And still you're fluent in English (I assume) - it's not an issue with the English language but your understanding of the context. Japanese (and Chinese) work a bit differently than latin languages. Even if you know 100% of the kanji (very few Japanese people do), it doesn't mean you know 100% of the words - and vice versa. Since the characters are idiomatic, it also makes it easier to guess the meaning of a word or character you don't know than if they would have been written out phonetically.

Kanji: The Chinese characters in question

N2: The second highest level of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT). N1 is by many seen as a very high bar and many Japanese employers demand it if you'll be using Japanese as your main working language. N2 is generally attained after 1-2 years of Japanese studies.

> Since the characters are idiomatic, it also makes it easier to guess the meaning of a word or character you don't know than if they would have been written out phonetically.

Ideographic, as in trying to portray ideas graphically, not idiomatic, as in using expressions like a native speaker

I had a feeling I was not using the right word, thanks for pointing out :)

> "N2 is generally attained after 1-2 years of Japanese studies"

From my own experience, this would only be true in the most favorable of the situations. 2 years studying fulltime while living in Japan sounds about right. 1 year studying as a hobby few hours a week, no way.

Oh yeah, I definitely meant full-time studies coupled with practice outside of study-hours.

I think your estimate for N2 is a bit too optimistic: passing it in two years would be very difficult without living in Japan.

For context, it took me 3 years of university (outside Japan) to pass N2.

Surely no one knows all the Kanji, since some of them have open academic investigation whether they even are a valid character or not?

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2018/10/29/language/ghost-...

No one knows "all Kanji" much like no one knows "all English words" even in native English-speaking countries.

Do kanji handwriting-recognition models even “know” (i.e. are trained on) all in-use kanji, or do they just not bother with some of the rarest ones because their presence in the dataset would decrease the likelihood of correctly matching more-common characters, which it’s overwhelmingly-likely are what you’re writing?

Presumably it's the same as words in English, where you'd never make a word suggestion model that just blindly considers all possible words. You swipe jow or gow and it will change it to "how" despite the other two existing in arguably correct English in some very obscure case.

Indeed. Which means if your goal is fluency, it's silly to strive for 100.0%.

I think even if you reach the parent comment's 98% point, "N2" will not appear there. But 90% English is probably good enough to be able to reason "N2 must be some kind of level".

I've personally always advised my students to increase difficulty once they've reached 87.5% accuracy.

(I'm just amused of all the % thrown around I this thread)

Exactly. You need to be in the zone of proximate development or learning isn’t very efficient. I remember as a teen I had a fixed mindset and would get 100% on every calculus test. The problem became that I liked getting a perfect so much that ended up actively avoiding harder material and just sticking with what I was taught in school. I was afraid of posing interesting problems to my self out of fear that I wouldn’t be able to answer them.

This is a dangerous and corrosive mindset that did a lot of harm to me and other people I know. It took me maybe until 25 to actually start to accept my lack of knowledge and incompetence and start to do something with it. I sometimes wonder what my life would be like if I had the emotional maturity to challenge myself at a young age instead of pursuing destructive perfectionism.

In case someone else wants to know:

From a quick Google I gathered that there are 5 levels of proficiency you can certify with. They are N1 to N5, N1 is the highest rating.

I thought his first sentence made his point. I didn't know what an N2 was either, but from the context I thought it could be some kind of test he barely passed.

Maybe whether one can make a reasonable guess depends on more than the context - perhaps background, experience, and point of view. I know I've missed points that are obvious to others because of our differing perspectives.

> the irony is that your first sentence is an excellent demonstration of the parent comments point

And allow me to claim that you've actually proved your parent's point! I have no idea what an "N2" is either but from the context was able to accurately guess that it's some kind of proficiency test.