every scientific paper, no matter how trivial, being translated almost immediately from every language into every other.  So default to German, or take an easier one, or ask your academic adviser and do what they say, or take an obscure one to challenge yourself, or take an ethnically appropriate one -- do you have a Russian or Japanese great-grandmother?  No matter what, it will hardly matter in the future.
Hey, I'm not judging.  I just like to shoot straight.  I'm a man of science.

Offline curiouscat

  • Chemist
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Posts: 3006
  • Mole Snacks: +121/-35
Re: Valuable chemistry languages
« Reply #3 on: November 03, 2013, 08:48:17 AM »
German.

Unless that's your native language, in which case that hardly counts as "foreign."  Heh. 

English then. :)

Quote
Seriously 'tho, this requirement is outdated. 

Agree. Most US PhD programs I know got rid of it in the 90's.

Quote
Maybe in the 1960's, many important documents weren't yet translated, particularly from German.  However, a few decades of requiring students to "take a foreign language for a science degree" has resulted in every scientific paper, no matter how trivial, being translated almost immediately from every language into every other.


True for new papers. But I still keep coming across older potentially useful papers that I get stuck on. In German, Russian, Japanese, French in roughly that order of occurrence.

Older stuff is as yet untranslated and Google etc. translates scientific documents quite atrociously. A good technical translator can easily bill $50-per-page translated.


Offline curiouscat

  • Chemist
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Posts: 3006
  • Mole Snacks: +121/-35
Re: Valuable chemistry languages
« Reply #4 on: November 03, 2013, 08:49:43 AM »
An alternative new-age strategy might be to learn Chinese or Spanish since that's where you'll possibly end up visiting for new plant setup, design etc.

Offline magician4

  • Chemist
  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 567
  • Mole Snacks: +70/-11
Re: Valuable chemistry languages
« Reply #5 on: November 03, 2013, 11:10:47 AM »
I would recommend Latin, so you can talk science with every Catholic priest thereafter, whereever you are, and maybe even convince the pope
a worthy endeavour!  ;D

bring the good news to the folks!

regards

Ingo
There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
(Douglas Adams)

Offline billnotgatez

  • Global Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 4399
  • Mole Snacks: +223/-62
  • Gender: Male
Re: Valuable chemistry languages
« Reply #6 on: November 03, 2013, 11:36:43 AM »
From the Internet
Quote
Here's a listing of the ten most popular languages spoken worldwide, along with the approximate number of primary or first language speakers for that language.

1. Mandarin Chinese - 882 million
2. Spanish - 325 million
3. English - 312-380 million
4. Arabic - 206-422 million
5. Hindi - 181 million
6. Portuguese - 178 million
7. Bengali - 173 million
8. Russian - 146 million
9. Japanese - 128 million
10. German - 96 million

Sponsored Links