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自分が読んで興味深く感じた英文記事を中心に取り上げる予定です
Posted at 2014.09.09 Category : 読書報告
日曜日に紹介させていただいたBarry Lancetさんの話を聞いてきました。動画は昨年のものです。写真ではスリラー作家のようにかっこいい感じに映っていましたが、実際は動画のようにやさしい感じの方でした。 Japantownという本が昨年発売されていたのを知っていましたが、てっきり日本をよく知らない作家が書いているものだと思ってスルーしていました。ところがLancetさんは英文書籍を扱っていた講談社インターナショナルに長らく勤めていた方でさまざまな日本関連本を手がけ、日本語にも堪能でした。 このシリージの面白いところは、他のアメリカ人なら見落としてしまう手がかりを日本に精通している主人公が読み解いていくところにあるようです。日本人英語学習者にも楽しめそうな感じですよね。 BOOKS
Veteran Tokyo editor turns his mind to crimeBY MARK SCHREIBER SPECIAL TO THE JAPAN TIMES “For one thing, Brodie (the book’s protagonist) was born in Japan to American parents who were both Caucasian,” he says. “He’s completely fluent in the language, making him an insider who can explain the country in terms that outsiders can understand.”
しかし何と言っても、ロストやスタートレックが有名なJ. J AbramsがJapantownのテレビ放映権を獲得したことでしょうか。Lancetさんの話によると、もともと日本を題材にしたドラマを探していたが、なかなかいいものに出会えていなかったそうです。 J. J Abramsや講談社インターナショナルの頃の話はTokyo Weekenderの記事にも出ていました。講談社インターナショナルは2011年に解散したのですが、作家デビューの後押しとなったようです。 Author Barry Lancet Talks about the Inspiration for His “Japantown” Thriller Series
Arts Japanese culture - July 19th, 2014 Mixing high culture with the seedy shadow side of the societies of Japan and the US, Japantown found a rapt audience even before it hit the shelves: the novel was reprinted three times before it was released, and once more one week after publication. Abrams, the director, writer and producer behind the recent Star Trek reboots and the immensely popular TV series Lost, has plans to turn the books into a television series through his production company, Bad Robot.
But between the interrogation session at that police station and the overnight success of his first novel, there were two decades of work as an editor with the Japanese publishing house, Kodansha International. Lancet commissioned and organized book projects for projects such as high-end cookbooks, studies of Asian philosophy, and others; this experience is part of what gives his fictional hero his deep knowledge of Japanese culture. As he explains, the novel itself took a long time to write: he jotted down ideas while on daily commutes and weekends, but chose to stay away from editing fiction at his day job. It was the closing of Kodansha that gave him the push to give the writing a solid year, but his advice for any budding writer is to keep at their projects every day, “even if it’s for five minutes in any given day.”
早くもシリーズ化され、4冊目まで契約をし、3冊目が来年11月に出るそうです。短期間で注目を浴びるようになりましたが、これは長い間の編集経験が生きているとJapan Timesの記事で話しています。作風についてもいろいろな試行錯誤の末に見つけたもののようです。 BOOKS
Veteran Tokyo editor turns his mind to crimeBY MARK SCHREIBER SPECIAL TO THE JAPAN TIMES Lancet credits his previous career as an editor at Kodansha International in Tokyo for giving him a wide range of exposure to Asian history and culture.
“Over the years I edited, acquired and developed dozens of works on art, history, Asian philosophy and other nonfiction books. I was able to meet experts in the field, go behind closed doors and delve deeply into many facets of the culture.”
He can’t say exactly how long it took him to write his first book.
“I was searching for my voice and the best way to tell the story. The first version was hardboiled, the second medium with punch, and the third and final incarnation was — and still is — a mystery-thriller with an edge. But the main thing is, I plugged away until I found a tone and an angle that met my vision.”
最新作Tokyo Killが発売されたばかりなんですが、表紙に隅田川とスカイツリーが描かれています。この本の評価がどうなるにしろ、表紙にスカイツリーが初めて描かれた本として歴史に名を刻むことになるとユーモアたっぷりに語っていました。 ミーハー全開で恥ずかしいですが、JJ Abramsが放映権を獲得したと聞いてJapantownを読み始めました（苦笑）最初の部分を試し読みできます。主人公の生い立ちが分かるところです。absorbed the language and culture like a spongeなんてのは日本語と同じ比喩ですね。 4分２５秒あたりから
I was the go-to guy for the SFPD on anything Japanese—even though my name is Jim Brodie, I'm six-one, a hundred-ninety pounds, and have black hair and blue eyes. And I'm Caucasian.
The connection? I'd spent the first seventeen years of my life in Tokyo, where I was born to a rugged Irish-American father, who lived and breathed law enforcement, and a more delicate American mother, who loved art. Money was tight, so I attended local schools instead of one of the exorbitant American international facilities and absorbed the language and culture like a sponge.
Along the way, I picked up karate and judo from two of the top masters in the Japanese capital, and thanks to my mother got my first peek at the fascinating world of Japanese art.
What drew my parents to the far side of the Pacific was the U.S. Army. Jake, my father, headed up a squad of MPs in charge of security for Western Tokyo, then worked for the LAPD. But he took orders badly so he eventually returned to Tokyo, where he set up the city's first American-style PI/security firm.
JapantownとTokyo Kill、２冊読み終わったらまたご報告させていただくかもしれません。
Posted at 2014.09.08 Category : Economist
ハフィントンポストでEconomistが奴隷制の本を書評した記事を撤回したことを知りました。Economistでもこのようなことがあるのですね。 The Economist Admits Slavery Was Pretty 'Evil' After AllThe Huffington Post | By Jack Mirkinson Email Posted: 09/05/2014 9:18 am EDT The Economist withdrew a nearly comically misguided piece of writing from its website on Friday, admitting that a book review that called for a more objective treatment of slavery should never have made it through the editing process.
The magazine had published the review of Edward Baptist's book “The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism” on Thursday. The review, which, like nearly everything in The Economist, did not carry a byline, lamented that all the white people in the book—namely, the people who owned the slaves—were portrayed as bad for some reason:
Mr Baptist has not written an objective history of slavery. Almost all the blacks in his book are victims, almost all the whites villains. This is not history; it is advocacy.
Economistのサイトでは以下のような断り書きがありました。最後にin the interests of transparency, anybody who wants to see the withdrawn review can click hereと、非難されたレビューを読めるようにしておくのはなかなかできないことだと思います。 American slavery
Blood cotton
How slaves built American capitalismSep 6th 2014 | From the print edition Apology: In our review of “The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism” by Edward Baptist, we said: “Mr Baptist has not written an objective history of slavery. Almost all the blacks in his book are victims, almost all the whites villains.” There has been widespread criticism of this, and rightly so. Slavery was an evil system, in which the great majority of victims were blacks, and the great majority of whites involved in slavery were willing participants and beneficiaries of that evil. We regret having published this and apologise for having done so. We are therefore withdrawing the review but in the interests of transparency, anybody who wants to see the withdrawn review can click here.
“Almost all the blacks in his book are victims, almost all the whites villains. This is not history; it is advocacy.”という主張は、被害者からしてみれば、加害者の都合を反映した勝手な理屈に思えてしまうかもしれません。
Posted at 2014.09.07 Category : 未分類
南新宿にある紀伊国屋の洋書売り場がBooks Kinokuniya Tokyoとなってからイベントにも力を入れるようになっているのですね。 Books Kinokuniya Tokyo】 Meet the Author! Barry Lancet on Sept. 7thAuthor of "Japantown" and "Tokyo Kill"
We are thrilled to invite Mr. Barry Lancet, author of the crime novel "Japantown" and upcoming sequel "Tokyo Kill", for a talk session and book signing in our store. In "Japantown", antique art dealer Jim Brodie inherits his father's private investigation firm in Tokyo. When he is called by the San Francisco Police Department to consult on a Japan-related multiple murder, Brodie must fly to a remote Japanese village and face dangers from an unknown enemy. An edge-of-your-seat novel, with TV dramatisation rights sold in the US!
"A sophisticated international thriller" - The New York Times Book Review
DATE: September 7th, Sunday 2014 1:00pm
PLACE: 6th Floor event space, Books Kinokuniya Tokyo
ADMISSION: FREE. No registration required.
LANGUAGE: Talk session will be in English, followed by a Q&A in English and Japanese.
BOOK SIGNING: Please purchase a copy of "Japantown" or "Tokyo Kill".
To make inquiries, call 03-5361-3316 (10:00am - 8:30pm
ちょうどJapan Times On Sundayの書評も彼の新作を紹介していました。間に合うか微妙ですが、時間があえばのぞいてみようと思います。 BOOKS Veteran Tokyo editor turns his mind to crimeBY MARK SCHREIBER SPECIAL TO THE JAPAN TIMES
Posted at 2014.09.07 Category : 読書報告
今回のエントリーは素人談義ですので、取り扱い注意でよろしくお願いします。下記の本を読んだのですが、自分の読みたい情報を自分勝手に読み込んでしまっている可能性があるからです。 この本はロボットが知能を持てるか、知能とはどういうことかを考察しているのですが、第三章の「自ら言葉を学ぶ知能」が興味深かったのでご紹介します。 Yutaの問題関心は、読解でよく言われる「ゆっくり読んで分からないものは速く読んでも分からない」という主張です。自分は精読を完全否定する立場ではないですが、構文や単語知識を駆使して精読を主張する人が速読多読の人になっているのをほとんどみかけない状況を考慮すると、このもっともらしいモデルが自分には説得力があるとは思えないのです。だからといって、「読めるようになるには読むしかない」というYutaの経験に基づいた主張が説得力をもったものではないのも理解しています。精読派には、脳みそ空っぽの精神論者と思われてしまっているかもしれません。 本で紹介されていた論文はあくまで、「単語の区切りがどこになるかを推定するに足るだけの情報が、文章それ自体の中に潜んでいる」ことにすぎませんが、「読めるようになるには読むしかない」という方向性に近いと思えてならないのです。 単語の区切りというのは言語取得が済んだわれわれには当然のことと思えます。 ほら、おにぎりですよ 上記の分があれば、「ほら／おにぎり／ですよ」のように区切ることができます。ただ、言語知識がなく、音声だけを聞いた場合には「ほらお／にぎ／りで／すよ」というように区切る可能性だってあるのですよね。 単語知識があるから、文章を意味のかたまりとして区切ることができる、となると、単語知識をまず覚えないといけないという立場になりやすいです。これは、単語学習派、構文学習派の考えに近いのではないでしょうか。 「単語知識を持っていないと与えられた文を形態素解析できないという問題」に対して、「単語知識を前提としない形態素解析の理論」があるそうです。それが以下の論文です。 ベイズ階層言語モデルによる教師なし形態素解析 論文の概要を読んでもなんのこっちゃですが、ここでの「教師なし」とは、与えられたデータ以外の外的な情報を使わないことだそうです。本では、「与えられた文書の単語の区切りと単語に関する確率的な知識である言語モデルを、与えられた文書だけから同時に推定する手法を提案して、それが既存の形態素解析器に劣らない性能を出すことを示した。」と説明していました。 概要
本論文では, 教師データや辞書を必要とせず, あらゆる言語に適用できる教師なし形態素解析器および言語 モデルを提案する. 観測された文字列を, 文字 n グラム-単語 n グラムをノンパラメトリックベイズ法の枠組 で統合した確率モデルからの出力とみなし, MCMC 法と動的計画法を用いて, 繰り返し隠れた「単語」を 推定する. 提案法は, あらゆる言語の生文字列から直接, 全く知識なしに Kneser-Ney と同等に高精度にス ムージングされ, 未知語のない n グラム言語モデルを構築する方法とみなすこともできる. 話し言葉や古文を含む日本語, および中国語単語分割の標準的なデータセットでの実験により, 提案法の有 効性および効率性を確認した.
キーワード: 形態素解析, 単語分割, 言語モデル, ノンパラメトリックベイズ法, MCMC
Abstract
This paper proposes a novel unsupervised morphological analyzer of arbitrary language that does not need any supervised segmentation nor dictionary. Assuming a string as the output from a nonpara- metric Bayesian hierarchical n-gram language model of words and characters, “words” are iteratively estimated during inference by a combination of MCMC and an efficient dynamic programming. This model can also be considered as a method to learn an accurate n-gram language model directly from characters without any “word” information.
Keywords: Word segmentation, Language Modeling, Nonparametric Bayes, MCMC
Alice in Wonderlandの例が以下ですが、(a)のデータが辞書や参照資料を使わなくても(b)のように区切れています。 lastly,shepicturedtoherselfhowthissamelittlesisterofhe rswould,intheafter-time,beherselfagrownwoman;andh owshewouldkeep,throughallherriperyears,thesimplean dlovingheartofherchildhood:andhowshewouldgathera boutherotherlittlechildren,andmaketheireyesbrightan deagerwithmanyastrangetale,perhapsevenwiththedre amofwonderlandoflongago:andhowshewouldfeelwitha lltheirsimplesorrows,andfindapleasureinalltheirsimple joys,rememberingherownchild-life,andthehappysumm erdays.
(a) 学習データ (部分).
last ly , she pictured to herself how this same little sister of her s would , inthe after - time , be herself agrown woman ; and how she would keep , through allher ripery ears , the simple and loving heart of her child hood : and how she would gather about her other little children ,and make theireyes bright and eager with many a strange tale , perhaps even with the dream of wonderland of longago : and how she would feel with all their simple sorrow s , and find a pleasure in all their simple joys , remember ing her own child - life , and thehappy summerday s .
(b) 単語分割結果. 辞書は一切使用していない.
図 12: “Alice in Wonderland ” の単語分割.
最後に, 提案法は東洋語だけでなく, 西欧語やアラ ビア語にもそのまま適用することができる. 図 12 に, 空白をすべて削除した “Alice in Wonderland ” の学 習テキストと, そこから推定した単語分割を示す. この学習テキストは 1,431 文, 115,961 文字と非常に小さいにもかかわらず, 教師なしで驚くほど正確な単語 分割が得られている. また, last-ly, her-s など接尾辞 が自動的に分離されていることに注意されたい. こ うした結果は屈折や複合語の多いドイツ語, フィンラ ンド語等の解析に特に有用だと考えられる.
英文読解のモデルにいきなり適用するのは無理解で強引かもしれません。それに、単語知識なんて不要だという乱暴な議論をしたいのではありません。単語知識があれば分析がスムーズになるでしょう。今回のはあくまで他の資料を使わずに単語区切りが可能だと示しているにすぎませんが、「読むことによって読めるようになる」可能性を示す論考ではないかと思いました。
Posted at 2014.09.07 Category : New York Times
スラヴォイ・ジジェクという哲学者がISISの動きを近代化を進めしつつも天皇を中心とする新政府を樹立した明治維新に近いものとみていました。 THE STONE
ISIS Is a Disgrace to True FundamentalismBy SLAVOJ ZIZEK SEPTEMBER 3, 2014 2:45 PM Does this make ISIS premodern? Instead of seeing in ISIS a case of extreme resistance to modernization, one should rather conceive of it as a case of perverted modernization and locate it into the series of conservative modernizations which began with the Meiji restoration in 19th-century Japan (rapid industrial modernization assumed the ideological form of “restoration,” or the return to the full authority of the emperor).
ただ、このエッセイについては、以前の著作の焼き直しが問題になっているようです。新たに以下のような注意書きがついていました。 Editors' Note: September 5, 2014
After this essay was published, a reader pointed out that several sections had originally appeared, in identical or substantially similar form, in Slavoj Zizek's 2008 book, "Violence: Six Sideways Reflections." The New York Times does not ordinarily reprint material that has been previously published; Op-Ed contributors are asked to affirm that their work is original, and exclusive to The Times. Had The Times known that portions of the essay were copied from an earlier work, it would not have accepted the essay for publication.
確かに以下のパラグラフのWilliam Butler Yeats’ “Second Coming”の部分からは、Violence: Six Sideways Reflectionsの72ページとほぼ同じでした。Terrorist Resentmentのチャプターの部分です。 It may appear that the split between the permissive First World and the fundamentalist reaction to it runs more and more along the lines of the opposition between leading a long satisfying life full of material and cultural wealth and dedicating one’s life to some transcendent cause. Is this antagonism not the one between what Nietzsche called “passive” and “active” nihilism? We in the West are the Nietzschean Last Men, immersed in stupid daily pleasures, while the Muslim radicals are ready to risk everything, engaged in the struggle up to their self-destruction. William Butler Yeats’ “Second Coming” seems perfectly to render our present predicament: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” This is an excellent description of the current split between anemic liberals and impassioned fundamentalists. “The best” are no longer able fully to engage, while “the worst” engage in racist, religious, sexist fanaticism.
次のパラグラフでタイトルにあったDisgrace to True Fundamentalismの意味を説明してくれています。本当の原理主義だったら、他の主義を批判することはないというのです。 But are the terrorist fundamentalists really fundamentalists in the authentic sense of the term? Do they really believe? What they lack is a feature that is easy to discern in all authentic fundamentalists, from Tibetan Buddhists to the Amish in the United States — the absence of resentment and envy, the deep indifference towards the nonbelievers’ way of life. If today’s so-called fundamentalists really believe they have found their way to Truth, why should they feel threatened by nonbelievers. Why should they envy them? When a Buddhist encounters a Western hedonist, he hardly condemns. He just benevolently notes that the hedonist’s search for happiness is self-defeating. In contrast to true fundamentalists, the terrorist pseudo-fundamentalists are deeply bothered, intrigued and fascinated by the sinful life of the nonbelievers. One can feel that, in fighting the sinful other, they are fighting their own temptation. This is why the so-called fundamentalists of ISIS are a disgrace to true fundamentalism.
最後の部分では、欧米に対する引け目、負い目を感じているからこその動きだと断じています。こちらを批判するのは、自身の優位性に自身がない証拠だというのです。 The problem with terrorist fundamentalists is not that we consider them inferior to us, but, rather, that they themselves secretly consider themselves inferior. This is why our condescending, politically correct assurances that we feel no superiority toward them only makes them more furious and feeds their resentment. The problem is not cultural difference (their effort to preserve their identity), but the opposite fact that they already like us, that, secretly, they have already internalized our standards and measure themselves by them. Paradoxically, what the fundamentalists of ISIS and those like them really lack is precisely a dose of that true conviction of one’s own superiority.
といっても、著作の方ではキリスト教やイスラム教の原理主義全般を扱っていたので、ISISだけがそのような特徴をもっているわけではなさそうです。。。
Posted at 2014.09.07 Category : 未分類
このエントリーを書いている時点で、準決勝は1−１とタイです。番狂わせを期待しています。US Openのサイトでは、ブログタイトルと同じフレーズを使って、今回の快進撃を紹介しています。14才で単身アメリカに渡ったところから始めています。やはり、その頃から飛び抜けた才能があったようですね。 In uncharted territoryBy Sandra Harwitt Saturday, September 6, 2014 In 2004, Kei Nishikori arrived on the doorstep of the Nick Bollettieri Academy as a quiet 14-year-old from Japan with no English language skills in his repetoire. From day one of his arrival in Florida it was clear that Kei was personally shy. But his game immediately came across loud and clear. This was a kid with talent, which is why Sony heir Masaki Morita sponsored Nishikori’s move to the U.S. to further his game.
At the academy he was quickly dubbed with the nickname “Project 45” by everybody. The moniker was a reference to the prime objective: guiding Nishikori to become the highest-ranked Japanese male player of all time, beating out the career-high No. 46 ranking that Shuzo Matsuoka had attained during his time on tour.
しかし、何と言っても注目はマイケルチャンをコーチにしたことでしょうか。特に今回は Famous coaches for all of the men's semifinalistsの記事でも触れられているように、ジョコビッチはベッカー、フェデラーはエドバーグと往年の名プレイヤーがコーチとなっているようです。 One person who is bolstering Nishikori at this US Open, and throughout this season, is his coach, Michael Chang. After the two five-set wins, Chang had a simple message for his prized student: “He told me congrats in winning this battle,” Nishikori said. “Two in a row. But he also say, it’s not done. Stay focus and try to recover these two days and, hopefully, I have another good one the next one.”
試合中の現在は、まだa wait-and-see situation that will be answered on Saturdayの状況ですが、良い結果になることを祈っています。 “I think if he’s able to play healthy through the course of a year, he’s almost Top 10 now with as little as he’s playing,” Chang added. “It’s going to take time. The physical part, it’s part of working on his conditiong. These things don’t happen overnight. But he’s improved and last night’s match is evidence of that.”
Chang expects big things for the future: “He’s only going to keep getting better,” he said, almost warning the rest of the field. Whether that includes a semifinal upset against top seed and five-time finalist Novak Djokovic is a wait-and-see situation that will be answered on Saturday.
Posted at 2014.09.06 Category : 映画予告編
映画『プロミストランド』を観てきました。安易な開発反対映画になっていない、マットデーモンの懐の深さを感じることができる映画です。下記レビューの最後でBut their gimmicks to the plot by the time the film is over. The gimmicks overwhelmed good thing in the story. と語っているようにあそこまでプロットを凝らなくてもよかったのではと思いましたが。。。 TOEIC学習者の方々が反応してしまうであろう。Cream and sugar?のフレーズが映画に登場していました。下記の舞台裏を紹介する動画ではウェートレスが映っていませんが、5秒くらいからレストランでのマットデーモンとのやり取りです。 映画スクリプトCoffee, handsome? Ah. Uh yeah, two. To go. Please. Cream and sugar? Uh yeah, please. No, put that away, it's on me. Thank you. To go. Please.（持ち帰りで）に対してCream and sugar?とウェイトレスが聞いている紛れもない正解のやり取りですね（笑） ハリウッドの良心というのはあまりにもベタで、手垢にまみれた表現ですが、マットデーモンの素晴らしさを感じられただけでもこの映画を観たかいがあったというものです。You need that injection of humor.とマットが語っているように、自身が関わる水問題対策の団体でもユーモアあふれる動画を作成していました。 冗談の記者会見を作成した方がメディアも取り上げてくれやすいという賢い判断も合ったのでしょうが、もちろん水問題には真面目に取り組んでいるようです。
Posted at 2014.09.05 Category : WSJ
キッシンジャーがWorld Orderという本を出したようです。これに先駆けWSJにも投稿していましたので、本を読む前に以下を確認するといいかもしれません。ワシントンポストでこの本をヒラリークリントンが書評をしていました。 ESSAY Henry Kissinger on the Assembly of a New World Order
The concept that has underpinned the modern geopolitical era is in crisisBy HENRY KISSINGER Updated Aug. 29, 2014 12:04 p.m. ET Opinions
Hillary Clinton reviews Henry Kissinger’s ‘World Order’
By Hillary Rodham Clinton September 4 at 3:00 PM 出勤前なので、両者の主張については、丁寧に読んでから改めて紹介させていただくかもしれません。 World Orderと聞いて、ブッシュ大統領のNew World Orderが思い出されます。 We have before us the opportunity to forge for ourselves and for future generations a New World Order. A world where the rule of law – not the law of the jungle – governs the conduct of nations. When we are successful – and we will be – we have a real chance at this New World Order, an order in which a credible United Nations can use its peacekeeping role to fulfill the promise and vision of the UN’s founders.
Posted at 2014.09.03 Category : Financial Times
水問題は知られた問題ですが、具体的にどのような問題が起きているのか把握できていません。Newshourの番組はそんなことを気付かせてもらいました。企業活動において水関連での投資状況から、水問題を考えているFinancial Timesの記事は網羅的でとても参考になります。動画で基本的な問題は取り上げていますが、より詳しい各企業の取り組みを記事では知ることができます。 A world without water
In the first instalment of a series on the threat of water scarcity, Pilita Clark reveals the cost to companies JULY 14, 2014 7:25 PM
Coke’s nearly $2bn in investments may sound big but in fact they are a small example of how much companies are starting to spend on water worldwide. Nearly 20 years after the World Bank began warning of a looming water crisis, the combination of a surging population, a growing global middle class and a changing climate is straining water supplies. For companies – from multinational corporations to small businesses – this amounts to higher costs for a resource that has long been taken for granted.
“The marginal cost of water is rising around the world,” says Christopher Gasson, publisher of Global Water Intelligence. “Previously, water was treated as a free raw material. Now, companies are realising it can damage their brand, their credibility, their credit rating and their insurance costs. That applies to a computer chipmaker and a food company as much as a power generator or a petrochemicals company.”
Examples of these costs abound:
● Nestlé, one of the world’s biggest food companies, set aside SFr38m ($43m) for water-saving and wastewater treatment facilities at its plants last year.
● In Australia a subsidiary of BG Group, the British oil and gas company, has launched a A$1bn ($938.7m) water monitoring and management system that will pipe treated water from its gasfields to boost water supplies for farmers and towns.
地球温暖化問題ほどの注目を集めていませんが、より緊急の問題として捉えているところもあるようです。ただグローバルな問題となりえないのは、水問題が各地域に局地的に起きているからのようです。 Water scarcity is a far more pressing problem than climate change, he says, but receives much less political attention than it should. “We have a water crisis because we make wrong water-management decisions,” he says. “Climate change will further affect the water situation but even if the climate wouldn’t change, we have a water problem and this water problem is much more urgent.”
One reason water receives less attention is that, unlike global warming, there is no such thing as a global water crisis. Instead, there are a series of regional predicaments in a world where the distribution of fresh water is so lopsided that 60 per cent of it is found in just nine countries, including Brazil, the US and Canada, according to the UN.
NestleやCoca Colaの水確保の取り組みが紹介されていますが、消費者向け商品を扱っている以上、reputationが傷つくといけないというのも興味深いです。 Such a move makes good business sense for a company such as Nestlé. Its coffee, cereals and milk products sit on breakfast tables worldwide, meaning it has a global reputation to protect. It is also the 49th-biggest industrial consumer of water in the world, according to Global Water Intelligence.
That makes it far more vulnerable to customer boycotts than the biggest water consumer, China Guodian, a power generator, which has captive customers and is barely known outside its own country.
英語学習的にはthe big elephant in the roomとGoogleの責任者が水問題を形容していたのは面白かったです。 Joe Kava, the company’s head of data centre operations, has warned that water is “the big elephant in the room” for tech companies, which can typically use hundreds of thousands of gallons of water a day. “We’ve been focusing on power consumption and energy efficiency and that’s excellent,” he said in 2009. “I think the next thing we need to turn our attention to is what do we do about the looming water crisis?” As water becomes more scarce, data companies’ use of it could attract public scrutiny, he added, possibly resulting in regulations governing how much water they consume.
Google told the FT last week that its focus on water conservation means it now has a facility in Finland cooled entirely by seawater. It is also looking at using captured rainwater in South Carolina.
ウィズダムには「誰もが知っていながら口をつぐむこと」とありました。 （オックスフォード） the elephant in the room
a problem or question that everyone knows about but does not mention because it is easier not to discuss it
The elephant in the room was the money that had to be paid in bribes.
There's a big elephant in the room and it's gun control.
FTのこの記事は4000語に及ぶ長めのものですが、英検や国連英検の受験を考えている人にはオススメです。
Posted at 2014.09.01 Category : Economist
個人的にヨーロッパの国籍の若者が義勇兵としてISに参加しているというのは衝撃でした。Newshour, EconomistとWall Street Journalがそれぞれ興味深い報道をしてくれていました。なかでもEconomistの全体をまとめる取材力・分析力は圧巻だと思います。 HARI SREENIVASAN: So some of this is coming into, or across our radars, because these people understand English. We’ve had this larger conversation of Westerners becoming radicalized, but it’s also because they know the difference of what the West is talking about. SHADI HAMID: So there’s an important distinction here. The Head of the Islamic State, al-Baghdadi, it’s not as if he himself is tweeting or any of the senior figures around him. We’re talking about the younger fighters on the ground, many of whom are English speaking and many of whom are European, even a few that are American. So for them, they grew up with Twitter, they grew up with Instagram, and Twitter is about something you just do during the day. So, they go on the battlefield, there’s been a big fight, their instinct is to tweet about that. 日常的にTwitterやFBを使いこなしている若者が英語で自然に発信していることがうかがえます。WSJはこのような対アメリカの動きにシンパシーを感じていたShiraz Maherという研究者を紹介しています。911を悲劇と捉えるのではなく、アメリカの当然の報いと捉えた心情から記事を始めてます。 THE SATURDAY INTERVIEW
Inside the Mind of the Western Jihadist
Shiraz Maher, a British citizen who lived the experience, describes the allure of the Islamic State for young Westerners and the deadly peril it poses.By SOHRAB AHMARI CONNECT Aug. 29, 2014 6:49 p.m. ET On 9/11, Shiraz Maher thought to himself: "Yeah, you Americans deserve this. For meddling in the Arab world. For supporting Israel. You shall reap what you sow, and this is what you've sown for a long time."
Within days the college student would quit alcohol, dump his girlfriend and join Hizbut Tahrir, a radical Islamist group he describes as the "political wing of the global jihad movement." He quickly climbed the ranks before eventually leaving the U.K. Islamist movement and rededicating his life to countering it.
WSJでは義勇兵について３つのタイプに分けています。 The typical British Islamic State terrorist is male, in his 20s and from a South Asian background. "He usually has some university education and a history of Muslim activism," Mr. Maher adds. The fighters broadly fall into three personality types.
The first is the adventure-seeker. "They're in jihadist summer school or camp," Mr. Maher says. "I'm with my buddies, we're hanging out and we have these great weapons—AK-47s, RPGs." The adventure-seekers are often involved with U.K. gangs or drugs, and they might consult "Islam for Dummies" before traveling to Syria. They publish photos of themselves eating fast food, swimming and playing soccer in al-Sham. The message they telegraph to friends back home is: "We live better lives here than we were in London—come."
Then there are the "really nasty guys," Mr. Maher says, "the ones who will show off a severed head on Facebook and say, 'Yeah, I just beheaded this son of a bitch.'" These guys, Mr. Maher adds, "should definitely never come back.'"
The third type are "what you might call idealistic or humanitarian jihadists for want of a better phrase," Mr. Maher says. "They would say, 'Look, haven't you seen what's happened to the women and children of Aleppo?' " Over time, they become hardened and no longer mention the innocents they came to rescue. "The land belongs to Allah," they now say. "We're here to impose Islam."
Mr. Maher himself fits the third type most closely, and had he been born a decade later he might not be sitting across from me at a restaurant eating steak tartare and sipping Guinness. "If I were younger and instead of 9/11 it was the Syrian conflict," he says, "there's a very, very good chance I would go. Instead of studying them, I would be the one being studied."
Economistはもっと詳しく義勇兵の現状を伝えてくれています。トルコからシリアに入国する経路から、国別の参加者まで、多岐にわたる内容を2000語程度にコンパクトにまとめる情報分析力は他の追随を許しませんね。 European jihadists
It ain’t half hot here, mum
Why and how Westerners go to fight in Syria and Iraq
Aug 30th 2014 | CAIRO | From the print edition Yet Western fighters do not shy away from battle. Some have taken part in slaughtering those labelled kuffar (unbelievers), including Sunnis deemed too moderate as well as Shia Muslims, who are all deemed apostates. They help fight for dams, military bases and oilfields. They carry out suicide missions such as the bombing in Aleppo, Syria’s second city, perpetrated in February by Abdul Waheed Majid, a Briton.
Westerners are useful for other reasons, too. Hostages released from IS’s clutches say they were guarded by three English-speakers. Foreign jihadists can e-mail the families of hostages in their own language to ask for ransoms.
Western fighters often seem to jump at the chance to take part in a fight or help build a new Islamic state. The Soufan Group, a New York-based intelligence outfit, reckons that by the end of May as many as 12,000 fighters from 81 nations had joined the fray, among them some 3,000 from the West (see chart). The number today is likely to be a lot higher. Since IS declared a caliphate on June 29th, recruitment has surged. Syria has drawn in fighters faster than in any past conflict, including the Afghan war in the 1980s or Iraq after the Americans invaded in 2003.
女性も参加しているというのには驚きですが、貧困とかではなく、the desire to escape the ennui of home and to find an identityが参加の理由ではないかとEconomistは見ています。 Poverty does not explain the lure of jihad for Western fighters. Many of them are quite middle-class. Nasser Muthana, a 20-year-old Welshman who goes by the name Abu Muthana al-Yemeni in IS videos, had offers to study medicine from four universities. Nor does a failure to integrate into the societies around them. Photographs of Muhammad Hamidur Rahman, another British fighter thought to have recently been killed, show a young man in a snazzy suit with a slick hairstyle. He worked at Primark, a cheap retailer, in Portsmouth, a city on the English coast. His father ran a curry restaurant. Nor does religious piety. Before leaving for Syria, Yusuf Sarwar and Mohammed Ahmed, two young men from Birmingham who pleaded guilty to terrorism offences in July, ordered copies of “Islam for Dummies” and “The Koran for Dummies” from Amazon. Some fighters are religious novices, says Mr Maher.
More plausible explanations are the desire to escape the ennui of home and to find an identity. “Some individuals are drawn out there because there is not a lot going on in their own lives,” says Raffaello Pantucci, an analyst at the Royal United Services Institute, a London think-tank. Images of combatants playing snooker, eating sweets and splashing in swimming pools have sometimes suggested that jihad was not unlike a student holiday, without the booze. For young men working in dead-end jobs in drab towns, the brotherhood, glory and guns seem thrilling. Many of Belgium’s fighters come from the dullest of cities, where radicals have concentrated their efforts to get recruits.
ヨーロッパ諸国の難しさはムスリムの人口が米国などと違って大きいことでしょう。取り締まりを厳しくしてしまうと、逆効果になる難しさも指摘しています。 So far the responses of Western governments to their citizens’ self-deployment have varied. America has cracked down on anyone it suspects of going to fight. It can afford to do so, argues Mr Hegghammer, because its Muslim population is smaller than that of many European countries, as is the fear of a political backlash. European governments have been more cautious. Their citizens have travelled out with ease. Harsher penalties might deter some. But prosecute too widely and governments may end up boosting the flow of recruits. And prisons have proved fertile recruitment grounds for Muslim radicals.
It ain’t half hot here, mumという記事タイトルに疑問を持った方、イギリスの第二次世界大戦時のインド駐屯の英国軍を描いたコメディテレビ番組のタイトルのようです。こんなの知らないですよね。。。
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