nadiatims Wrote:I'm a fan of moses too. I especially like his attitude. Moses studies a very impressive number and variety of languages but jumps from one to the other before reaching a particularly high level, which is fine. But judging from this bbc video (which may well be heavily rehearsed and scripted), this guy seems more fluent in his (comparatively) limited number of his languages. His speed and accent seems good enough to convince me that he probably is reasonably fluent in all these languages. I can't really judge learning a few languages in detail as more impressive then learning the basics in 30. The only polyglots that annoy me are the ones that seem to massively exaggerate/misrepresent their own level.

i'd agree with much of this and think his video is impressive but also think there a lot of talented hyperpolyglots out there

Zgarbas Wrote:Romance languages may be similar but that doesn't make them a buy-one-get-one-free kind of deal. Sure, get a bit of basic training and you have a huge comprehensibility rate with them, but that doesn't mean you can use them.

doesn't mean you can use them? what do you mean?

[Zgarbas]

If I'm in Rome I can understand what the people are saying, but I can't answer back, I can't grasp beyond basic conversation, etc. Basic comprehension, but I can't actually use the language and it would be silly to state that I know it because of that. In fact, once I got around to actually learning a Romance language the common vocab was more bothersome than of help.

And you started your post stating that it is not impressive and that you can surpass him in a year.

guys i think we're being trolled..

I wish we were. : (

Interesting to say the least.
He got a head start by absorbing some of the languages he speaks naturally and while being a child.

About multilingualism, for me, being near fluent in a language is what counts because I learn languages to get into the culture, societies and the media of their respective countries. That being said, I don't think I'll ever go beyond 5 languages (I'm in the beginning of my third, and I'm sure the forth is inevitable in five years).

thecite Wrote:God, the amount of effort needed to maintain eleven languages -__-
It's enough just maintaining two.

True. I doubt that I'll add another language after Japanese because I find it hard to maintain fluency in the handful of languages I speak. Maintaining eleven languages must take a good part of your free time if you're not using at least some of them professionally. Admirable.

Zgarbas Wrote:And you started your post stating that it is not impressive and that you can surpass him in a year.

Where did I say I could surpass him in a year?! I didn't: You're making it up. I have been called a pedophile, a killer, psychopath and a worse still a recluse, but this time there is no evidence to support what you just said. Please apologise.

The net is split as to whether it is Collins or Harper Collins who ran the award - I want to contact them to find out how they tested fluency as this would be very interesting but I can't find anything on Collins' or Harper Collins' website which is very strange.

A video of a famous hyperpolyglot getting it wrong:

I showed the video to a friend of mine from South Africa and she said that his Afrikaans was perfectly accented and would probably think he was a native speaker if she didn't already know it was a language he learned on his own.

Did anyone read the article? He's only 20 years old. As far as I'm aware, he's much younger than the other polyglots who've been cited in this thread, yet he is at a similar, if not the same, level as them. He's just getting started...

I can't comment on any of the other languages but I can tell that he is not a native speaker of Dutch. He pronounces words rather stiff and his expression is also very bookish, like you will not find a person on the street that talks in that manner. Makes me suspect he might not be as fluent in the language as he claims.

oh don't, dtcamero will call you a troll...

Kuma01 Wrote:I can't comment on any of the other languages but I can tell that he is not a native speaker of Dutch. He pronounces words rather stiff and his expression is also very bookish, like you will not find a person on the street that talks in that manner. Makes me suspect he might not be as fluent in the language as he claims.

It's safe to say that his speech was heavily practiced and memorized, but I don't know if you can infer actual ability based on that. Most people not used to being on TV would probably sound pretty stiff even in their native language.

That said, most super polyglots hold themselves to an extremely low level standard for fluency. It's like how I play 8 instruments, but am not particularly excellent at any of them.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:

Zgarbas Wrote:And you started your post stating that it is not impressive and that you can surpass him in a year.

Where did I say I could surpass him in a year?! I didn't: You're making it up. I have been called a pedophile, a killer, psychopath and a worse still a recluse, but this time there is no evidence to support what you just said. Please apologise.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:English, German, Dutch, Afrikaans, are the same family (Germanic) and have similar vocabulary. I could learn these in a year.


French, , Catalan and Italian.Spanish Are the same family (romance) and have similar vocabulary. I could learn these in a year.

Right there.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:I have been called a pedophile, a killer, psychopath and a worse still a recluse, but this time there is no evidence to support what you just said. Please apologise.

Let's add "interminable bore" to that list.

quark Wrote:

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:

Zgarbas Wrote:And you started your post stating that it is not impressive and that you can surpass him in a year.

Where did I say I could surpass him in a year?! I didn't: You're making it up. I have been called a pedophile, a killer, psychopath and a worse still a recluse, but this time there is no evidence to support what you just said. Please apologise.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:English, German, Dutch, Afrikaans, are the same family (Germanic) and have similar vocabulary. I could learn these in a year.


French, , Catalan and Italian.Spanish Are the same family (romance) and have similar vocabulary. I could learn these in a year.

Right there.

I didn't say i could learn Hebrew, Russian or Greek in a year did I, you idiot?

Jarvik7 Wrote:That said, must super polyglots hold themselves to an extremely low level standard for fluency. It's like how I play 8 instruments, but am not particularly excellent at any of them.

Yes, this is why I was so cynical - Most of these claims I have followed up have been spurious to say the least and some out and out frauds. I just think 11 languages fluently without using them professionally every day is a bit over exaggerated. Kato Lomb is my favourite hyperpolyglot and she is well documented.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:

quark Wrote:

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:Where did I say I could surpass him in a year?! I didn't: You're making it up. I have been called a pedophile, a killer, psychopath and a worse still a recluse, but this time there is no evidence to support what you just said. Please apologise.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:English, German, Dutch, Afrikaans, are the same family (Germanic) and have similar vocabulary. I could learn these in a year.


French, , Catalan and Italian.Spanish Are the same family (romance) and have similar vocabulary. I could learn these in a year.

Right there.

I didn't say i could learn Hebrew, Russian or Greek in a year did I, you ***** idiot?

Wow. That's a real nice way to get people to take you and your accomplishments seriously. Bravo.
Maybe you could try learning some humility in a year and add that to your list of achievements.

biAtch Wrote:

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:I have been called a pedophile, a killer, psychopath and a worse still a recluse, but this time there is no evidence to support what you just said. Please apologise.

Let's add "interminable bore" to that list.

As I said before the admin edited the post: I think from your posts that you post just for a reaction: you may very easily prove me wrong: help out a person in the "whats this word/phrase? thread"

quark Wrote:Maybe you could try learning some humility in a year and add that to your list of achievements.

I have got humility - I wouldn't be challenging myself on the what's this word/phrase thread if I didn't have humility, you Joycean clown.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:

quark Wrote:Maybe you could try learning some humility in a year and add that to your list of achievements.

I have got humility - I wouldn't be challenging myself on the what's this word/phrase thread if I didn't have humility, you Joycean clown.

...Which is why you're resorting to insults and name-calling. Fine. I'm sorry. You are the best ever, and are WAY better than this fool who can only speak a meager 11 languages.

I am resorting to insults and name calling because you tried to make me look like a liar and a boastful fool.

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:I am referring to insults and name calling because you tried to make me look like a liar and a boastful fool.

I'm not trying to do anything. You're doing that all by yourself.

where have I lied?

HonyakuJoshua Wrote:where have I lied?

Sorry. You haven't actually lied, so I take that one back. But you still come across as being boastful and extremely rude.
It's a little disappointing to find a thread where people were excited and happy about another person's accomplishments (which are impressive, romance languages or not). You then proceeded to come in here, dump all over what he's done, proclaim that you're not impressed, say that he's not as good as the article says he is, get mad because no one is singing your praises, and then claim that you could achieve just as much as he did, if not more. You took a really positive and inspiring thread and made it negative and self-serving.
There's no point in arguing with you about this though, so I'm done.

Anyway...Holy crap! This guy can speak 11 languages? His German accent especially sounds really good. He's definitely inspires me to start kicking my butt in Japanese and get going on Korean.

quark Wrote:But you still come across as being boastful and extremely rude.
say that he's not as good as the article says he is, get mad because no one is singing your praises, and then claim that you could achieve just as much as he did, if not more. You took a really positive and inspiring thread and made it negative and self-serving.

I think I am a direct person who often rubs people up the wrong way and have been called rude before.

I didn't say I had achieved just as much as he did if not more. You are making things up again. I didn't mention my own achievements until someone asked me. I referred to Moses Mccormick who I think is AWESOME as well as Kato Lomb (whose book is available FREE http://tesl-ej.org/ej45/tesl-ej.ej45.fr1.pdf) who I recommend anyone who wants real inspiration should read about - she defo encouraged me to be a translator. I think what Rawlings did was impressive, just not impressive enough to call him "the man".

The closest language to my native one that he spoke was Russian. It did sound a bit exaggerated at times (as in Russian native speakers would not stress words that much) but I'm still muchly impressed. I'm looking forward to hearing him speaking Polish