Translation software today employ information technology, which,
\nlike any other piece of tech surrounding us today, has a fascinating history.
\nIt is a mix of a plethora of disciplines, which, at first sight, have very
\nlittle in common. The history of artificial intelligence, a new subject
\nclustering a number of sciences together, also has a chapter on Romanian
\ncontribution, which consisted first and foremost in the marriage of linguistics
\nand mathematics.<\/p>\n
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Emerged in the United States, computational linguistics is the
\nsuccessful name of this inter-disciplinary field. It bridges the gap between
\nlanguage and computer science, studying the connection between natural language
\nand computer language as artificial intelligence. In the years before the
\nSecond World War, cybernetics was a novel science encouraging the association
\nbetween various fields of research. It was the forefather of computational
\nlinguistics. At the end of the 1930s, \u0218tefan Odobleja was one of the pioneers
\nof this new field. But after the second world war, when the Soviet occupation
\ncreated a new communist regime, the scientific prospects changed for the worse.
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In Romania, one of the pathfinders of computational linguistics was
\nmathematician Solomon Marcus. In a 1998 interview for the Center for Oral
\nHistory, Solomon Marcus described how the ideology of the one-party state
\nshaped scientific research. <\/p>\n
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Cybernetics was chastised as a bourgeois construct. At the time,
\nRomania was following Moscow’s orders to a fault. And Russian scientists came
\nup with a very inspiring idea, to separate certain linguistic research, such as
\nmathematical linguistics, from the broader umbrella of human sciences. They
\nassociated it to the branch of technological sciences. After a period of
\ncriticism against cybernetics, Moscow changed its attitude, hailing the
\ntechnological and scientific revolution. And hence this would become one of the
\ngoals of communist society, achieving a technological and scientific society. <\/p>\n
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As any other shift of policy adopted by the communist regime,
\npragmatism prevailed over ideology. The same happened in Moscow, and Soviet
\nsatellites followed closely in Moscow’s steps. Solomon Marcus:<\/p>\n
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Obviously, Bucharest too set out to accomplish this objective. It
\nachieved two things. First, it recognized all mathematical linguistic research,
\nand second, computation linguistics was associated with the technological and
\nscientific revolution. Mechanized translations was the goal at the time, and
\nefforts were made to make this happen. Machines, not people, were meant to do
\ntranslations. The issue was key, as both the Russians and the Americans wanted
\nto be able to swiftly translate texts from English and Russian. Linguistics had
\nbeen anathema to Stalin, considering his Marxist views. Yet, all of a sudden, computational
\nlinguistics was no longer stigmatized, being included in the branch of
\ntechnological sciences. <\/p>\n
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The two scientific communities, made up of philologists and
\nmathematicians, were unenthusiastic about the new discipline. Solomon Marcus:<\/p>\n
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Rosetti was one of the few philologists who hailed and encouraged
\nthis new type of activity. His peers either ignored the matter or argued
\nagainst it. They said it was not linguistics. Professor Emanuel Vasiliu’s
\napproach to linguistics was quite similar to logic and mathematics.
\nMathematicians, on the other hand, believed that mathematics was by tradition
\nclose to mechanics, physics or chemistry, but didn’t overstep the boundaries of
\nthese disciplines. Mathematics being associated with a human science such as
\nlinguistics went very much against tradition. Because of that, a great deal of
\nmathematicians were very skeptical. They didn’t believe this could work. I
\ncan’t say they took an active stance against it, but they were hesitant. Moisil
\nwas one of the few who were enthusiastic about it. You do realize the luck we
\nhad. Due to their support, we could teach mathematical linguistics at the
\nUniversity of Bucharest starting with the 1960s. <\/p>\n
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With a view to researching the new field, Solomon Marcus therefore
\ngot support from some of the most influential mathematicians, like Grigore
\nMoisil, and from philologists like Alexandru Rosetti. He therefore moved to
\nimplementing the new tendencies in university lectures and published articles. <\/p>\n
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I was very lucky, because I remembered that Moisil and Rosetti
\nworked together and militated for the introduction of mathematical linguistics
\nactivities in Romania. They also championed the creation of a mathematical linguistics
\nuniversity class, and Romania was one of the first countries in the world to
\nhave this discipline taught in universities. Emanuel Vasiliu and I, a
\nmathematician and a linguist, we had a good start in the field. We also
\nbenefited from certain exchanges with our peers abroad. I had published a
\nmathematical linguistics handbook at the University of Bucharest in 1963, and
\nthis allowed us to send our papers to various scholars abroad who were pursuing
\nsimilar lines of research. The handbook was immediately translated in London,
\nNew York, Moscow, Paris and Prague. <\/p>\n
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In 1966, Bucharest played host to the International Linguistics
\nCongress, bringing together a number of prestigious scholars in the field. The
\nevent put Romania on the map of world science and turned computational
\nlinguistics into the most important science that would shape people’s way of
\nlife over the coming decades. (V. Palcu)<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Romania’s contribution to the development of this science<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":131141,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41141],"tags":[42884,42885,42793,36832],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-131140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-history-show","tag-computational-linguistics","tag-linguistic-research","tag-solomon-marcus","tag-ussr"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n