What does this say in English?
July 3, 2008 2:31 PM   Subscribe

Can someone help me translate a bit of text from German to English, for an article I'm writing? (GoogleTranslate and Babelfish aren't quite cutting it)

Demnach werden hohe Anforderungen an die Wahrscheinlichkeit und Bedeutung des Erkenntnisgewinns eines Projekts der Grundlagenforschung gestellt, damit dieses einen Tierversuch zu rechtfertigen vermag, während bei angewandter Forschung im medizinischen Bereich ein "einsehbarer" Zusammenhang zwischen dem Tierversuch und dem Schutz der Gesundheit genügt. Dass Forschungsuntersuchungen an Tieren "allen Regeln der Wissenschaftlichkeit genügen" müssen, wird als unabhängige weitere Voraussetzung postuliert: ''Insbesondere müssen die angestrebten Ergebnisse eindeutig über das Bekannte hinausweisen; die zu prüfend Annahme muss sinnvoll, das gewählt Verfahren erfolgversprechend und dem jeweiligen Stand der Forschung angepasst sein".
posted by alohaliz to Society & Culture (11 answers total)
 
Response by poster: Yeah, I'm trying to quote from it, so I want it to be accurate...this is what Google gave me:

Accordingly, high demands on the likelihood and importance of the realization of a project of the profit basic research, so this one animal attempt to justify them, while applied research in the medical field "einsehbarer" link between the animal trial and the protection of health is enough. That research studies on animals "all the rules of scientific standards" must, as an independent further condition postulated:''In particular, the results clearly on the Known hinausweisen the acceptance testing to be useful to the elected promising procedure and the current state of research adapted "

according to Babelfish, einsehbarer = observably, hinausweisen = out-wise(?)
posted by alohaliz at 3:13 PM on July 3, 2008


einsehbarer: more observable? Still working on the rest of it.
posted by nax at 3:44 PM on July 3, 2008


I am not fluent, but work in a related field, so understand the sense of this. Here is my best stab:

Accordingly, high standards must be set based on the probability and significance of the research goals of the basic research project, for which an animal study can be justified,
while for applied medical research, a clear link between the animal study and protection of health will suffice.

The fact that research studies on animals must meet all scientific requirements, implies a further condition:
"In particular, the expected benefits must outweigh the known risks; the test results must be useful and the procedure [protocol] likely to advance the state of research."
posted by blue_wardrobe at 3:47 PM on July 3, 2008


here's what I'm getting, with my rusty German and handy Cassel's:

Demnach werden hohe Anforderungen an die Wahrscheinlichkeit und Bedeutung des Erkenntnisgewinns eines Projekts der Grundlagenforschung gestellt,

Therefore expectations of the likelihood and meaning of a project outcome will be dependent on the original premise;

damit dieses einen Tierversuch zu rechtfertigen vermag, während bei angewandter Forschung im medizinischen Bereich ein "einsehbarer" Zusammenhang zwischen dem Tierversuch und dem Schutz der Gesundheit genügt.

whereas to be able to reconcile the animal research to related experiments in the medical field, an observable correlation between the animal research and ??? is sufficient.

Dass Forschungsuntersuchungen an Tieren "allen Regeln der Wissenschaftlichkeit genügen" müssen, wird als unabhängige weitere Voraussetzung postuliert:

In order for experimental investigations of animals to sufficiently follow the scientific needs, an unrelated further condition must be postulated:

''Insbesondere müssen die angestrebten Ergebnisse eindeutig über das Bekannte hinausweisen; die zu prüfend Annahme muss sinnvoll, das gewählt Verfahren erfolgversprechend und dem jeweiligen Stand der Forschung angepasst sein".

This is coming up gibberish in my brain and through my dictionary. I feel like key words are missing and the grammar is not making sense to me, but I really think blue wardrobe's got it. Been a long time since I've done this. Those of you with current German skills, please don't be too harsh!
posted by nax at 4:06 PM on July 3, 2008


Demnach werden hohe Anforderungen an die Wahrscheinlichkeit und Bedeutung des Erkenntnisgewinns eines Projekts der Grundlagenforschung gestellt, damit dieses einen Tierversuch zu rechtfertigen vermag, während bei angewandter Forschung im medizinischen Bereich ein "einsehbarer" Zusammenhang zwischen dem Tierversuch und dem Schutz der Gesundheit genügt.

Therefore high demands regarding the probability and significance of the gain in knowledge are placed on a project of pure research in order to be able to justify animal experimentation, whereas with applied research in a medical realm a "predictable [? "visible"/"understandable"] connection between the animal experimentation and the protection of health suffices.

Dass Forschungsuntersuchungen an Tieren "allen Regeln der Wissenschaftlichkeit genügen" müssen, wird als unabhängige weitere Voraussetzung postuliert: ''Insbesondere müssen die angestrebten Ergebnisse eindeutig über das Bekannte hinausweisen; die zu prüfend Annahme muss sinnvoll, das gewählt Verfahren erfolgversprechend und dem jeweiligen Stand der Forschung angepasst sein".

That research investigations [this is probably actually some term w/ established translation I don't know] on animals must "satisfy all rules of a scientific nature" is postulated as a further independent presupposition: "in particular, the sought-after results must point unambiguously beyond what is already known; the hypothesis to be tested must be useful and the chosen procedure must promise results and be appropriate to the current state of research.
posted by kenko at 4:27 PM on July 3, 2008


"
posted by kenko at 4:27 PM on July 3, 2008


I see the trouble with einsehbarer now. It's a derivate of "einsehbar".

einsehbar = visible, understandable, obvious
einsehbarer = more visible, more understandable, more obvious

so, "a more obvious connection" between the animal study and health protection will suffice.
posted by blue_wardrobe at 4:49 PM on July 3, 2008


No, just "an obvious connection": the adjective is declined following the article.
posted by kenko at 5:11 PM on July 3, 2008


"einsehbar" - I think maybe the word you're looking for in this context is "demonstrable".

So something like,
demonstrable connection between the animal experimentation and the protection of health suffices.
I might unpack the whole paragraph into a little more natural English word order like this:
Therefore, to justify animal experimentation on a project of pure research, high demands are made regarding the probability and significance of the advance in knowledge, whereas with applied research in a medical realm, it is enough to be able to show a connection between the animal experimentation and protection of health.
posted by flug at 5:37 PM on July 3, 2008


Demnach werden hohe Anforderungen an die Wahrscheinlichkeit und Bedeutung des Erkenntnisgewinns eines Projekts der Grundlagenforschung gestellt, damit dieses einen Tierversuch zu rechtfertigen vermag, während bei angewandter Forschung im medizinischen Bereich ein "einsehbarer" Zusammenhang zwischen dem Tierversuch und dem Schutz der Gesundheit genügt. Dass Forschungsuntersuchungen an Tieren "allen Regeln der Wissenschaftlichkeit genügen" müssen, wird als unabhängige weitere Voraussetzung postuliert: ''Insbesondere müssen die angestrebten Ergebnisse eindeutig über das Bekannte hinausweisen; die zu prüfend Annahme muss sinnvoll, das gewählt Verfahren erfolgversprechend und dem jeweiligen Stand der Forschung angepasst sein".

"Accordingly, projects in basic research are held to high standards for the probability and significance of the advance in knowledge if experimentation on animals is to be justified, whereas for applied research in the field of medicine it is sufficient that the animal experimentation must have an evident [einsehbarer] relevance to the protection of health. An additional and independent condition states that research on animals must "satisfy all rules of scientific method": "In particular, the results aimed at must unequivocally point beyond what is currently known; the hypothesis to be tested has to be reasonable, and the chosen procedure has to be such that it is likely to ensure success and conforms to the current state of research."

Notes: "einsehbarer" has the -er on the end because it modifies the masculine nominative "Zusammenhang". It means you can see or reconstruct the connection. I don't like kenko's "rules of a scientific nature" for "alle Regeln der Wissenschaftlichkeit". We're not talking about scientific laws, like the law of gravity; we're talking about procedural norms of science. My "scientific method" may be a bit too specific, but on the other hand I found this: "scientific method: the totality of principles and processes regarded as characteristic of or necessary for scientific investigation, generally taken to include rules for concept formation, conduct of observations and experiments, and validation of hypotheses by observations or experiments", which seems to fit the bill. I don't like "research investigations" for "Forschungsuntersuchungen" because it's redundant. Yes, so is the original. Germans often use redundant noun constructions for no reason other than that they like how it sounds, like "Baukonstruktion". A "Forschungsuntersuchung" is just "Forschung", in other words "eine Untersuchung", in other words research or an investigation. I don't like calling "sinnvoll" "useful" -- "sinnvoll" means it has to make sense or be reasonable, in other words you shouldn't be refuting nonsense. In real-world terms it boils down to usefulness, but the word means "reasonable" in this context. "Erfolgsversprechend" is a sticky point. It's usually translated as "promising", which to my mind does not mean a 100% guarantee or a literal promise. This is why I don't like kenko's "promise results", so I hemmed and hawed a bit in my translation, but I might have been too conservative. "angepasst" means you've adapted or conformed something to some standard.

I do this professionally, so if you want more translated, send me an email at k.schoellner@stanfordalumni.org and be ready to pay me. I'm not expensive.
posted by creasy boy at 2:40 AM on July 4, 2008 [1 favorite]


I like that creasy boy's translation is nearly as incomprehensible as the German, keeping it in the spirit of scientific writing. (with all due respect, cb. I'm not worthy!)

;)
posted by nax at 6:17 AM on July 5, 2008


« Older Ticket system that runs off emails   |   Record player recommendations? Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.