经济学人精读教材有道考神团队@陈曲Frank
致各位亲爱的同学们：
大家好，我是有道考神团队的陈曲老师。欢迎大家选择经济学人课程，我们的课程时间持续一周，具体为：
7月18日19:00-20:00 精讲篇章1 – kill seven diseases, save 1.2m lives a year（医疗类）7月19日19:00-20:00 精讲篇章2 – hyperactive, yet passive（经济类）
7月20日19:00-20:00 精讲篇章3 – clear thinking on climate change（环境类）
7月21日19:00-20:00 精讲篇章4 – the future of computing（科技类）
7月22日19:00-20:00 精讲篇章5 – who’s afraid of the cheap oil（经济类）
7月23日19:00-20:00 精讲篇章6 – migrant crisis（移民危机）
请大家注意以下注意事项：
1.讲义以课文为主，请各位同学课前预习课文，查出不认识的单词。
2.请各位同学准备好笔记本，授课时做好笔记，微博晒笔记有陈曲老师专属的礼品赠送。
3.除了课文外，陈曲老师还精心挑选了课后的阅读篇章。供大家研读学习。
4.关于这些文章，大家既可以阅读讲义，也可以下载本网盘中pdf格式的期刊。
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大家一起学习一点真正的英语（Authentic English）！
Passage 1: Eradicating Disease
Oct 10th 2015 | From the print edition
Viral and parasitic diseases are not only worth killing off, they are also increasingly vulnerable.
TO EXTERMINA TE a living species by accident is normally frowned on. To do so deliberately might thus seem an extraordinary sin. But if that species is Plasmodium falciparum, the sin may be excused. This parasitic organism causes the most deadly form of malaria. Together with four cousins, it is responsible for about 450,000 deaths a year, and the ruination of the lives of millions more people who survive the initial crisis of disease. Besides the direct suffering this causes, the lost human potential is enormous. The Gates Foundation, an American charity, reckons that eradicating malaria would bring the world $2 trillion of benefits by 2040.
Malaria is one of the worst examples of the damage that transmissible diseases can wreak. But it is not alone. AIDS carries off fit, young adults by the millions and tuberculosis by the hundreds of thousands. Measles, whooping cough and diarrhoea together kill over 1m children a year. Parasitic worms and mosquito-borne viruses like dengue, though they take relatively few lives, debilitate many.
Campaigns have brought the toll down heroically. As recently as 2000, malaria killed around 850,000 people a year; likewise, since 2000 deaths from measles have fallen by 75%, to around 150,000. These successes are to be celebrated, but an even greater prize exists: to go beyond controlling infections and infestations and instead to eradicate some of them completely, by exterminating the pathogens and parasites that cause them. That has been accomplished a couple of times in the past, for smallpox (a human disease) and rinderpest (a cattle disease similar to measles). The end is reckoned to be close for polio (a virus that once killed and crippled millions) and dracunculiasis (a parasitic worm). But more must follow.
Swat teams
Some diseases are not suitable for eradication because the organisms that cause them hang around in the environment, or have other animal hosts. Others, such as tuberculosis, can infect people “silently”, without causing symptoms, so are invisible to doctors. But sometimes the culprit is a poverty of ambition. A list of five plausible targets—measles, mumps, rubella, filariasis and pork tapeworm—has hardly changed since the early 1990s, yet measles, mumps and rubella are all the subjects of intensive vaccination campaigns that could easily be converted into ones of eradication. And even though Swaziland is poised to become the first malaria-free country in sub-Saharan Africa, only a few dare to make explicit the goal of ridding the planet of the disease. Hepatitis C should be made a target, too. It kills half a million a year, and affects rich and poor countries alike, yet new drugs against it are almost 100% effective and there are no silent carriers. Eradicating these seven diseases—the five, plus malaria and hepatitis C—would save a yearly total of 1.2m lives. It would transform countless more.
People argue that the cost of chasing down the last few cases of a disease is not worth it. If
the mass-vaccination campaigns under way can lower the incidence of measles, mumps, rubella and so on in poor countries to something close to rich-world levels, the argument goes, that is surely good enough.
Well, it isn't. A disease can bounce back. That is what malaria did in the 1960s, when political attention waned, and the parasites that cause it evolved resistance to drugs and the mosquitoes that spread it evolved resistance to insecticides.
Three big improvements underpin the argument for throwing eradication's net more widely. The first is better communications. The technology for locating and monitoring cases of disease in poor countries, even when few and far between, has improved immeasurably in the past two decades with the spread of mobile phones and the internet, and the expansion of road networks.
The se cond is better medical technology. The reason filariasis is on the “possibles” list, for example, is the invention of ivermectin, a drug that kills the worm which causes it. The inventors of this drug won half of this year's Nobel prize for medicine. The other half was won by the woman who came up with an answer to drug resistance in malaria—a medicine called artemisinin, which has been crucial to the success of the recent push against the disease. (This time, alert to the risk of resistance, doctors have formulated it with other drugs to create combination therapies that natural selection finds hard to get around.)
Even better technology is in the pipeline. In the case of mosquito-borne illnesses such as malaria and dengue, genetic engineering promises ways of making the insects resistant to the pathogens that they pass on to people, of crashing the mosquito population, and even of attacking insects and pathogens with genetically modified fungi and bacteria. Genetic engineering also promises a wide range of new vaccines.
The third reason for seeking eradication is a change in political attitudes. The emergence of AIDS, in particular, made governments everywhere sit up and take notice. Last year's west African outbreak of Ebola only reinforced the message. Political attention leads to better medical infrastructure. To deal with AIDS, new networks of clinics were created and staffed with trained personnel. These can serve as the backbone of the campaigns that would be the starting-point for many extermination programmes.
The Dalek doctrine
The list of candidates for such programmes should be extended as and when circumstances change. The biggest prize might be AIDS itself. Smallpox, the first target for eradication, was picked in part because the virus that caused it had only humans as hosts and could not survive independently for more than a few hours. It had, in other words, no hiding place. Both of these are true of HIV, the AIDS-causing virus. What is missing is the third ingredient for smallpox: a reliable vaccine.
Throughout history, humans and disease have waged a deadly and never-ending war. Today the casualties are chiefly the world's poorest people. But victory against some of the worst killers is at last within grasp. Seize it.
中文翻译（来自于网络）：
第一篇：根除疾病
病毒性疾病和寄生虫疾病不仅仅值得杀死，而且还在变得愈发不堪一击。
无意间灭绝一个活的物种的行为通常会招致不满。因而，有意这样做可能会被视为是一种特殊的罪。但是，如果这个物种是恶性疟原虫，这种罪就可能会得到宽恕。这种寄生生物引发的是疟疾中最致命的一种。它与四近亲一起，要为每年的450000例死亡以及除此之外的数百万从这种疾病的最初危机中活下来的生命的荒废而负责。除了这所造成的直接痛苦之外，失去的人类潜力也是巨大的。美国慈善组织盖茨基金会测算，到2040年，根除疟疾会带给世界2万亿美元的利润。
疟疾是传染性疾病能够造成的诸多最严重破坏例子中的一例。但是，这种疾病不是孤独的。艾滋病夺走的健康、年轻的成年人数以百万记，肺结核数以十万记。麻疹、百日咳、腹泻每年杀死的儿童加起来超过100万。像登革热这样的由寄生虫和蚊子传播的病毒，虽然夺走的生命相对较少，却毁了许多人。
各种运动已经令总数大幅下降。近的如2000年，疟疾一年杀死了大约为850000人；然而，自2000年以来，麻疹的死亡率已经下降了75％，至150000例。这些成功值得庆祝，但是一个更大的奖赏是存在的：超越控制传染和感染，而是通过根除造成这些疾病的病原体和寄生虫的方式，彻底消灭某些疾病。这种方式曾在过去应对天花（一种人类疾病）和牛瘟（一种类似于麻疹的牛类疾病）等疾病时屡获成功。据测算，应对小儿麻痹症（一种曾经杀死并致残了数百万人的病毒）和麦地那龙线虫病（一种寄生虫）的最终结果也与此类似。但是，…
特警队
有些疾病会因为引发它们的生物体在环境中四处活动或是有其他动物宿主而不适合根除，而其他一些疾病，如肺结核，能够在不引发各种症状的情况下，“安静地”感染人类。因而，它们对于医生来说是隐形的。但是，有的时候，罪魁祸首却是缺乏雄心壮志。一份由麻疹、腮腺炎、风疹、丝虫病和猪肉绦虫这5个合理的目标所组成的名单，自上世纪90年代初期以来，几乎毫无变化；然而，麻疹、腮腺炎和风疹都是各类更够轻而易举地转变为一种根除运动的密集疫苗接种运动的对象。即便斯威士兰将成为撒哈拉沙漠以南非洲首个完全根除疟疾的国家，但是，只有少数的几个国家敢明确地提出根除疾病的目标。丙型肝炎也应当成为一个目标。虽说，它每年杀死50万人，而且对国家的影响不分贫富。但是，抗击这种疾病的新药的疗效几乎达到了百分之百，并且不存在安静的携带者。根除这七种疾病——原来的五种再加上疟疾和丙型肝炎——会让每年所拯救的总人数达到120万，而且还会改变更多的人。
人们认为，努力降低上述几种疾病的发病率的成本花的不值。这种观点认为，如果正在进行的各种大规模疫苗接种运动能够将贫穷国家的麻疹、腮腺炎、风疹等疾病的发病率降至接近于富裕国家的水平，就已经很不错了。
但是，这是不够的。一种疾病能够卷土重来。这就是疟疾在政治关注度下降、引发这种疾病的寄生虫进化出抗药性以及传播这种疾病的蚊子进化出对杀虫剂的抵抗力的上世纪60年代曾经做过的事情。
三大提高支撑了把根除之网向纵深铺开的观点。首先是更好的通信。在过去的20多年间，随着移动电话和互联网的传播以及公路网的延伸，在贫穷国家，定位并监控病例——甚至是在病例非常少的情况下——的技术已经有了极大的提高。
其次是更好的医疗技术。例如，丝虫病在“可能”名单上的原因是一种能够杀死引发这种疾病的病虫的药物——伊维菌素的发明。这种药物的发明者赢得了今年诺贝尔医学奖奖金的一半，另一半则被一位终于发现了疟疾抗药性答案——一种被称之为青蒿素的药物的女性所获得，这种药物对近年来抗击这种疾病的成功起到了关键的作用。
比它们还要好的技术正在开发中。在疟疾和登革热这类由蚊子传播的疾病中，基因工程提供了让害虫对它们传播给人类的病原体产生抵抗力、大规模地杀死蚊子，甚至是用经过基因改良的真菌和细菌攻击害虫和病原体的前景。基因工程还提供了大规模新疫苗的前景。
支持寻求根除疾病的第三个原因是政治态度的改变。尤其是在对待艾滋病方面，它的紧迫性已经让国政府去关注这种疾病。去年爆发的西非埃博拉疫情仅仅是强化了这一信息。政治上的关注带来的是更好的医疗基础设施。为了应对艾滋病，新的医疗网络已经建好，训练有素的医务人员已经就位。这些都可以用作将会成为众多的根除计划出发点的各种运动的支撑。
戴立克原则
这类计划的候选名单应当随着情况的变化而得到扩展，而且也应该在情况变化时得到扩展。最大的奖赏可能是艾滋病自身。天花当初被选为根除的第一个目标，部分是因为引发这种疾病的病毒只有人类这唯一一个宿主，而且不能独立存活几个小时以上。换句话说，它没有藏身之地。这两点对于引发艾滋病的病毒——HIV来说也是如此。当前所缺少的就是应对天花的第三种要素：一种值得信赖的疫苗。
纵观历史，人类和疾病进行了一场致命的和没有尽头的战争。如今，这场战争的伤亡者主要是世上最贫穷的人。但是，对于其中某些最致命杀手的反击，终于是胜利在望了。请抓住它。
Passage 2: Hyperactive, yet passive
Dec 5th 2015 | From the print edition
Worries about corporate myopia miss the point. Even in America, business is not dynamic enough
IT IS easy to make the case that modern business is too frenetic. This week 10 billion shares of America's 500 largest listed firms will have changed hands in frenzied trading. Their bosses will have been swamped by 750,000 incoming e-mails and a torrent of instant data about customers. In five days these firms will have bought $11 billion of their own shares, not far off what they invested in their businesses. With one eye on their smartphones and the other on their share prices, bosses seem to be the bug-eyed captains of a hyperactive capitalism.
Many bemoan the accelerating pace of business life. Long-term thinking is a luxury, say these critics of capitalism. When managers are not striving to satisfy investors whose allegiance to firms is measured in weeks, they are pumping up share prices in order to maximise their own pay. Executives feel harried, too. Competition is becoming ever more ferocious: if Google or Apple are not plotting your downfall, a startup surely is. Yet such perceptions do not bear close scrutiny. Short-termism is not the menace it seems . And the problem with competition is that it is not fierce enough.
Myopia: the long view
Start with short-termism. The fear that capitalism is too myopic has a long history. John
Maynard Keynes observed that most investors wanted “to beat the gun”. For over 50 years Warren Buffett has made money on the premise that other investors behave like headless chickens. But this drum has seldom been banged more loudly than today. If she wins the White House, Hillary Clinton wants to end the “tyranny” of short-termism. The Bank of England and McKinsey & Co, a consultancy trusted in boardrooms, worry investors cannot see past their noses. The French have legislated to give more voting rights to longer-lasting shareholders. Economists fret that firms' reluctance to invest their profits hurts growth.
Since the 1990s the clock of business has whirred faster in some ways. Silicon Valley upstarts have unsettled some mature industries. Computers buy and dump shares in the stockmarket within mi lliseconds. Yet even in America Inc, the home of hyperactive capitalism, “short-termist” is the wrong label.
Since the crisis of 2008-09 firms' horizons have in fact lengthened. New corporate bonds have an average maturity of 17 years, double the length they had in the 1990s. In 2014 departing chief executives of S&P 500 firms had served for an average of a decade——longer than at any point since 2002 (and longer than most presidents). The average holding period of an S&P 500 share is a pitiful 200 days, but that is double the level of 2009. Constant trading masks the rise of index funds whose holding period, like Mr Buffett's, is “for ever”. Larry Fink, the boss of BlackRock, the world's biggest asset manager, asks firms to draw up five-year plans.
Nor are firms investing less. The same system that is accused of myopia has just financed the $500 billion shale-energy revolution, a boom in experimental biotech companies and the electric-car ambitions of Elon Musk, a maverick entrepreneur. Relative to assets, sales and GDP, American firms' investment has held steady. The mix has shifted from plant and machines to things like software and research and development (R&D), but that is to be expected as equipment costs fall.
Economists grumble that listed firms are not investing their record profits, particularly since low interest rates mean that the cost of capital is cheap. But were companies to reinvest the cash they spend on buy-backs, their capital spending and R&D costs would rise to 15% of sales, way above the 25-year average of 9%. Few bosses would opt for such a splurge just because rates are low, especially if they are low as a result of economic worries. It is natural for mature firms to return cash to investors through dividends and buy-backs. And firms can invest too much as well as too little. China's idle factories and steel mills, absolved of duty to make a profit, are nothing to emulate.
That still leaves American businesses, and many of their rich-world peers, with a problem. If firms are sitting on cash, it can lead to a deficit in overall demand in the economy. Even if they return their surplus profits to shareholders, that may not boost demand if those shareholders are already rich and lengthenedthe extra money. Macroeconomic policies to boost demand will help. But competition can also make a difference by reducing outsize profits and spurring firms to invest more. Here there is cause to fret.
The boom in Silicon Valley gives an impression of a golden age of dynamism―in some industries, such as taxis, startups are indeed causing revolutions. Overall, however, American capitalism is more sluggish than it was. Small firms are being started at the slowest rate since the 1970s. Young firms' weight has shrunk, measured by their number and share of employment. The labour market has become less dynamic.
Most industries are getting cosier. Of the 13 sectors in America (excluding farming), ten were
more concentrated in 2007 than in 1997. Since Lehman Brothers folded in 2008, American firms have done $11 trillion of deals——worth 46% of their market value——whose main aim has been to increase market share and pricing power. Airlines, cable TV, telecoms, food and health care have all become less competitive. Giant tech firms with high market shares are making huge profits——tech firms together have 41% of all the cash held by non-financial firms.
Long-term paranoid
The answer is twofold. First, remove the barriers to the creation of small firms. Nearly 30% of American occupations now require licences——tourist guides in Nevada need 733 days of training, for example. Some 22% of small firms complain that red tape is their biggest problem; many have trouble getting credit. Both issues loom even larger in Europe. Second, be vigilant about oligopolies: so far America's antitrust regulator has blocked only a handful of the large deals proposed since 2008, although it is now scrutinising combinations such as Office Depot and Staples. Rather than trying to stipulate the horizon over which investors and firms should think, governments should promote competition. That is the best way to harness capitalism's hyperactive energy in the service of growth.
中文翻译（来自网络）
第二篇：被动的亢奋
有关企业短视的担忧没有抓住关键所在。就算是在美国，商业也是活力不再。
举例说明当代商业无比疯狂易如反掌。本周，美国最大的500家上市企业的1000亿股股票必将在疯狂的交易中换手；这些企业的老板将被收件箱中的75000封的电子邮件和一股关于客户的实时数据洪流所淹没；这些企业会在5天内买入价值1100亿美元的自家股票，这同他们当初所投入本钱相差无几。一只眼盯着他们的智能手机、另一只眼盯着自家的股价的老板们一个个双眼圆睁，似乎都成了某种亢奋资本主义的船长。
众人对商业生活步伐的这种加快叹息不已。这些资本主义的批评者声称，长远打算是一种奢侈。现在的经理，不是在设法满足对企业的忠诚是以周来计算的投资者，就是在推高股价以便让自己的收入最大化。高管们也是不胜纠结。竞争正变得越来越残酷：如果苹果或谷歌没有在想法把你搞垮，某个初创企业肯定在打你的主意。然而，这种观点是经不住推敲的。短视不是它看上去那样具有威胁性，竞争的问题是这种竞争还不够残酷。
长远眼光中的短视
先说短视。资本主义目光短浅的担忧有着一段很长的历史。凯恩斯曾经指出，大多数投资者都想“抢跑”。50年来，巴菲特始终是在靠着其他投资者的行为如同是被砍掉了头的鸡这个假设在挣钱。但是，这种鼓噪从没有像今天这样响亮。希拉里表示，如果入主白宫，她准备终结短视的“暴政”。英格兰银行以及在董事会会议室中深受信任的咨询机构麦肯锡担心，投资者不可能看到鼻子以外的地方。法国已经通过了授予长期股东更多投票权的立法。经济学家抱怨说，企业对于把利润拿出来进行投资的不情愿会伤及增长。
从某种程度上来说，自上世纪90年代以来，商业之钟越转越快。硅谷的新贵撬动了一些成熟的行业。计算机在市场上买卖股票是千分之几秒的事情。然而，即便是在美国——这个亢奋资本主义的总部，“短视”也是错误的标签。
自2008－09年危机以来，企业的视距实际上是拉长了。新的企业债，平均期限是17
年，是上世纪90年代的2倍；在2014年离职的标普500企业的高管，平均任期是10年，比2002年以来任何一年都长（而且比大多数总统都长）；标普500股票的平均持有期限，虽说是可怜的200天，却是2009年水平的2倍。频繁的交易掩盖的是持有期限像巴菲特那样是“永远”的指数基金的兴起。世界最大的资产管理人――贝莱德的老板拉里?9?9芬克要求企业制定5年计划。
企业的投资也没有在减少。得到了短视骂名的这套体系刚刚给页岩刚刚资助了价值是5000亿美元的页岩能源革命、实验性生物技术公司的一次大发展和特立独行的企业家埃隆·马斯克的电动汽车野心。相对于资产、销售额和GDP，美国企业的投资始终保持稳定。融合已从植物＋机器转向了软件＋研发等，但是，这是设备成本下降之后意料之中的事情。经济学家抱怨说，现在的上市企业没有把他们创纪录的利润用于投资，尤其是在低利率就意味着资本成本低廉的情况下。但是，如果企业把他们花在回购上的现金用于再投资，他们的资本支出和研发成本就会升至销售额的15％，这会高25年来平均水平高出9％。很少有老板会单单因为利率低就做出如此大手大脚的选择，尤其是在利率低是因为经济令人担忧的情况下。对于成熟的企业来说，通过分红和回购把现金返还给投资者是自然的。再者，企业的投资可多可少。
这仍然留给美国商界以及其他富裕国家的大多数商界人士一个难题。倘若企业坐拥大把现金，这可能会造成经济体总需求的疲软。在股东早已赚得盆满钵满并且把多余的钱藏起来的情况下，就算企业把多余的利润返还给他们，可能也无法提振需求。这时，为了刺激需求，宏观经济政策将派上用场。但是，竞争也可以通过降低额外利润并刺激企业加大投资的方式发挥作用。这才是应该抱怨的所在。
硅谷的繁荣给人们的印象是，这是一个活力四射的黄金时代——在出租车等行业，创业企业的确在引发革命。但是，总的来说，美式资本主义比以前懒了。小企业正在以上世纪70年代以来最慢的速度被创建起来。年轻的企业。无论是数量还是在就业中所占的比重，都在萎缩。劳动力市场已经变得活力不再。
大多数行业都在越变越舒适。在（除农业之外的）美国的13个部门中，有10个部门的2007年的集中度超过了1997年。自雷曼兄弟在2008年倒闭以来，美国企业做成了价值1.1万亿美元——占他们市场价值46％——的以提高市场份额和增强定价能力为主要目标的交易。航空、有线电视、电信、食品和医疗保健等行业都变不再那么有竞争性。市场份额巨大的科技巨头正在创造巨额的利润——科技企业总共持有非金融企业所持的全部现金的41%。
目光长远强迫症
答案是双重的。一方面，移除针对创建小企业的各种障碍。如今，美国将近30%的就业岗位需要证书。例如，在内华达州，导游岗位需要733天培训。大约22%的小企业抱怨说，繁琐的手续是最大的问题；许多企业都存在贷款难问题。这两个问题在欧洲更为突出。另一方面，警惕垄断：截至目前，美国反垄断监管机构仅阻止了2008年以来拟议中的大型交易中的一小部分，尽管他们目前正在对诸如史泰博与欧迪办公之类的合并进行审查。对政府来说，与其设法替投资者和企业设定应有的视野，不如提倡竞争。这是驾驭无比亢奋的资本主义能量并使之服务于增长的最佳途径。
Passage 3: Climate change
Nov 28th 2015 | From the print edition
Clear thinking needed
Global warming cannot be dealt with using today’s tools and mindsets. So create some new ones.
IN SOME ways, the climate talks that begin in Paris on November 30th will show world leaders at their best. Taking a break from pressing issues such as terrorist threats and stuttering economies, they will try to avert a crisis that will pose its gravest risks long after they have left office. It is the opposite of the myopic thinking that is often said to afflict politics. A pity, then, that politicians have set themselves an impossible task, and that they are mostly going about it in the wrong way.
That climate change is happening, that it is very largely man-made and that it is exceedingly dangerous, are all now hard to deny (though America’s leading Republican presidential candidates routinely try). This year will all but certainly be the hottest since 1880, when NASA’s records begin. If so, 2015 will break a record that was set only in 2014. Every single year so far this decade has been hotter than every single year before 1998.
The wind turbines and solar panels that are spreading across Europe, America and China are barely restraining carbon-dioxide emissions. Since the turn of the century, global energy has become more, not less, carbon intensive. Coal now supplies 41% of the world’s electricity and 29% of the world’s energy—a bigger share than at any time in at least four decades. The atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide is 40% higher than it was at the beginning of the industrial revolution.
A terrible two
The presidents and prime ministers who gather in Paris will insist that global warming must be halted before the world becomes 2°C (3.6°F) hotter than it was in pre-industrial days. That is what they have said for years but, considering the momentum behind climate change, this target is as unrealistic as it is arbitrary. If annual greenhouse-gas emissions remain at the present level, enough pollution will enter the atmosphere in just 30 years eventually to warm the world by two degrees.
Greens say that the target is a rallying point—that it is useful because it inspires action, and action, once under way, will inspire yet more action in a virtuous circle. If only world leaders would stiffen their spines and promise even more green energy, they argue, disaster could be averted. But this drastically understates the challenge. The parts of the planet that have become rich have done so by tapping a vast store of fossil energy with feckless, if understandable, abandon. For the rest of the world to join them over the century ahead, and then for all concerned—as well as the planet’s non-human inhabitants—to flourish in the centuries that follow, will take a lot more than just a big expansion of existing renewable technologies.
The world and its leaders need more ambition and more realism. The ambition requires increasing the options available. Generous subsidies perpetuate today’s low-carbon technologies; the goal should be to usher in tomorrow’s. Unfortunately, energy companies (unlike, say, drug
firms or car companies) see investment in radical new technologies as a poor prospect, and governments have been feeble in taking up the slack. A broad commitment quickly to raise and diversify R&D spending on energy technologies would be more welcome than more or less anything else Paris could offer.
This would be costly. But remember three things. One is that spending money to reduce grave risks is reasonable. The second is that s ome of today’s climate policies cost a lot more than a greatly expanded research portfolio and yield rather less. The subsidies that have created thousands of wind and solar farms have achieved only a little and at great cost. Other green subsidies, such as some of those for biofuels, have done actual harm. There is plenty of money to be saved.
A third is that one of the best measures against climate change raises money. Well-designed carbon prices can boost green power, encourage energy-saving and suppress fossil-fired power much more efficiently than subsidies for renewables. A few brave places have plumped to set such prices through carbon taxes: the latest is Alberta, in Canada. Most countries that have tried to price carbon have instead issued tradable pollution permits—invariably too many of them, with the result that the price is too low to change behaviour. Ideally such countries would admit their mistake and start taxing. Failing that, they should keep their emissions-trading schemes but add a floor price, and raise it steadily.
The new research agenda needs to tackle the deficiencies of renewables. Though solar, in particular, has become a lot cheaper, new materials, manufacturing and assembly technologies could make it cheaper still. Better ways of storing energy are required—so that wind or solar power can be used, for example, in the cold, still winter evenings when European electricity demand tends to peak. So are better ways of getting it from A to B, either through larger grids or in the form of newly synthesised fuels. Could biotechnology produce photosynthetic bugs that pump out lots of usable fuels? No one knows. It would be worth a few billion to find out.
Nor should the ambitions for research be limited to renewables. There are other forms of fossil-fuel-free energy, such as nuclear. Innovation in nuclear energy is not easy: such power plants are dangerous and need vigilant, independent regulation; they are unpopular and currently vastly expensive. But a civilisation that looks decades or more ahead cannot exclude new forms of nuclear from the research agenda.
Living with it
Radical innovation is the key to reducing emissions over the medium and long term, but it will not stop climate change from getting worse in the meantime. This is where the realism comes in: many people will have to adapt to a hotter Earth, and some of them will need help.
Wealthier countries (including China) have promised $100 billion a year to help poorer ones. The trouble is that it is not clear what counts towards this total or what the money is for. If the Paris climate conference dissolves in rancour, this will probably be the cause. The priority should be research into crops that can survive extreme weather; better sanitation and health care to make the poor more resilient to climate shocks; and cheap energy, whether green or not. The poor need all these things more than they need gifts of green-power technologies that even the West finds too expensive.
The final strand of new thinking ought to be research into cooling the Earth artificially. Climate models suggest that global warming could be slowed by spraying particles into the
stratosphere or by using salt crystals to make clouds whiter, and hence better at reflecting sunlight. No one knows whether such “geoengineering” projects can be designed in a way that does not replace existing climate risks with worse new ones. But that is a reason for research and debate, not for looking the other way. Geoengineering is not a substitute for cutting greenhouse-gas emissions (for one thing, it does not stop carbon dioxide from changing the chemistry of the oceans). But putting it off-limits, as many greens desire, is foolish.
In short: thinking caps should replace hair shirts, and pragmatism should replace green theology. The climate is changing because of extraordinary inventions like the steam turbine and the internal combustion engine. The best way to cope is to keep inventing.
参考译文（来自网络）
第三篇：气候变化
需要清晰的思考
全球变暖不能够用现在的工具和观念模式来处理，所以我们要创造一些新东西。
在某种程度上，在11月30号于巴黎召开的气候大会将展示世界各国的领导人们的最佳状态。从例如恐怖威胁、吃紧的经济这些紧迫问题中抽身，他们努力去避免一场将在他们离任很久后才会造成重大危险的危机。这与经常说起的折磨政界的短视思维相反。然而遗憾的是，那些政治家们为他们自己设定了一项不可能的任务，并且他们大多都在用错误的方式处理它。
气候变化正在发生。它很大一部分是人为造成，并且极度危险。这些如今都难以否认（尽管美国民调领先的共和党总统候选人们例行公事地尝试否认）。今年几乎可以肯定将会是1880年NASA有记录以来最热的一年。如果这样，2015年将打破2014年刚刚创下的记录。到目前为止，这十年中的每一年都比1998年之前的任何一年更热。
遍及欧洲、美国和中国的风力发电机和太阳能板几乎没有制止二氧化碳的排放。自世纪之交以来，全球能源消耗有多没少。煤炭供应了全世界41%的电力和29%的世界能源——一个比最近至少40年的任何时候都要高的份额。大气中的二氧化碳浓度比工业革命之初时要高40%。
可怕的2
聚集在巴黎的总统们、首相们将坚称在世界变得比前工业时代高出2℃（3.6℉）之前，全球变暖必须被遏制。那是他们说了很多年的东西。但考虑到气候变化背后的动力，这个目标既不切实际又武断。如果每年的温室气体排放保持在现在的水平，仅仅30年，足够的污染物将会进入大气层，使得全球气温提升两度。
环保人士说这个目标是一个有号召力的目标。它是有用的，因为它激励人们行动起来，一旦行动起来，将会激励起更多的行动，这形成一个良性循环。他们认为只要全世界的领导人们挺直他们的腰杆，并许诺更多的绿色能源，灾难可以被避免。然而这大大低估了挑战。这个星球的部分地区已经通过不负责任地利用大量化石能源变得富裕。这情有可原。世界剩下的国家在未来的一个世纪加入了这一行列。然后是所有可以考虑到的一切——也包括星球上不是人类的居民——要在之后的几个世纪蓬勃发展，将会消耗比仅仅是现存的可再生能源技术的大扩张所能提供的多得多的能源。
世界和它的领导人们需要更大的雄心和更加务实的态度。雄心要求增加可获得的其他选择。慷慨的补贴造就了今天的低碳技术，但目标应该是明天的技术。不幸的是，能源公司（不
同于药物公司和汽车公司）认为投资在崭新的技术会有一个糟糕的前景。政府在填补这一空缺上十分无力。一个宽泛的，能快速提高能源技术的研究与开发速度，并使其多样化的承诺，会比巴黎气候会议上提供的其他几乎任何事情更受欢迎。
这将花费昂贵，但是记住三件事。第一，花钱来减少巨大风险是合理的。第二，现今的一些气候政策花费比增加研究投资组合和领域要多得多，然而效果却不好。已经创造成千上万风力和太阳能发电厂的补贴，成效只有一点点，然而花费巨大。其他的绿色补贴，例如给生物燃料的补贴，实际上已经造成危害了。这里有大量的资金可以被节省下来。
第三，针对气候变化最好的措施之一是筹集资金。在增加绿色能源，鼓励能源节约和抑制化石燃料方面，设计周全的碳排放价格远比对可再生能源的补贴有效。一些勇于进取的地方已经在通过碳排放税来定价。最新的例子是加拿大的Alberta。绝大多数尝试设定碳排放价格的国家改为签发可交易的污染许可证——签发太多不可避免。这导致了碳排放价格太低以致不能改变排放行为。理想情况下，这种国家将会承认他们的错误，并且开始征收碳排放税。如果失败了，他们应该保持他们的碳排放交易计划，但要设定最低限价，并且稳步提升。
新的研究议程需要解决可再生能源的缺陷，尤其是太阳能，尽管已经变得便宜了很多。新的材料、制造和装配技术可能让它更加便宜。举个例子，在寒冷、寂静的冬夜里，当欧洲的用电需求达到高峰，需要更好的储能方式，这样一来风和太阳能就能够被使用。同样还需要更好的传输方式，或者通过更大的电网，或者以新合成燃料的方式输送。生物技术能够生产出生成大量可用燃料的光合细菌吗？没人知道。它值得花上几十亿来探索。
研究的雄心不应该被限制在可再生能源，还有其他形式的非化石燃料来源，例如核能。在核能方面的创新不容易。核电站是危险的，需要严密、独立的管理：它们不受欢迎，目前造价昂贵。但是一个着眼数十年乃至更长时间之后的文明不应该把新型核能排除在研究议程之外。
与之共存
从中长期来看，根本性创新是减少排放的关键，但在此期间气候将变得更糟。这是务实要进入的地方。很多人将不得不适应更热的地球，他们中的一些人需要帮助。
较富裕的国家（包括中国）已经许诺拿出每年1000亿美元来帮助较贫困的国家。麻烦的是哪些花费应该计入总数和这些钱用在哪里。如果巴黎气候会议不欢而散，这可能是其原因。当务之急应该是对能够在极端天气下存活的农作物的研究，使穷人更适应气候突变的更好的卫生和医疗措施，和廉价的能源。无论其绿色与否，穷人需要所有这些东西超过他们需要那些甚至连西方也认为过于昂贵的绿色能源技术。
新的思维最后一环应该是研究冷却地球的方法。气候模型表明通过喷洒微粒到同温层或者使用盐晶来让云变得更白，这样云能更好地反射太阳光，全球变暖可能被减缓。没有人知道这种地球工程项目能否被设计成不用更糟的气候来取代现存的气候。但是这正是研究和争论的原因，而不是寻找其他方法的原因。地球工程不是减少温室气体排放的代替品（例如，它不能停止二氧化碳改变海洋的化学组成）。但很多环保人士渴望把它排除在外，这同样愚蠢。
总之：思考帽应该取代刚毛衬衫，实用主义应该代替绿色神学。因为像蒸汽机和内燃机的超凡发明，气候正在变化。最好的解决方法就是继续发明。
Passage 4: The Future of Computing
Mar 12th 2016 | From the print edition
The era of predictable improvement in computer hardware is ending. What comes next?
IN 1971 the fastest car in the world was the Ferrari Daytona, capable of 280kph (174mph). The world’s tallest buildings were New York’s twin towers, at 415 metres (1,362 feet). In November that year Intel launched the first commercial microprocessor chip, the 4004, containing 2,300 tiny transistors, each the size of a red blood cell.
Since then chips have improved in line with the prediction of Gordon Moore, Intel’s co-founder. According to his rule of thumb, known as Moore’s law, processing power doubles roughly every two years as smaller transistors are packed ever more tightly onto silicon wafers, boosting performance and reducing costs. A modern Intel Skylake processor contains around 1.75 billion transistors—half a million of them would fit on a single transistor from the 4004—and collectively they deliver about 400,000 times as much computing muscle. This exponential progress is difficult to relate to the physical world. If cars and skyscrapers had improved at such rates since 1971, the fastest car would now be capable of a tenth of the speed of light; the tallest building would reach half way to the Moon.
The impact of Moore’s law is visible all around us. Today 3 billion people carry smartphones in their pockets: each one is more powerful than a room-sized supercomputer from the 1980s. Countless industries have been upended by digital disruption. Abundant computing power has even slowed nuclear tests, because atomic weapons are more easily tested using simulated explosions rather than real ones. Moore’s law has become a cultural trope: people inside and outside Silicon Valley expect technology to get better every year.
But now, after five decades, the end of Moore’s law is in sight (see Technology Quarterly). Making transistors smaller no longer guarantees that they will be cheaper or faster. This does not mean progress in computing will suddenly stall, but the nature of that progress is changing. Chips will still get better, but at a slower pace (number-crunching power is now doubling only every 2.5 years, says Intel). And the future of computing will be defined by improvements in three other areas, beyond raw hardware performance.
Faith no Moore
The first is software. This week AlphaGo, a program which plays the ancient game of Go, beat Lee Sedol, one of the best human players, in the first two of five games scheduled in Seoul. Go is of particular interest to computer scientists because of its complexity: there are more possible board positions than there are particles in the universe (see article). As a result, a Go-playing system cannot simply rely on computational brute force, provided by Moore’s law, to prevail. AlphaGo r elies instead on “deep learning” technology, modelled partly on the way the human brain works. Its success this week shows that huge performance gains can be achieved through new algorithms. Indeed, slowing progress in hardware will provide stronger incentives to develop cleverer software.
The second area of progress is in the “cloud”, the networks of data centres that deliver services over the internet. When computers were stand-alone devices, whether mainframes or desktop PCs, their performance depended above all on the speed of their processor chips. Today
computers become more powerful without changes to their hardware. They can draw upon the vast (and flexible) number-crunching resources of the cloud when doing things like searching through e-mails or calculating the best route for a road trip. And interconnectedness adds to their capabilities: smartphone features such as satellite positioning, motion sensors and wireless-payment support now matter as much as processor speed.
The third area of improvement lies in new computing architectures—specialised chips optimised for particular jobs, say, and even exotic techniques that exploit quantum-mechanical weirdness to crunch multiple data sets simultaneously. There was less need to pursue these sorts of approaches when generic microprocessors were improving so rapidly, but chips are now being designed specifically for cloud computing, neural-network processing, computer vision and other tasks. Such specialised hardware will be embedded in the cloud, to be called upon when needed. Once again, that suggests the raw performance of end-user devices matters less than it did, because the heavy lifting is done elsewhere.
Speed isn’t everything
What will this mean in practice? Moore’s law was never a physical law, but a self-fulfilling prophecy—a triumph of central planning by which the technology industry co-ordinated and synchronised its actions. Its demise will make the rate of technological progress less predictable; there are likely to be bumps in the road as new performance-enhancing technologies arrive in fits and starts. But given that most people judge their computing devices on the availability of capabilities and features, rather than processing speed, it may not feel like much of a slowdown to consumers.
For companies, the end of Moore’s law will be disguised by the shift to cloud computing. Already, firms are upgrading PCs less often, and have stopped operating their own e-mail servers. This model depends, however, on fast and reliable connectivity. That will strengthen demand for improvements to broadband infrastructure: those with poor connectivity will be less able to benefit as improvements in computing increasingly happen inside cloud providers’ data centres.
For the technology industry itself, the decline of Moore’s law strengthens the logic for centralised cloud computing, already dominated by a few big firms: Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent. They are working hard to improve the performance of their cloud infrastructure. And they are hunting for startups touting new tricks: Google bought Deepmind, the British firm that built AlphaGo, in 2014.
For more than 50 years, the seemingly inexorable shrinking of transistors made computers steadily cheaper and more capable. As Moore’s la w fades, progress will be less metronomic. But computers and other devices will continue to become more powerful—just in different and more varied ways.
中文翻译：（来自网络）
第四篇：计算的未来
计算机硬件进步可预测的时代正在走向尾声。接下来是什么？
1971年，世界上最快的汽车是法拉利代托纳（Daytona），时速可达280公里。世界上最高的建筑物是纽约的双子塔，高415米。同年11月，英特尔推出了第一款商用微处理器芯片
4004，由2300个微小的晶体管组成，每个有红血球大小。
从那以后芯片的进步与英特尔联合创始人高登·摩尔（Gordon Moore）的预测一致。根据他的经验法则，即摩尔定律，随着越来越小的晶体管被更紧密地封装到硅片上，性能提升、成本下降，芯片处理能力约每两年提升一倍。英特尔现在的Skylake处理器由约17.5亿个晶体管组成，4004芯片上一个晶体管的大小相当于50万个最新芯片上的晶体管，它们的整体运算能力是4004芯片的四十万倍。现实世界很难实现这样这样指数级的增长。如果自1971年起汽车和摩天大楼以这样的速度发展，那么现在最快的汽车速度已经能达到光速的十分之一；最高的建筑物再高一倍就要触到月球了。
摩尔定律的影响在我们周围随处可见。今天30亿人口袋里装着智能手机：每个手机都比20世纪80年代房间大小的超级计算机能力更强。无数行业因数字化的剧变而被颠覆。强劲的计算能力甚至已经减少了核试验的次数，因为比起实际试验，原子武器更容易通过模拟爆炸测试。摩尔定律已成为一种文化指代：硅谷内外的人都期盼着技术每年有进步。
然而五十年后的现在，摩尔定律已走到了尽头。将晶体管做得更小不再能保证它们会更便宜或更快。这并不是说计算能力的提升会突然停滞，但是这种提升的本质正在改变。芯片还会更好，但提升的速度会放缓（英特尔称，运算能力目前要每两年半才翻一倍）。计算的未来将由其他三方面的进步定义，而不再只是单纯的硬件性能提升。
摩尔不再可信
首先是软件。本周一款围棋软件AlphaGo在首尔如期举行的五番棋比赛的头两盘中击败了人类最优秀的棋手之一李世石。由于围棋的复杂性，计算机科学家对它特别感兴趣：棋盘上落子位置的可能性比宇宙中的粒子数量还要多。因此，要取得胜利，围棋软件不能简单地依靠由摩尔定律提供的计算蛮力。相反，AlphaGo依靠的是“深度学习”技术，在一定程度上模仿人类大脑的工作方式。它本周的成功表明通过新的算法可以取得性能的巨大进步。实际上，硬件提升放缓将为开发更加智能的软件提供更强劲的推动力。
第二个进步领域是“云”，即通过互联网提供服务的数据中心网络。当计算机是单机设备时，无论是大型主机还是台式电脑，它们的性能首先取决于处理器芯片的速度。今天的计算机无需改变硬件就能变得更为强大。它们可以利用云端庞大（且灵活）的运算资源来搜索电子邮件或者计算最佳出游路线。互联性增强了计算机的能力：智能手机的功能如卫星定位、运动传感器和无线支付等现在与处理器速度同等重要。
第三个进步领域是新的计算架构，如为特殊工作优化的特制芯片，甚至利用量子力学这种新技术的超凡力量来同时处理多个数据集。当通用微处理器能快速提升运算速度时，不那么需要追求这些途径，但是现在的芯片特为云计算、神经网络处理、计算机视觉和其他任务而设计。这些专用硬件将被装在云端，需要时可以随时调用。这再一次表明终端用户设备自身的性能不如以前那么重要，因为繁重的工作已经在别处完成了。
速度并非所有
这在实际中意味着什么呢？摩尔定律绝非物理法则，而是自我应验的寓言，是科技行业齐心
协力达成的集中规划的胜利。它的消亡会让技术进步的速度更难预测；提升性能的新技术的出现有早有晚，因此这条路可能会时起时落。但是考虑到大多数人依赖功能与特性的有无而非处理速度来评价他们的计算设备，消费者可能对发展减速感触不大。
对公司而言，向云计算的转向将掩盖摩尔定律的终结。公司升级台式电脑的频率已经降低，也不再运营自己的邮件服务器。不过这一模式依赖的是快速可靠的连通性。这会加强对宽带基础设施提升的要求：随着云提供商的数据中心内部计算能力的不断提升，连通性差的公司将越来越无法从中受益。
对于科技行业自身而言，摩尔定律的衰落强化了集中式云计算的逻辑，这已经由少数几家大公司主导：亚马逊、谷歌、微软、阿里巴巴、百度和腾讯。它们正努力提升自己云基础设施的性能，同时也在搜罗别具创意的创业公司：谷歌2014年收购了Deepmind，正是这家英国公司开发了AlphaGo。
半个多世纪以来，晶体管不断缩小，看似无可阻挡，让计算机价格稳步降低、性能持续提升。随着摩尔定律的消亡，进步不再那么有时间规律。但计算机和其他设备会不断变得更强大，只是以不同的、更多元化的方式。
Passage 5: Who's afraid of cheap oil?
Jan 23th 2016 | From the print edition
Low energy prices ought to be a shot in the arm for the economy. Think again.
ALONG with bank runs and market crashes, oil shocks have rare power to set monsters loose. Starting with the Arab oil embargo of 1973, people have learnt that sudden surges in the price of oil cause economic havoc. Conversely, when the price slumps because of a glut, as in 1986, it has done the world a power of good. The rule of thumb is that a 10% fall in oil prices boosts growth by 0.1-0.5 percentage points.
In the past 18 months the price has fallen by 75%, from $110 a barrel to below $27. Yet this time the benefits are less certain. Although consumers have gained, producers are suffering grievously. The effects are spilling into financial markets, and could yet depress consumer confidence. Perhaps the benefits of such ultra-cheap oil still outweigh the costs, but markets have fallen so far so fast that even this is no longer clear.
The new economics of oil
The world is drowning in oil. Saudi Arabia is pumping at almost full tilt. It is widely thought that the Saudis want to drive out higher-cost producers from the industry, including some of the fracking firms that have boosted oil output in the United States from 5m barrels a day (b/d) in 2008 to over 9m b/d now. Saudi Arabia will also be prepared to suffer a lot of pain to thwart Iran, its bitter rival, which this week was poised to rejoin oil markets as nuclear sanctions were lifted, with potential output of 3m-4m b/d.
Despite the Saudis' efforts, however, producers have proved resilient. Many frackers have eked out efficiencies. They hate the idea of plugging their wells only for the wildcatter on the next block to reap the reward when prices rebound. They will not pack up so long as prices cover day-to-day costs, in some cases as low as $15 a barrel. Meanwhile oil stocks in the mostly rich-country OECD in October stood at 267 days' net imports, almost 50% higher than five years earlier. They will continue to grow, especially if demand slows by more than expected in China and the rest of Asia. Forecasting the oil price is a mug's game (as the newspaper that once speculated about $5 oil, we speak from experience), but few expect it to start rising before 2017. Today's price could mark the bottom of the barrel. Some are predicting a trough of as low as $10.
The lower the better, you might say. Look at how cheap oil has boosted importers, from Europe to South Asia. The euro area's oil-import bill has fallen by 2% of GDP since mid-2014. India has become the world's fastest-growing large economy.
Yet the latest lurch down is also a source of anxiety. Collapsing revenues could bring political instability to fragile parts of the world, such as V enezuela and the Gulf, and fuel rivalries in the Middle East. Cheap oil has a green lining, as it drags down the global price of natural gas, which crowds out coal, a dirtier fuel. But in the long run, cheap fossil fuels reduce the incentive to act on climate change. Most worrying of all is the corrosive new economics of oil.
In the past cheap oil has buoyed the world economy because consumers spend much more out of one extra dollar in their pocket than producers do. Today that reckoning is less straightforward than it was. American consumers may have been saving more than was expected. Oil producers are tightening their belts, having spent extravagantly when prices were high. After the latest drop in crude prices, Russia announced a 10% cut in public spending. Even Saudi Arabia is slashing its budget to deal with its deficit of 15% of GDP.
Cheap oil also hurts demand in more important ways. When crude was over $100 a barrel it made sense to spend on exploration in out-of-the-way provinces, such as the Arctic, west Africa and deep below the saline rock off the coast of Brazil. As prices have tumbled, so has investment. Projects worth $380 billion have been put on hold. In America spending on fixed assets in the oil industry has fallen by half from its peak. The poison has spread: the purchasing managers' index for December, of 48.2, registered an accelerating contraction across the whole of American manufacturing. In Brazil the harm to Petrobras, the national oil company, from the oil price has been exacerbated by a corruption scandal that has paralysed the highest echelons of government.
The fall in investment and asset prices is all the more harmful because it is so rapid. As oil collapses against the backdrop of a fragile world economy, it could trigger defaults.
The possible financial spillovers are hard to assess. Much of the $650 billion rise in emerging-market corporate debt since 2007 has been in oil and commodity industries. Oil plays a central role in a clutch of emerging markets prone to trouble. With GDP in Russia falling, the government could well face a budgetary crisis within months. Venezuela, where inflation is above 140%, has declared an economic state of emergency.
Other oil producers are prone to a similar, if milder, cycle of weaker growth, a falling currency, imported inflation and tighter monetary policy. Central banks in Colombia and Mexico raised interest rates in December. Nigeria is rationing dollars in a desperate (probably doomed) effort to boost its currency.
There are strains in rich countries, too. Yields on corporate high-yield bonds have jumped from about 6.5% in mid-2015 to 9.7% today. Investors' aversion spread quickly from energy firms
to all borrowers. With bears stalking equity markets, global indices are plumbing 30-month lows. Central bankers in rich countries worry that persistent low inflation will feed expectations of static or falling prices—in effect, raising real interest rates. Policymakers' ability to respond is constrained because rates, close to zero, cannot be cut much more.
Make the best of it
The oil-price drop creates vast numbers of winners in India and China. It gives oil-dependent economies like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela an urgent reason to embrace reform. It offers oil importers, like South Korea, a chance to tear up wasteful energy subsidies—or boost inflation and curb deficits by raising taxes. But this oil shock comes as the world economy is still coping with the aftermath of the financial crash. You might think that there could be no better time for a boost. In fact, the world could yet be laid low by an oil monster on the prowl.
中文翻译：
第五篇：谁害怕廉价石油？
处于低位的能源价格理应成为经济的一剂强心剂。但是，转念一想.....
石油冲击波与银行挤兑和市场崩盘一起，具有一种放松对怪兽捆绑的罕见力量。从1973年的阿拉伯石油禁运开始，人们认识到，油价的飙升会引发经济浩劫。相反，当油价像1986年那样，因为供过于求而暴跌时，它会给世界带来了各种各样的好处。一般来说，油价下跌10％，能够提升增长0.1-0.5个百分点。
在过去18月中，油价下跌了75％，每桶的价格从110美元跌至27美元之下。然而，这一次，好处就没有确定了。尽管消费者已经获益，生产商却在饱受煎熬。其后果正在殃及金融市场，而且有可能打压消费者的信心。如此超级廉价的石油的好处可能仍然要大于代价，但是，到目前为止，市场的下跌之快，甚至让这一点也变得不再那么明确了。
新石油经济
世界正在淹没在石油之中。沙特正在开足马力往外打油。一种被广为接受的观点认为，沙特想把成本较高的生产商挤出这一行业，这其中就包括把美国的原油日产量从2008年的500万桶提高到目前的900多万桶的一些页岩油企业。同时，沙特还将准备承受一些痛苦，以便打击随着核制裁被解除而准备好在本周重返石油市场的、潜在日产量为300-400万桶的死对头伊朗。
然而，尽管沙特尽了极大的努力，生产商却显示出十足的韧劲。许多页岩油企业挤出了效率。它们痛恨封闭自家油井却让投机分子在油价反弹时从下一个区域获利的想法。只要油价还够应付在有些情况下已经低至每桶15美元的日常成本，他们就不会卷铺盖卷走人。与此同时，大多数富裕国家的原油储备已在去年10月达到267天的净进口量，比5年前高出将近一半。这些储备还会继续增加，尤其是在中国和亚洲其他地区的需求减速大于预期的情况下。预测油价是一件吃力不讨好的事情（正如本报曾经根据经验，预测油价将跌至大约5美元那样）。但是，没有几个人预测油价会在2017年之前开始上涨。目前的价格可能已经见底。有的人正在预测低至10美元的底部。
人们也许会说，当然是越低越好了。看看廉价的石油是如何提振了从欧洲到南亚的那些进口国吧。欧元区的石油进口账单在GDP中的占比，自2014年中期以来下降了2个百分点。印度已经成为全世界发展最快的大型经济体。
然而，这次大跌还是焦虑的一大源头。崩塌的收入可能会给世界上的一些脆弱地区，如委内瑞拉和海湾地区，带去政治上的不稳定；同时，它还可能加剧中东地区的对抗。廉价的石油还会因为压低了将更加肮脏的燃料——煤炭挤出市场的天然气的全球价格而有助于环
保。但是，从长期来看，廉价的化石燃料降低了对气候变化有所作为的动力。最令人担忧的是具有慢性破坏作用的新石油经济。
过去，廉价石油因为消费者会之掏出比生产商多得多的额外支出而提振了世界经济。如今，这笔帐算起来已经不如原来那样直接了。美国消费者可能一直在超出预期地储蓄。油价高企时大手大脚花钱的石油生产商正在勒紧裤腰带。经过这一轮的油价大跌后，俄罗斯已经宣布将公共开支削减10％。就连沙特也在大幅消减预算以应对占GDP15％的赤字。
廉价石油还以更加重要的方式伤害需求。当油价超过每桶100美元时，为北极、西非和巴西深海岩层等偏远地区的勘探和开采而花钱是有意义的。随着油价的暴跌，投资也在急剧减少。价值3800亿美元的多个项目已经被叫停。美国石油行业对固定资产的开支已经从峰值下降了一半。毒性已经四处扩散：去年12月48.2％的采购经理人指数录得了全美制造业的一次整体加速收缩。在巴西，油价对国有石油企业巴西石油的伤害已经因为令政府高层处于瘫痪状态的一件腐败丑闻而被放大。
投资的减少和资产价格的下跌，因为速度过快而更加有害。由于这一次油价是崩塌是在全球经济脆弱不堪的背景下发生的，它可能触发各种违约。
潜在的金融溢出是难以评估的。新兴市场企业自2007年以来所增加的6500亿美元债务中的绝大部分都发生在石油和大宗商品行业。石油在很多容易陷入困境的新兴市场中占据着举足轻重的地位。鉴于俄罗斯GDP的下降，该国政府极有可能在数月内面临一场预算危机。通胀超过140％的委内瑞拉已经宣布了经济紧急状态。
其他的石油生产国容易很可能进入一段虽然较为温和但却是同样的弱增长、货币贬值、输入性通胀和从紧的货币政策的周期。哥伦比亚和墨西哥央行已于去年12月提高了利率。尼日利亚正在对美元实施资本管制，竭尽全力（可能是垂死挣扎地）提振其货币。
富裕国家也存在压力。高收益的企业债券的收益率已经从2015年年中的6.5%左右跳升至目前的9.7%。投资者的避险行为快速地从能源企业扩散到了所有的借钱方。证券市场熊势明显，全球各大指数都在下探30个月的低点。富裕国家的央行银行家担心，持续的低通胀将造成物价停滞或者是跌跌不休的预期——实际上，这相当于提高了实际利率。决策者的应对能力则掣肘于不可能再被大幅下调的零利率。
利用好这次机会
油价下跌在印度和中国造就出大量的赢家。它给沙特和委内瑞拉等石油依赖性经济体提供了一个拥抱改革的迫切理由，给南韩等石油进口国提供了一个取消各种烧钱的能源补贴——甚或是通过加税来刺激通胀并抑制赤字的机会。但是，这次的石油冲击波是在全球经济仍在应对金融危机后遗症的情况下发生的。人们可能会认为，再也没有比这更好地进行刺激的时机了。事实上，世界仍有可能倒在一头逡巡觅食的石油怪兽之下。
Passage 6: How to manage the migrant crisis
Feb 6th 2016 | From the print edition
A European problem demands a common, coherent EU policy. Let refugees in, but regulate the flow.
REFUGEES are reasonable people in desperate circumstances. Life for many of the 1m-odd asylum-seekers who have fled Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other war-torn countries for Europe in
The Brain Activity Map 绘制大脑活动地图 Hard cell 棘手的细胞 An ambitious project to map the brain is in the works. Possibly too ambitious 一个绘制大脑活动地图的宏伟计划正在准备当中，或许有些太宏伟了 NEWS of what protagonists hope will be America’s next big science project continues to dribble out. 有关其发起人心中下一个科学大工程的新闻报道层出不穷。 A leak to the New York Times, published on February 17th, let the cat out of the bag, with a report that Barack Obama’s administration is thinking of sponsoring what will be known as the Brain Activity Map. 2月17日，《纽约时报》刊登的一位线人报告终于泄露了秘密，报告称奥巴马政府正在考虑赞助将被称为“大脑活动地图”的计划。 And on March 7th several of those protagonists published a manifesto for the project in Science. 3月7日，部分发起人在《科学》杂志上发表声明证实了这一计划。 The purpose of BAM is to change the scale at which the brain is understood. “大脑活动地图”计划的目标是改变人们在认知大脑时采用的度量方法。 At the moment, neuroscience operates at two disconnected levels. 眼下，神经学的研究处在两个断开的层次。 The higher one, where the dimensions of features are measured in centimetres, has many techniques at its disposal, notably functional magnetic-res onance imaging, which measures changes in tissues’ fuel consumption. 在相对宏观的层次当中各个特征的规模用厘米来衡量，有很多技术可以使用，尤其是用来测量组织中能量消耗变动情况的核磁共振成像技术。 This lets researchers see which bits of the brain are active in particular tasks—as long as those tasks can be performed by a person lying down inside a scanner. 该技术可使研究人员找出在完成具体的任务时，大脑的哪些部分处于活跃状态。At the other end of the scale, where features are measured in microns, lots of research has been done on how individual nerve cells work, how messages are sent from one to another, and how the connections between cells strengthen and weaken as memories are formed. 而另一个度量的层次则要求用微米来测量各种特征，这一层次的研究很多都是关于单个神经细胞是如何工作的、信息在神经细胞之间是如何传递的以及当产生记忆的时候神经细胞之间的联系是如何得到加强和减弱的。 Between these two, though, all is darkness. 然而，位于这两个层次之间的研究还处于一片漆黑当中。 It is like trying to navigate America with an atlas that shows the states, the big cities and the main highways, and has a few street maps of local neighbourhoods, but displays nothing in between.
Youngsters’job preferences and prospects are mismatched 年轻人的工作偏好与就业前景不相匹配 Teenage picks 青少年的选择 The world of work is changing.Are people ready for the new job outlook? A survey of15-year-olds across41countries by the OECD,a club of mostly rich countries,found that teenagers may have unrealistic expectations about the kind of work that will be available. 职业的世界正在发生变化。人们做好准备接受新的就业观了吗？世界经合组织（一个以发达国家为主的组织）对41个国家的15岁青少年进行了一项调查，结果发现青少年对于未来可能从事的工作抱有不切实际的期望。 Four of the five most popular choices were traditional professional roles: doctors,teachers,business managers and lawyers. Teenagers clustered around the most popular jobs,with the top ten being chosen by47%of boys and53%of girls.Those shares were significantly higher than when the survey was conducted back in2000. 在五个最受欢迎的职业选择中有四个是传统的职业角色：医生、教师、企业经理和律师。青少年对于最受欢迎工作的选择呈现了聚集性，有47％的男孩和53％的女孩选择了排在前十位的职业。这一比例显著高于2000年调查时的水平。 The rationale for this selection was partly down to wishful thinking on the part of those surveyed(designers,actors and musical performers were three of the top15jobs).Youth must be allowed a bit of hope. 受访者做出这一选择往往是出于自己的一厢情愿（最受欢迎的15个职业中有3个分别是设计师、演员和歌手）。我们必须给年轻人一点希望。
《经济学家》读译参考（第13篇）：一路繁衍——你知道外来入侵物种吗？ Go forth and multiply 一往无前，生生不息 WHAT makes for a successful invasion? Often, the answer is to have better weapons than the enemy. And, as it is with people, so it is with plants—at least, that is the conclusion of a p_______①published in ★Biology Letters[1] by Naomi Cappuccino, of Carleton University, and Thor Arnason, of the University of Ottawa, both in Canada. 怎样才能成功入侵？答案常常是：拥有比敌人更好的武器。人是这样，植物也是如此——至少，《生物书简》上发表的一篇论文是这么认为的，作者是来自加拿大加里敦大学的纳奥米?卡普奇诺和渥太华大学的索尔?阿纳森。 The phenomenon of alien species ★popping up[2] in unexpected parts of the world has grown over the past few d________② as people and goods become more mobile and （1）?plant seeds and animal larvae have ★hitched[3] along for the ride?. Most such aliens blend into the ecosystem in which they arrive without too much fuss. (Indeed, many probably fail to establish themselves at all—but those failures, of course, are never noticed.) Occasionally, though, something ★goes bananas[4] and starts trying to take the place over, and an invasive species is born. Dr Cappuccino and Dr Arnason asked themselves w_______③. 过去的几十年，随着人和货物的流动日益频繁，植物种子和动物幼体也乘机“搭便车”四处播散，世界各地无意间出现了越来越多的外来物种。这些外来物种大多数都轻而易举地融入了所到之处的生态系统。（事实上，许多物种可能还没有站稳脚跟——当然，人们从未注意到这一点。）不过，偶尔也有某些物种疯狂繁殖，开始企图占领原有物种的生长空间，一种入侵物种就这样形成了。卡普奇诺和阿纳森对此感到百思不得其解。 One hypothesis is that aliens leave their predators b________④. Since the predators in their new homelands are not adapted to exploit them, they are able to reproduce unchecked. That is a nice idea, but it does not explain why only certain aliens become invasive. Dr Cappuccino and Dr Arnason suspected this might be because native predators are [b]（2）
China in Laos Busted flush How a Sino-Lao special economic zone hit the skids May 26th 2011 | BOTEN, LAOS | from the print edition ?Tweet ? Soon all this will be jungle again AT HOME and abroad, China is a byword for fast-track development, where yesterday’s paddy field is tomorrow’s factory, highway or hotel. Less noticed is that such development can just as quickly go into reverse. Golden City, in Boten, just over the border from China in tiny Laos, is a case in point. When a Hong Kong-registered company signed a 30-year, renewable lease with the Lao government in 2003 to set up a 1,640-hectare special economic zone built with mainland money and expertise, Golden City was touted as a
Cloth of gold 一块价值堪比黄金的布 Why the economic value of a face mask is$56.14 为什么说一个口罩的经济价值是56.14美元 After a brutal first six months of the year,governments across the world are hoping for an economic bounce-back.Rich-world GDP fell by about 10%in the first half of2020. 在经历今年上半年的残酷考验后，世界各国政府都期待经济能够触底反弹。2020年上半年，发达国家的GDP下降了约10%。 Yet much has changed since—including that more people are now wearing masks.Economists,obsessed with translating everything into GDP,wonder if more widespread face-covering could help the recovery.然而，自从越来越多的人戴上口罩后，情况发生了显著变化。经济学家痴迷于用GDP来解释一切事物，如今他们想知道，随着更多的人戴上了口罩，经济能否走向复苏。The thinking goes that masks can,in part,substitute for lockdowns. People wearing them need not be discouraged as much from using public transport.More shops and offices might be able to reopen,albeit while practising social distancing. 这种想法基于这样一个逻辑，戴口罩在一定程度上可以代替封锁措施。当人们戴上口罩后，就不必再对公共交通工具进行限制了。更多的商店和办公室也将重新开放，尽管是在保持社交距离的前提下。 Calculations from Goldman Sachs,a bank,suggest that a15 percentage-point rise in the share of the population that wears masks
经济学人双语阅读1
经济学人杂志双语阅读 Consumer spending in Asia：Shopaholics wanted Consumer spending in Asia亚洲消费状况 Shopaholics wanted 购物狂时代该来了？ Jun 25th 2009 | HONG KONG From The Economist print edition Can Asians replace Americans as a driver of global growth? 亚洲人能够代替美国人做全球经济的发动机吗？ ASIA'S emerging economies are bouncing back much more strongly than any others. While America's industrial production continued to slide in May, output in emerging Asia has regained its pre-crisis level (see chart 1). This is largely due to China; but although production in the region's smaller economies is still well down on a year ago, it is rebounding in those countries too. Taiwan's industrial output rose by an annualised 80% in the three months to May compared with the previous three months. JPMorgan estimates that emerging Asia's GDP has grown by an annualised 7% in the second quarter. 时下亚洲新兴经济体们的恢复势头比其他任何国家都要迅猛。在美国工业生产继续下滑的5月，亚洲新兴国家的产出已经回到了它们危机前的水平(见表一)。这很大程度上要归功于中国，此外尽 管该地区较小经济体的生产比去年仍有所下降，但最近这些国家也
【经济学人】双语阅读：政治遗传学人体政治 Science and technology 科学技术 The genetics of politics 政治遗传学 Body politic 人体政治 Slowly, and in some quarters grudgingly, the influence of genes in shaping political outlook and behaviour is being recognized 在某些方面，塑造政治前景和行为的基因影响正在慢慢地被人们所接受，虽然还是不情愿。 IN 1882 W.S. Gilbert wrote, to a tune by Sir Arthur Sullivan, a ditty that went I often think it's comical how Nature always does contrive/that every boy and every gal that's born into the world alive/is either a little Liberal or else a little Conservative. 在1882年，W.S吉尔伯特写的一首小诗-是为阿瑟-沙利文爵士的一首曲子而作，我一直认为，大自然的精工雕作是那么可笑/每个出生到这个世界上，并存活下来的男孩和女孩们/不是有一点自由倾向，就是有一点保守。 In the 19th century, that view, though humorously intended, would not have been out of place among respectable thinkers. 在十九世纪，这个观点虽然有一点幽默的意味，但是在那些备受尊敬的思想家眼中，也并不是一无是处。 The detail of a man's opinion might be changed by circumstances. 一个人意见的详细观点可能会由于环境而改变。 But the idea that much of his character was ingrained at birth held no terrors. 但是，这种与生俱来的，由他的性格决定的观念也没什么恐怖的。 It is not, however, a view that cut much ice in 20th-century social-scientific thinking, particularly after the second world war. 然而，它在二十世纪的社会科学思想中没有占到一席之地，特别是二战之后。 Those who allowed that it might have some value were generally shouted down and sometimes abused, along with all others vehemently suspected of the heresy of believing that genetic differences between individuals could have a role in shaping their behavioural differences. 那些认为它有一些价值的人们发出的呐喊，通常会被持不同观点人们的声音所掩盖，有时还会遭到辱骂，和那些对当时的异端邪说----即个体之间的遗传差异在塑造他们各自不同的行为上起了一定的作用----有些猜测的人们一样受到不公平对待。
Tencent Video battles iQiyi in China’s streaming wars腾讯视频与爱奇艺之中国流媒体大战 But the two big Chinese streaming platform may onc day settle into a cosy duopoly 但两大平台在未来某天或将实现双头垄断 L aunched in2010,iQiyi has grown used to the foreign press calling it“the Netflix of China”.Not the worst nickname,given the videostreaming pioneer’s success.But Gong Yu,iQiyi’s founder and boss,insists that his firm is more accurately described as“Netflix plus”.A bold claim for a loss-making business worth one-fifteenth as much as America’s(cash-generating)entertainment powerhouse with a market value of$214bn.Still,Mr Gong has a point. 创立于2010年的爱奇艺常常被外国媒体称为“中国版网飞”。鉴于这家流媒体先驱的成功，这一称号也算名副其实。但爱奇艺创始人兼老板龚宇坚称，准确来说，爱奇艺是“加强版网飞”。对于这家仍在亏损的公司来说，这种说法有些张狂，作为美国娱乐业巨头的网飞现已实现盈利，市值高达2140亿美元，而爱奇艺市值仅为其十五分之一。不过，龚宇所言仍有些许道理。 Like Netflix,iQiyi offers customers a deep catalogue of licensed and original content.Unlike Netflix,which relies almost entirely on subscription fees,iQiyi has multiple revenue streams.“Membership fees”,which start from19.8yuan ($2.87)a month,accounted for just over half of iQiyi’s7.4bn yuan in revenues in the second quarter. 爱奇艺和网飞一样，也为客户提供海量版权及原创影视作品。但不同于几乎完全依赖会员费的网飞，爱奇艺拥有多项收入来源。在爱奇艺第二季度74亿元的营收中，每月19.8元（约合2.87美元）起的“会员费”占比刚刚过半。 The rest came mainly from an online store(which sells“entertainment-related merchandise”),a nascent mobile-gaming arm,an e-book business and advertisements;iQiyi operates a“freemium”model which allows stingier users to stream some content free of charge provided they agree to watch ads.
来源于https://www.doczj.com/doc/825589295.html,/wordpress/（The Economist《经济学人》中文版）和https://www.doczj.com/doc/825589295.html,/（《The Economist》《经济学人》中文版） 11月10, 2008 [2008.11.08] 美国大选：无限期望 America's election：Great expectations NO ONE should doubt the magnitude of what Barack Obama achieved this week. When the president-elect was born, in 1961, many states, and not just in the South, had laws on their books that enforced segregation, banned mixed-race unions like that of his parents and restricted voting rights. This week America can claim more credibly that any other western country to have at last become politically colour-blind. Other milestones along the road to civil rights have been passed amid bitterness and bloodshed. This one was marked by joy, white as well as black (see article). 相信无人质疑奥巴马于本周取胜的重要意义。这位新总统出生于1961年，那时美国很多州的法律都要求强化种族分离、禁止像奥巴马父母那样的跨族通婚、限制选举权利；这些不仅限于南部地区，而出现在全国范围内。从本周开始，美国可以更加自信的宣称：任何其他的西方国家都变得有些政治色盲了。在通向民权的道路上，其它里程碑似的重大历史事件都是在痛苦与血泊中通过的；而此次总统选举则以愉快著称，受到了包括白人及黑人在内的全国选民的称赞。 Mr Obama lost the white vote, it is true, by 43-55%; but he won almost exactly same share of it as the last three (white) Democratic candidates; Bill Clinton, Al Gore and John Kerry. And he won heavily among younger white voters. America will now have a president with half-brothers in Kenya, old schoolmates in Indonesia and a view of the world that seems to be based on respect rather than confrontation. 奥巴马丢掉了大约43%-55%的白人选票，这是不争的事实；但他与过去三位白人民主党候选人–克林顿、戈尔和肯尼迪–得到的白人选票几乎相同。同时，他在年轻一代的白人选民中取得了重大胜利。这位新总统有一个同父异母的兄弟在肯尼亚，有老同学在印尼，他的世界观似乎建立在尊重而不是对抗的基础之上。 That matters. Under George Bush America’s international standing has sunk to awful lows. This week Americans voted in record-smashing numbers for many reasons, but one of them was an abhorrence of how their shining city’s reputation has been tarnished. Their country will now be easier for its friends to like and harder for its foes to hate. 这很重要。在布什治下，美国的国际声誉降到了糟糕地步。本周美国选民的投票数量突破了历史纪录，其中原因很多，有一个就是他们对曾经辉煌无比的城市形象已然黯淡无光而感到愤恨。现在他们的国家将会更易赢得朋友的喜爱，而不易引起敌人的仇恨。 In its own way the election illustrates this redeeming effect. For the past eight years the debacle in Florida in 2000 has been cited (not always fairly) as an example of shabby American politics. Yet here was a clear victory delivered by millions of volunteers-and by the intelligent use of technology to ride a wave of excitement that is all too rare in most democracies. Mr Obama showed that, with the right message, a candidate with no money or machine behind him can build his own.
经济学人杂志双语阅读：Fatalism v fetishism宿命论VS进口至上说 Economics focus 经济聚焦 Fatalism v fetishism 宿命论VS进口至上说 Jun 11th 2009 From The Economist print edition How will developing countries grow after the financial crisis? 金融危机后发展中国家将如何成长？ FORTY years ago Singapore, now home to the world's busiest port, was a forlorn outpost still garrisoned by the British. In 1961 South Korea was less industrialised than the communist north and dependent on American aid. In 1978 China's exports amounted to less than 5% of its GDP. These countries, and many of their neighbours, have since traded their way out of poverty. Given their success, it is easy to forget that some development economists were once prey to “export fatalism”. Poor countries, they believed, had little to gain from venturing into the world market. If they tried to expand their exports, they would thwart each other, driving down the price of their commodities. 现今世界最繁忙的港口坐落于新加坡-在40年前它还只是英国人驻军的遥远哨所。1961年的南朝鲜靠美国援助度日，在产业化的路上远远落后于他们北面的社会主义邻居。1987年的中国出口额占GDP总量不到5%。之后，这些国家和他们的邻居们靠开放商路脱离了贫穷。在这些国家成功的光环下，过去许多发展经济学家深受“出口宿命说”(注一)折磨的往事被淡忘了。他们曾经相信，穷国投身全球市场并无利可图。一旦他们试图扩大出口，那么穷国之间便会互相伤害并造成他们出产的商品价格下降。 The financial crisis of the past nine months is stirring a new export fatalism in the minds of some economists. Even after the global economy recovers, developing countries may find it harder to pursue a policy of “export-led growth”, which served countries like South Korea so well. Under this strategy, sometimes called “export fetishism”, countries spur sales abroad, often by keeping their curr encies cheap. Some save the proceeds in foreign-currency reserves, rather than spending them on imports. This strategy is one reason why the developing world's current-account surplus exceeded $700 billion in 2008, as measured by the IMF. In the past, these surpluses were offset by American deficits. But America may now rethink the bargain. This imbalance, whereby foreigners sell their goods to America in exchange for its assets, was one potential cause of the country's financial crisis. 过去九个月里的金融危机在某些经济学家的脑海里搅起了新的出口宿命论。就算是在金融危机过后，也许发展中 国家也可能会觉得他们要想采用那种使南朝鲜一类的国家受益颇多的“出口带动型增长”政策变得更加困难了。在这种被称为“出口至上主义”的策略下，政府常以保持本国货币的廉价来激励跨国贸易。一些国家选择把出口收益存入外汇储备，而不是用它们来进口。国际货币基金组织统计出，2008年发展中国家的经常账户(注二)有7千亿美元的结余，这(出口至上主义的策略)也许就是原因之一。在过去，这些结余会被美国的贸易逆差抵消。但是美国现在可能要重新考虑一下
Europe's debt crisis 欧洲债务危机 Spot the pattern 看变化模式 Jul 5th 2011, 18:55 by R.A. | WASHINGTON 2011年7月5日18：55 R.A./华盛顿 HERE'S a chart showing the yields on 10-year Greek debt over the past three months. See the pattern? 本图显示的是在过去3个月10年期希腊债券的收益率。变化模式看清楚了吧？ There's a spike, followed by a decline, followed by a higher spike, followed by a decline to a higher trough, and so on. European leaders keep taking steps to avert disaster, and each time markets are less assuaged. 有个尖峰，接着是下跌，然后又是稍高一些的尖峰，接着跌入一个较高的波谷，如此反复。欧洲国家的领导人一直在采取措施避免灾难，而每一次市场都没有大的起色。 The latest spike corresponds to the stalemate over the IMF's willingness to continue making bail-out payments without a new, long-term rescue package in place (and the corresponding disagreement over how to rollover Greek debt, plus the drama surrounding the passage of Greece's new austerity plan). The IMF agreed to keep paying, French and German banks seemed willing to sign on to a rollover plan, and Greece got its new austerity programme through parliament. But it wasn't long before trouble kicked up again. 最近的尖峰反映了这样一个困境：国际货币基金组织愿意继续救助，但又没有制定出一个长期的一揽子救助计划（同时也反映出如何缓解希腊债务各方存在分歧，以及希腊的新紧缩计划能否通过依然有变数）。国际货币基金组织同意继续提供支付，法国和德国的银行似乎愿意签署资金周转计划书，希腊国会通过了新的紧缩计划。但是，没过多久，麻烦又来了。 Moody's and Standard and Poor's have both suggested that the agreed-upon rollover plan might well constitute a default. Since that's precisely the outcome European leaders were hoping to avoid, this news has sent everyone scurrying to come up with a new and better deal. Meanwhile, Moody's has cut Portugal's debt rating to junk. Portugal may well need a new rescue package, which will surely include debate over the fate of creditors, which will mean more questions about bank finances and more brinksmanship. And the European economy continues to slow, even as the European Central Bank continues to tighten policy. 穆迪和标准普尔都暗示，商定好的周转计划很可能得不到执行。因为这种结果正是欧洲国家的领导人们想避免的，所以这条消息让每个人都急不可待地要制定出一个新的、更好的解决办法。与此同时，穆迪公司已经将葡萄牙的债务评级降至垃圾级。葡萄牙很可能需要一个新的一揽子救援计划，这必将包括对债权人命运的辩论，而辩论的内容将更多的是关于银行财政方面的问题和边缘政策。欧洲经济增长速度持续放缓，尽管欧洲央行继续收紧货币政策。 I don't know that there's any broad lesson here, other than: for all the steps already taken by European leaders, the euro zone hasn't really gotten any closer to solving the underlying issues of insolvency and institutional weakness.
Not as close as lips and teeth China should not fear India’s growing friendship with Vietnam Oct 22nd 2011 | from the print edition WHEN China’s sovereignty is at issue Global Times, a Beijing newspaper, does not mince words. In September it growled that a contract between Vietnam and an Indian state-owned oil-and-gas company, ONGC, to explore in Chinese-claimed waters in the South China Sea would “push China to the limit”. Yet this month India and Vietnam have reached an agreement on “energy co-operation”. Global Times is incensed that this was signed just a day after Vietnam, during a visit to Beijing by the head of its communist party, Nguyen Phu Trong, had agreed with China on “ground rules” for solving maritime squabbles. Now, thundered the paper, “China may consider taking actions to show its stance and prevent more reckless attempts in confronting China.” The more sober China Energy News, a publication of the Communist Party’s People’s Daily, has weighed in, warning India that its “energy strategy is slipping into an extremely dangerous whirlpool.” Behind such fulminations lie two C hinese fears. One is that India’s involvement complicates its efforts to have its way in the tangled territorial disputes in the South China Sea. The