Marker-based filtering of bilingual phrase pairs for SMT

State-of-the-art statistical machine translation systems make use of a large translation table obtained after scoring a set of bilingual phrase pairs automatically extracted from a parallel corpus. The number of bilingual phrase pairs extracted from a pair of aligned sentences grows exponentially as the length of the sentences increases; therefore, the number of entries in the phrase table used to carry out the translation may become unmanageable, especially when online, 'on demand' translation is required in real time. We describe the use of closed-class words to filter the set of bilingual phrase pairs extracted from the parallel corpus by taking into account the alignment information and the type of the words involved in the alignments. On four European language pairs, we show that our simple yet novel approach can filter the phrase table by up to a third yet still provide competitive results compared to the baseline. Furthermore, it provides a nice balance between the unfiltered approach and pruning using stop words, where the deterioration in translation quality is unacceptably high

Hybrid rule-based - example-based MT: feeding apertium with sub-sentential translation units

This paper describes a hybrid machine translation (MT) approach that consists of integrating bilingual chunks (sub-sentential translation units) obtained from parallel corpora into an MT system built using the Apertium free/open-source rule-based machine translation platform, which uses a shallow-transfer translation approach. In the integration of bilingual chunks, special care has been taken so as not to break the application of the existing Apertium structural transfer rules, since this would increase the number of ungrammatical translations. The method consists of (i) the application of a dynamic-programming algorithm to compute the best translation coverage of the input sentence given the collection of bilingual chunks available; (ii) the translation of the input sentence as usual by Apertium; and (iii) the application of a language model to choose one of the possible translations for each of the bilingual chunks detected. Results are reported for the translation from English-to-Spanish, and vice versa, when marker-based bilingual chunks automatically obtained from parallel corpora are used

Conservation of the european mining and metallurgical heritage. Part 2

In the June 1999 issue of the CIM Bulletin an inventory of Mining Museums Across Canada was published. Because museums are an important educational tool and a touristic attraction, it is a pleasure to have professors Octavio Puche Riart and Luis Felipe Mazadiego Martinez respond to our invitation to write about the European mining and metallurgical museums. Part 1 of this article appeared in the May 2000 issue

From Anthropometry of the Chilean Child to Mapuche´s Anthropology. Leotardo Matus: Scientific Practices and Body Measurements. Chile, 1906- 1915

El objetivo de este trabajo es describir la trayectoria científica desplegada por Matus entre los años 1906 y 1915, examinando las prácticas de recolección y organización de los datos utilizados para la antropometría y la antropología, las discusiones metodológicas sobre la aplicación de técnicas e instrumentos utilizados en ambas disciplinas, como así también el establecimiento de relaciones académicas y los diálogos que sostuvo con las distintas instituciones y agentes involucrados. En un contexto marcado por la búsqueda de la especificidad de "la raza chilena", ambas investigaciones, le permitieron a Matus elaborar un retrato científico capaz de revelar las características raciales de la población chilena.This paper describes the scientific career developed by Matus between 1906 and 1915. Particularly, attention is paid to the collection and organization of his anthropometrical and anthropological data, to his methodological discussions on techniques and instruments used, and to the academic and institutional networks he built throughout. In a context where defining a "Chilean race" was a prominent scientific and political objective, both studies allowed Matus to establish a scientific definition over the racial characteristics of the Chilean population

The Villavicencio’s vineyard in Maule. 1711-1726

Las cuentas de gastos de la vendimia de Villavicencio, en la zona de Maule Sur, son la base para la realización de un análisis de los distintos elementos presentes en la faena: trabajadores y su mantención, insumos y herramientas, y de su producción. La información va desde el año de 1711 hasta 1726, lo que permite entender de cierta manera los procesos que se llevaron a cabo, poniendo en escena lo que significó la labor de cada participante y los insumos requeridos. La presente propuesta radica en entender estos “micro-espacios”, como es esta estancia, en su propia dimensión, constituida en escenario de información vitivinícola, tanto de los productos requeridos para su labor como también del componente humano imprescindible.The expense accounts for the wine production in Villavicencio, in southern Maule, are the basis for an analysis of the different elements present in its production: workers and their maintenance, supplies and tools, and the production process. The information comes from the years 1711-1726, which allows us to start to understand the processes that were carried out, and what was required of each participant at each stage. By this we hope to begin to understand "micro-spaces" such as this hacienda in their own dimension, within the world of wine production, by studying the products required for its work, and the essential human component

Impact of large-scale tests in contexts of weak technical tradition Experience of Mexico and the Iberoamerican Group for PISA

El artículo inicia con un breve repaso del desarrollo de la psicometría, que destaca la brecha entre la situación de Estados Unidos y la de otros países, sobre todo de menor desarrollo, en cuanto a la existencia de personal calificado en temas técnicos complejos. En seguida se hacen consideraciones sobre la noción de validez y su importancia, en especial en cuanto a la validez de consecuencias. Luego se describe el impacto de las evaluaciones, con especial atención a las de gran escala y las internacionales, con el caso de PISA, considerando en especial el caso de países con una tradición psicométrica débil. En la conclusión se discute el tema, a partir de la experiencia de México y del Grupo Iberoamericano de PISA.The paper begins with a brief review of the development of psychometrics, which highlights the gap between the situation in the US and in other countries, especially less developed, as to the existence of qualified personnel in complex technical issues. Then considerations are made on the notion of validity and its importance, especially concerning consequential validity. Impact of the tests is then described, with special attention to large scale and international, with the case of PISA, and mainly concerning countries with weak psychometric tradition. In the conclusion the whole issue is discussed, from the experience of Mexico and the Latin American Group of PISA

The concern about educational quality and its social value

The article is based on the observation that in many countries there is widespread concern about the quality of their respective education systems. Next, the support of this concern is analyzed; at least in part, it is based on a superficial interpretation of the results of large-scale performance tests, such as those promoted by the OECD, which are known by the acronym PISA. Then we reflect on the risk that a limited vision of the notion of educational quality can lead to neglect fundamental dimensions of the educational endeavor, and we conclude with considerations about the social value of educationEl artículo parte de la constatación de que en muchos países se detecta una extendida preocupación por la calidad de sus respectivos sistemas educativos. En seguida se analiza el sustento que tiene esa preocupación, en parte basada en una interpretación superficial de los resultados de pruebas en gran escala de rendimiento, como las promovidas por la OCDE que se conocen con la sigla PISA. Luego se reflexiona sobre el riesgo de que una visión limitada de la noción de calidad educativa puede llevar a descuidar dimensiones fundamentales de la tarea educativa, y se concluye con consideraciones sobre el valor social de la educación