Trouble understanding this apology: 我々が...謝罪


An English website wrote an apology in Japanese after it took down an image of
cracked hinomaru (日の丸) — the hinomaru linked to a donation page for the
disasters following the March 11 earthquakes.

It read: 我々が 起こした偉大な犯罪の謝罪 (われわれが おこした いだいな はんざいの しゃざい)

I understand the meaning, but I don't really get how this sentence works.

It's really tricky for me because no one explicitly apologizes, or there is no
actual apologizing here. Is something like です dropped, or する? If a です is
dropped, I see that as saying they are the apology...is that a valid way to
apologize?

And is 偉大な犯罪 strange in this context? I thought 偉大 was more along the lines
magnificence rather than greatness in terms of magnitude.




This is some very obvious example of Google Translate gone out of hand.

At the very best, it is missing some bits. But best I can tell, it's mostly
nonsensical.

* * *

**Edit:** OK, so I was hoping we could swiftly address that: put it under
"machine-translated gibberish" and move on...

But it seems like some people are not fully convinced that this is absolute
gibberish. For some reason, they think there is a point in trying to fathom
what the transistors at Google's Data Center were thinking when they came up
with that (to be clear: "What is a good way to give an apology in situation
X?" would make a very good _and separate_ question).

Oh let me count the ways Google Translate is wrong:

  * 我々: is almost certainly not the right word here (but would need context to be sure)
  * 起こす: probably not, either.
  * 偉大な: is pretty much the opposite of what they want to say ("great", but in a positive way, i.e.: "awesome")
  * 犯罪【はんざい】(crime): is hilariously inappropriate. I suspect an unforgivably literal translation of "offense"...
  * that の between 犯罪 and 謝罪 makes no sense, any way you look at it...
  * 謝罪【しゃざい】(apology): probably not the word you want. 謝る【あやまる】 or 詫びる【わびる】: more likely...

Are we satisfied that _no part_ of this sentence makes any sense now?

And just before anyone says anything: _no_ , this wasn't a useful exercise in
any way... Your time and brain cells will be much better used, reading human-
generated Japanese...




This is some very obvious example of Google Translate gone out of hand.

At the very best, it is missing some bits. But best I can tell, it's mostly
nonsensical.

* * *

**Edit:** OK, so I was hoping we could swiftly address that: put it under
"machine-translated gibberish" and move on...

But it seems like some people are not fully convinced that this is absolute
gibberish. For some reason, they think there is a point in trying to fathom
what the transistors at Google's Data Center were thinking when they came up
with that (to be clear: "What is a good way to give an apology in situation
X?" would make a very good _and separate_ question).

Oh let me count the ways Google Translate is wrong:

  * 我々: is almost certainly not the right word here (but would need context to be sure)
  * 起こす: probably not, either.
  * 偉大な: is pretty much the opposite of what they want to say ("great", but in a positive way, i.e.: "awesome")
  * 犯罪【はんざい】(crime): is hilariously inappropriate. I suspect an unforgivably literal translation of "offense"...
  * that の between 犯罪 and 謝罪 makes no sense, any way you look at it...
  * 謝罪【しゃざい】(apology): probably not the word you want. 謝る【あやまる】 or 詫びる【わびる】: more likely...

Are we satisfied that _no part_ of this sentence makes any sense now?

And just before anyone says anything: _no_ , this wasn't a useful exercise in
any way... Your time and brain cells will be much better used, reading human-
generated Japanese...

