generousの語感

 

Posted at 2015.10.10     Category : 未分類

ちょっと古い話題ですが、語感がすっきりと理解できた例だったもので紹介します。generousというとTOEICではgenerous donationのように使われることが多いですね。日本語であまり「寛大な」というのを個人的に使わないせいか、あまりピンとこない語でした。

オスカーでのレディガガのパフォーマンスをジュリーアンドリュースは generousと評していました。



アンドリュースに歌を歌うことへの承認を電話で確認し、彼女への敬意を示して彼女と同じキーで歌ったこと、もろもろに対してgenerousと一言でまとめたのでしょう。この話を聞いて確かにgenerousだと納得しました。

レディガガが素晴らしいパフォーマンスを見せることで、ジュリーアンドリュースの素晴らしさを改めて確認できるまさにgenerous tributeになっていますね。

 

IKEA effectをご存知ですか

 

Posted at 2015.10.09     Category : Nature

今週のNatureは「人は見たいものしか見ない」という耳の痛い問題とその対処方法を取り上げています。まあ、解決法は見慣れたものばかりですが、自分でいざ実行するとなると難しいんですよね。Nature の社説ではhuman brain’s habit of finding what it wants to find（見つけたいものを見つけるという人の脳の習慣）と表現されています。

Let’s think about cognitive bias
The human brain’s habit of finding what it wants to find is a key problem for research. Establishing robust methods to avoid such bias will make results more reproducible.
07 October 2015

“Ever since I first learned about confirmation bias I’ve been seeing it everywhere.” So said British author and broadcaster Jon Ronson in So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed (Picador, 2015).

You will see a lot of cognitive bias in this week’s Nature. In a series of articles, we examine the impact that bias can have on research, and the best ways to identify and tackle it. One enemy of robust science is our humanity — our appetite for being right, and our tendency to find patterns in noise, to see supporting evidence for what we already believe is true, and to ignore the facts that do not fit.

The sources and types of such cognitive bias — and the fallacies they produce — are becoming more widely appreciated. Some of the problems are as old as science itself, and some are new: the IKEA effect, for example, describes a cognitive bias among consumers who place artificially high value on products that they have built themselves. Another common fallacy in research is the Texas sharp-shooter effect — firing off a few rounds and then drawing a bull’s eye around the bullet holes. And then there is asymmetrical attention: carefully debugging analyses and debunking data that counter a favoured hypothesis, while letting evidence in favour of the hypothesis slide by unexamined.

cognitive bias（認知バイアス）の一例としてあげられていたIKEA効果。IKEAで買った家具を自分で組み立てるとその家具を好きになるという効果だそうですが、WikipediaやTedトークなんかにも取り上げられていたとは知りませんでした。

（Wikipedia）
IKEA effect
The IKEA effect is a cognitive bias in which consumers place a disproportionately high value on products they partially created.[1] The name derives from the Swedish manufacturer and furniture retailer IKEA, which sells many furniture products that require assembly.



今週のNatureではcognitive biasを避けるための科学的な指針を打ち立てる必要性を訴えています。

Advocates of robust science have repeatedly warned against cognitive habits that can lead to error. Although such awareness is essential, it is insufficient. The scientific community needs concrete guidance on how to manage its all-too-human biases and avoid the errors they cause.

Human, All Too Human (Menschliches, Allzumenschliches)というニーチェの有名な本がベースかわかりませんがall-too-human（あまりに人間的な）はちょくちょく使われる表現ではあります。表現自体はニーチェの本とは無関係に使われていますが、雑学的に教養的知識を仕入れておくと何かと読解には役立ちます。



社説も長いものだったのでNatureが力を入れていることは想像できましたが、記事も3つ掲載していました。

How scientists fool themselves – and how they can stop
Humans are remarkably good at self-deception. But growing concern about reproducibility is driving many researchers to seek ways to fight their own worst instincts.
Regina Nuzzo
07 October 2015

Blind analysis: Hide results to seek the truth
Robert MacCoun & Saul Perlmutter
07 October 2015

Crowdsourced research: Many hands make tight work
Raphael Silberzahn& Eric L. Uhlmann
07 October 2015

その中でHow scientists fool themselves – and how they can stopという記事にあったコンパクトなまとめCognitive fallacies in researchとその対応策であるDebiasing techniquesを紹介します。

Cognitive fallacies in research
Hypothesis myopia
Collecting evidence to support a hypothesis, not looking for evidence against it, and ignoring other explanations

Texas sharpshooter
Seizing on random patterns in the data and mistaking them for interesting findings

Asymmetric attention
Rigorously checking unexpected results, but giving expected ones a free pass

Just-so storytelling
Finding stories after the fact to rationalize whatever the results turn out to be

Debiasing techniques
Devil’s advocacy
Explicitly consider alternative hypothesis – then test them out head-to-head.

Pre-commitment
Publicly declare a data collection and analysis plan before starting the study

Team of rivals
Invite your academic adversaries to collaborate with you on a study

Blind data analysis
Analyse data that look real but are not exactly what you collected – and then lift the blind

不正を働く悪意の人が一定数いるのはやむを得ないと思うのですが、STAP騒動でも気になったのはなぜあれほどの経歴のある著名な科学者が騙されてしまったのか、ということ。やはり「見たいものを見たい」という誘惑は避けれれないほど大きいため、Natureが個々人の注意に頼るのではなく、科学的な方法論の確立を主張をしているのかもしれません。

 

I'd rather be a rebel than a slave

 

Posted at 2015.10.07     Category : 未分類

季刊Timeout Tokyoの最新号が出ました。紀伊国屋の洋書売場や渋谷駅などで配布されていますので、興味のある人は是非。今回の特集は日本でのCulture Shockを100紹介しています。Timeout Londonでも30に抜粋された日本のCulture Shockが紹介されているということで確認しようとTimeout LondonのAppで該当号を購入して読んでみました。

日本特集を紹介する前にTimeout Londonの表紙が物議をかもしているらしいので、まずこちらの騒動の方を紹介します。



Meryl Streep and co-stars attract backlash over Suffragette T-shirt slogan
‘I’d rather be a rebel than a slave’ is a quote from Emmeline Pankhurst, played by Streep in a new film, but for some the phrase evokes unfortunate associations
Mahita Gajanan in New York
Monday 5 October 2015 20.56 BST

Meryl Streep and three other cast members of the film Suffragette have been the subject of criticism online, after appearing in a photo shoot last week wearing T-shirts featuring a controversial slogan.

“I’d rather be a rebel than a slave,” the slogan read, quoting a 1913 speech by women’s rights activist Emmeline Pankhurst. The photos were published in Time Out London alongside interviews with Streep, Carey Mulligan, Romola Garai and Anne-Marie Duff.

On Twitter, the photos inspired ire over the alleged racial insensitivity of the use of the quote, which for some carried connotations of the American history of slavery and Confederate rebellion. While some applauded the use of the quote, others were less impressed.

女性参政権運動家Emmeline Pankhurstの言葉“I’d rather be a rebel than a slave”がthe quote, which for some carried connotations of the American history of slavery and Confederate rebellionであることが批判されているようなのです。批判する人は「奴隷になるなら（奴隷支持の）米国南軍になるほうがましだ」というメッセージだと怒っているようです。

これを受けてTimeout Londonの編集者は弁明するステートメントを出しています。そのような意図は全くなかったし、特集を読んでもらえればそんな文脈で用いていないことは明らかで、苦情は一件もないと強気に訴えています。

Statement in response to 'Suffragette' t-shirt complaints
Time Out's official response
By Time Out London editors
Posted: Tuesday October 6 2015
（前略）
This is a quote from a 1913 speech given by Emmeline Pankhurst, one of the historic British suffragettes whose fight for equality is portrayed in the movie. The original quote was intended to rouse women to stand up against oppression - it is a rallying cry, and absolutely not intended to criticise those who have no choice but to submit to oppression, or to reference the Confederacy, as some people who saw the quote and photo out of context have surmised.

（中略）

Time Out published the original feature online and in print in the UK a week ago. The context of the photoshoot and the feature were absolutely clear to readers who read the piece. It has been read by at least half a million people in the UK and we have received no complaints.

まあ、アメリカ人とイギリス人とで文脈の違いのあらわれかもしれません。ハーパーリーのGo Set a Watchmanでも南部の人種問題は根強いことが改めてあらわになったことを考えるとアメリカ人は余計デリケートにこの言葉を受け止めやすいのかもしれません。

TimeoutのステートメントではEmmeline Pankhurstの言葉を長めに紹介していました。これだけの長さがあれば今回のような誤解は起きなかったでしょうが、インパクトは欠けてしまうのでバランスが難しいところですね。

'I know that women, once convinced that they are doing what is right, that their rebellion is just, will go on, no matter what the difficulties, no matter what the dangers, so long as there is a woman alive to hold up the flag of rebellion. I would rather be a rebel than a slave.'

この件はこれだけではありません。参政権の運動は白人女性だけではなく例えばインド人女性だって活動に参加したのに映画では白人女性しか描かれていない。この映画はwhitewashしているというのです。

Meryl Streep lambasted over 'I'd rather be a rebel than a slave' T-shirts promoting film that critics say white washes the women's suffrage movement
• Streep appears alongside co-star Carey Mulligan and others--all white women--in the ads promoting the upcoming film Suffragette
• Critics say the T-shirts inevitably bring to mind the Confederacy by pairing the words 'rebel' and 'slave'
• Critics also point out that the suffrage movement was at times at odds with the black civil rights movemen

What's more, some say the film's all white cast unfairly contribute to the 'white washing' of the women's suffrage movement, whose pioneers included more than just white women.

まあ、白人キャストの問題は映画界全体が抱える問題でしょう。Newshourでも数ヶ月前に取り上げられていました。



同じ言葉でも人によって違うように受け取る可能性があるというのは言葉の難しさでありますね。個人的には、いつこの映画が日本で公開されるのかが気になります。

 

新語のインプリケーション

 

Posted at 2015.10.05     Category : 未分類

日経新聞の連載記事「原油安、揺れる世界」で「サウジアメリカ」という造語を紹介していました。Asia Nikkeiでも訳されている記事なので力を入れたものなのでしょう。

　原油新秩序――。米ゴールドマン・サックスはシェールが起こす地殻変動をそう呼ぶ。需給を重んじた既存勢力を押しのけ増産に走るシェール業者は今や米原油生産の６割を担う。英ＢＰによると米原油生産は日量1100万バレル台と過去５年で６割増加。サウジアラビアやロシアを超え昨年39年ぶりに世界一となった。「サウジアメリカ」の造語まで生まれた。

October 2, 2015 4:00 pm JST
Shale revolution, economic slowdowns
Low oil prices reshaping the world economy

"The New Oil Order" is the term coined by Goldman Sachs to encapsulate the tectonic shifts in the world energy landscape arising from the sudden bounty from U.S. fracking, which has pumped up oil production in the U.S. by 60% in five years.
Shale operators account for 60% of crude output in the U.S.
Last year, the U.S. became the world's biggest oil producer for the first time in 39 years, overtaking Saudi Arabia and Russia, according to BP.
The U.S. rise to the top of the oil production hierarchy has led to a new term, "Saudi America."

「サウジアメリカ」という見出しで29ヶ月アメリカが算出量世界一だという報告があります。

Mark J. Perry @Mark_J_Perry
July 15, 2015 4:32 pm | AEIdeas
Energy superpower ‘Saudi America’ has been the world’s largest petroleum producer for 29 months in a row

Bottom Line: The new EIA data on international petroleum production through March provides more evidence that America’s shale energy revolution is taking the US from “resource scarcity” to a new era of “resource abundance.” The shale revolution has transformed the US into a formidable energy superpower and America now consistently produces a greater “total oil supply” than Saudi Arabia (by more than 3M bpd for the last five months) and has led the world in total petroleum production for 29 straight months. This energy bonanza in the US — described as the “energy equivalent of the Berlin Wall coming down” — would have been largely unthinkable even six years ago. But then thanks to revolutionary drilling and extraction techniques that were developed by American “petropreneurs” and are “made in the USA,” vast oceans of previously locked shale oil and gas have been accessed across the country, making the US the world’s No. 1 petroleum producer for 29 months running.

雑誌Economistは昨年の2月にすでに「サウジアメリカ」という語を使って記事を書いていました。この雑誌の分析力の高さを感じますね。産油国アメリカの経緯を丁寧に紹介してくれています。

The economics of shale oil
Saudi America
The benefits of shale oil are bigger than many Americans realise. Policy has yet to catch up
Feb 15th 2014 | MIDLAND, TEXAS | From the print edition

Until the early 1970s, America was the world’s largest oil producer and the Texas Railroad Commission stabilised world prices by dictating how much the state’s producers could pump. When Arab states slapped an oil embargo on Israel’s Western allies after the six-day war in 1967, Texas cushioned the blow by allowing a massive production boost.
But rising consumption and declining production eroded the state’s spare capacity, and in March 1972 Texas called for flat-out production. “This is a damn historic occasion and a sad occasion,” the Texas Railroad Commission’s chairman declared. When Arab producers imposed another embargo the next year, prices rocketed. America had lost the role of world price arbiter to OPEC, a cartel dominated by despotic regimes. American politicians tried desperately to curb consumption (for example, by lowering speed limits) and to conserve supplies (by banning crude-oil exports in 1975).
American production declined steadily from a peak of 9.6m barrels a day in 1970 to under 5m in 2008. About then, independent producers began adapting the new technologies of hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) and horizontal drilling, first used to tap shale gas, to oil. Total American production has since risen to 7.4m barrels a day, and the Energy Information Administration, a federal monitor, reckons it will return to its 1970 record by 2019. The International Energy Agency is more bullish; it reckons that by 2020 America will have displaced Saudi Arabia as the world’s biggest producer, pumping 11.6m barrels a day.



「サウジアメリカ」という言葉の持つインプリケーションはどのようなものか気になってしまいます。アメリカが産油国で1位を示すだけなら何も「サウジ」をつけなくてもいいじゃないですか。単に面白いだけなら鮮度も落ちるので、2年間も使われないと思うのです。そのインプリケーションを感じさせてもらえる記事がニューヨークタイムズにありました。ここではアメリカ南部の石油産出地域を“Cowboyistan”と呼ぶことを紹介してくれています。

New Balance of Power
By CLIFFORD KRAUSSAPRIL 22, 2015

HOUSTON — For the better part of the last century, crude oil prices have swung like a pendulum, pushing and pulling the fortunes of nations. More often than not, global supplies of the volatile commodity were controlled by the rulers of desert domains who would otherwise have been powerless had it not been for the oil that bubbled beneath their thrones.

That pendulum is on the move again, sending the price of oil cascading to less than $45 this winter from more than $100 a barrel last June, and it may fall further in the months ahead. On the surface, this latest oil boom gone bust may feel like history repeating itself, but there is a vital difference this time: The center of the oil world has spun from the sands of Saudi Arabia to the shale oil fields of Texas and North Dakota, a giant new oil patch some wildcatters have begun to call “Cowboyistan.”

昨年の10月のOPECでの生産量の話し合いが書かれていたのですが、サウジアラビアが原油安にもかかわらず生産量を減らすことに反対したのは市場シェアをアメリカに奪われ影響力がなくなってしまうことを恐れたとあります。

But the Saudis and their Gulf allies said no. They argued that if they cut production, they would merely lose market share to the surging American producers who were increasing daily production by a million barrels year in and year out with no end in sight. The decision effectively forfeited the cartel’s traditional role as the global oil swing producer — the one and only supplier with the volume of production to raise and lower prices by managing the cartel’s output.

The decision came as a shock to the oil market. From the moment OPEC decided to keep its production constant at 30 million barrels a day, a fairly gradual price retreat that began in July morphed into a nose dive as commodity traders dumped their oil positions. Many independent American producers saw the move as a direct attack on them, but it was really a throwing in the towel to the new reality of growing American oil output.

The demise of OPEC as the price manipulator is what virtually every American president since Richard Nixon had in mind when they promised to find a way to make the United States energy independent, not chained to Middle East or OPEC oil, after the oil embargoes of the 1960s and 1970s.

最後の方の記事でも書いていますが、フラッキングの技術もあがり、フラッキングは需給に合わせて生産体制を柔軟に変更できるので、今後はアメリカが石油市場に多大な影響力を行使すると読んでいます。

There is a strong chance, energy experts say, that this could be the beginning of decades of United States dominance in the oil markets, and that dominance will be accompanied by relatively inexpensive energy. The shale fields around the country are plentiful, and there is much more to be drilled. Lower prices have already driven down drilling and other service company costs by more than 15 percent.

But more important, the drilling and fracking technology that has made the shale revolution possible is rapidly improving, bringing production costs even lower and raising the yield of each well. For instance, more powerful computers are improving multidimensional geological modeling for well planning. And production output is improving through experimentation in the mixing and use of proppants like sand and ceramics to keep fractures in shale open to release more oil.

Yutaの解釈に過ぎませんが「サウジアメリカ」という語を使われる場合には、アメリカが単に生産量が一位になりましたというより、石油市場を支配するようになりましたというインプリケーションがあるのかなと思いました。こういう造語って意味はすぐにわかるんですけど、インプリケーションを把握するのに苦労することもあるのでやっかいですよね。

 

なつかしのパート1の定番が蘇る

 

Posted at 2015.10.04     Category : 未分類

「安心してください。はいていますよ」って英語でなんというだろうと思っていたらすでにYoutubeに英語版の動画がアップされていました。しかもアメリカ人に受けるようにネタを作っています。ただ、この再生回数は6000回なのでviralになっているとはいえないようです。。。

TOEICで着ている状態の写真だったらwearを使うということですよね。公式問題集vol2には正解になっている文章がありました。

He's wearing protective clothing.

ネット検索していると以下のような説明を見つけました。

★動作と状態の動詞を区別しよう！

（例）
They are putting on uniforms.（＝彼らは制服を着ようとしているところです）
They are wearing uniforms.（＝彼らはすでに制服を着ています）

「put on」＝動作を表す
「wear」＝状態を表す

「put on」と「wear」の区別はPart1では頻出ですから、しっかり覚えておきましょう！！
衣服を身に着けている状態の写真で、「putting on」と言っていたら間違いです。

少し前のTOEIC対策書では定番の解説だったのですが、今時のものでも載せているのでしょうか。

 

それぞれのアニバーサリー

 

Posted at 2015.10.01     Category : 未分類

The Act of KillingやThe Look of Silenceなど1965年のインドネシアの大虐殺を取り上げた映画のオッペンハイマー監督がニューヨークタイムズに寄稿していました。なんでこのタイミングなのかと思ったのですが、日本では9月30日事件と呼ばれているようにこの時期に起きたもので、しかも今年が50周年でした。

Suharto’s Purge, Indonesia’s Silence
By JOSHUA OPPENHEIMERSEPT. 29, 2015

This week marks the 50th anniversary of the beginning of a mass slaughter in Indonesia. With American support, more than 500,000 people were murdered by the Indonesian Army and its civilian death squads. At least 750,000 more were tortured and sent to concentration camps, many for decades.

The victims were accused of being “communists,” an umbrella that included not only members of the legally registered Communist Party, but all likely opponents of Suharto’s new military regime — from union members and women’s rights activists to teachers and the ethnic Chinese. Unlike in Germany, Rwanda or Cambodia, there have been no trials, no truth-and-reconciliation commissions, no memorials to the victims. Instead, many perpetrators still hold power throughout the country.

この件は過去にブログでも取り上げました。

（自分メモ）ビフォーアフターのビフォー

（自分メモ）ビフォーアフターのアフター

このOpEdの目的を述べているのは3パラグラフ目で米国はこの虐殺を認め、南アフリカのように真実と和解に至るプロセスに取り組むべきだと主張しています。なじみのない出来事なので、1-2パラグラフ目では背景説明をしていますよね。

Indonesia is the world’s fourth most populous nation, and if it is to become the democracy it claims to be, this impunity must end. The anniversary is a moment for the United States to support Indonesia’s democratic transition by acknowledging the 1965 genocide, and encouraging a process of truth, reconciliation and justice.

世界的にみると知られていない事件のためか背景説明もしてくれています。

On Oct. 1, 1965, six army generals in Jakarta were killed by a group of disaffected junior officers. Maj. Gen. Suharto assumed command of the armed forces, blamed the killings on the leftists, and set in motion a killing machine. Millions of people associated with left-leaning organizations were targeted, and the nation dissolved into terror — people even stopped eating fish for fear that fish were eating corpses. Suharto usurped President Sukarno’s authority and established himself as de facto president by March 1966. From the very beginning, he enjoyed the full support of the United States.

もちろんこのような背景説明だけではピンとこないでしょうから、I felt I had wandered into Germany 40 years after the Holocaust, only to find the Nazis still in power.といった比喩も交えています。この比喩が的を得ているとしたら恐ろしいことですね。

I did not know if it was safe to approach the killers, but when I did, I found them open. They offered boastful accounts of the killings, often with smiles on their faces and in front of their grandchildren. I felt I had wandered into Germany 40 years after the Holocaust, only to find the Nazis still in power.

Today, former political prisoners from this era still face discrimination and threats. Gatherings of elderly survivors are regularly attacked by military-backed thugs. Schoolchildren are still taught that the “extermination of the communists” was heroic, and that victims’ families should be monitored for disloyalty. This official history, in effect, legitimizes violence against a whole segment of society.

監督はインドネシア政府だけではなくアメリカ政府も事件の関与を認めるべきだと主張していますね。

We need truth and accountability from the United States as well. U.S. involvement dates at least to an April 1962 meeting between American and British officials resulting in the decision to “liquidate” President Sukarno, the populist — but not communist — founding father of Indonesia. As a founder of the nonaligned movement, Sukarno favored socialist policies; Washington wanted to replace him with someone more deferential to Western strategic and commercial interests.

ここでは虐殺を実行している側を援助していた欧米政府とメディアとを批判しています。スカルノ大統領が冷戦時の東側に着いていたからとはいえ、冷静後もメディアの評価は変わっていないです。

Western aid to Suharto’s dictatorship, ultimately amounting to tens of billions of dollars, began flowing while corpses still clogged Indonesia’s rivers. The American media celebrated Suharto’s rise and his campaign of death. Time magazine said it was the “best news for years in Asia.”

シンガポールは建国50周年でしたし、1965年は東南アジアでの政治変動の時だったようです。高速鉄道での泣き笑いもいいですが、当事国の歴史にも関心を払えるようになりたいものです。