外刊精读：疫情期间世界经济的良药

| 原文来自 The Economist April 25th 2020

Climate change

An Earth Day in the life of a plague

The challenge of covid-19 must neither distract people from action on climate change nor confuse them about it

新型冠状病毒肺炎的挑战既不能分散人们对气候变化采取行动的注意力，也不能使人们对气候变化感到困惑。

April 22nd was doubly disrupted. If it had not been messed up by the covid-19 pandemic, as all days now are, parts of it would have been brought to a halt by activism about the climate. This was the 50th anniversary of the first Earth Day, a festival of demonstrations, marches and teach-ins that took place mostly in America and is widely seen as marking the birth of modern environmentalism. Organisers had hoped that this year’s would see hundreds of millions take to the streets around the world. A huge school strike of the sort pioneered by Greta Thunberg, a Swedish activist, was planned, as well as who-knows-what by way of direct action. A new generation of environmental activists intended to demand a better future more loudly than ever.

4月22日受到双重干扰，如果没有像现在这样被新冠肺炎大流行病搅乱，部分地区就会因为气候行动主义而被停止。4月22日是第一个地球日的50周年纪念日，该节日主要在美国举行示威、游行和宣讲会活动，它被广泛视为现代环保主义诞生的标志。组织者原本希望今年世界各地将有数亿人走上街头，一场由瑞典活动家格里塔•腾贝格(Greta Thunberg)倡导的大规模学校罢工已经计划好了，而且谁也不知道原本会采取什么直接行动。新一代的环保主义者打算比以往更大声地要求一个更美好的未来。

文章理解：关于“4月22日受到双重干扰，如果没有像现在这样被新冠肺炎大流行病搅乱，部分地区就会因为气候行动主义而被停止运转。”根据资料，世界气象组织秘书长Petteri Taalas在一次虚拟新闻发布会上说，虽然COVID-19造成了严重的国际健康和经济危机，但如果不能解决气候变化问题，可能会威胁人类福祉、生态系统和经济长达几个世纪。（资料来自：Earth Day highlights Climate Action      Published  22 April 2020 Press Release Number: 22042020 ）说明4月22日地球日面对的有两大问题：一是新冠疫情带来的国际健康和经济危机；二是气候变化生态危机。即使没有新冠疫情的爆发，气候变化也是极为严重的灾难，部分地区的生产可能会由于气候保护主义的要求而受到限制。现在双重灾难的爆发导致部分地区停止原本计划而要采取新的更为强烈的呼吁。（仅为本人理解，如有错误请批评指正）

Pandemic n./adj.

n.流行病，瘟疫

eg:an outbreak of such a disease 大流行病

adj.（疾病）在全国（或世界）流行的

Doubly adv.

1.     更加；越发；倍加

eg:doubly difficult/hard/important 越发困难╱艰难╱重要

2.在两方面；由于双重原因

例句：I was doubly attracted to the house—by its size and its location. 我喜欢这房子有两方面的原因——大小合适而且地点好。

Halt v./n.

v.（使）停止，停下

n.1.停止；阻止；暂停

例句：The thought brought her to an abrupt halt . 她一想到这个便猛地停下了。

2.小火车站台（只有站台）

Demonstration n.

1.     集会示威；游行示威 

to take part in/go on a demonstration 参加╱进行示威游行

to hold/stage a demonstration 举行示威游行

2.示范；示范表演；演示

3.证明；证实；论证；说明

March v./n.

v.1. 齐步走；行进

2.（坚定地向某地）前进，进发

3.使同行；强迫（某人）一起走

4.游行示威；游行抗议

n.1.示威游行；抗议游行

eg:protest marches 抗议游行to go on a march 进行示威游行

2.行进；行军

3.稳步发展；稳步前进

4.进行曲

Teach-ins:  宣讲会；座谈会  （复数：teach-ins）

Environment（n.环境）——Environmental（adj.环境的，周围的；有关环境的）——Environmentalism（n.环境保护论）

Act（v.行动/n.行为）——Activism（n.行动主义；激进主义）—— Activist（n.积极分子；激进主义分子）

Messed up  陷入困境；搞糟 

近义词：get into hot water、get into a jam

Take place  发生；举行 

近义词：occur、happen、generate、proceed、celebrate

Hundreds of millions 数以百万计；极言其数之多

Hundreds of millions of 数以亿计；好几亿；数亿的

Hundreds of millions of people 数亿的人；亿万人；亿万人民

Of the sort  那样的；诸如此类的

例句：He had the looks and voice of the sort of man one could trust for good directions. 他有着那种我们可以信赖地跟着他朝着正确的方向前进的人的外貌。

例句：Other experts note, however, that what outsides see as carefully calculated policy changes may in fact be nothing of the sort. 然而另外一些专家认为，外人所看到的那些经过精打细算的政策变化，可能根本不是那么回事。

Who-knows-what 没人知道是什么

例句：Don't have arrows pointing to who-knows-what page.

不要用箭头指示到没人知道的页码（没人会费力寻找到它）。

The pandemic means that this widespread and coordinated youthful passion, one of the most striking developments in recent climate politics, is instead being expressed indoors and online. This in itself will inevitably lead some to contemplate how climate change and covid-19 fit together. One of the slogans of the first Earth Day was what the pioneering environmentalist Barry Commoner called “The first law of Ecology”—that “Everything Is Connected With Everything Else”.

这场大流行意味着，这种广泛而协调的年轻人的热情——作为最近气候政治中最引人注目的发展之一——正在室内和网上得到表达。这本身将不可避免地导致一些人思考气候变化和新冠肺炎是如何配合在一起的。第一个地球日的口号之一，是环保先驱巴里·康蒙纳(Barry Commoner)所说的“第一生态定律”，即“万物皆相关”。

Coordinate v./n.

v.1.使协调；使相配合 

例句:We need to develop a coordinated approach to the problem. 我们需要拿出解决这一问题的协调一致的办法。

2.使（身体各部分）动作协调；协同动作

n.1.坐标 2.（颜色协调的）配套服装，套装

Striking adj.

1.     引人注目的；异乎寻常的；显著的 

eg:a striking feature 显著的特征

2.妩媚动人的；标致的；俊秀的

Inevitably adv.

1.     不可避免地；必然地

例句：Inevitably, the press exaggerated the story. 新闻界照例又夸大了这件事情。

2.     意料之中

例句：Inevitably, it rained on the day of the wedding. 果然不出所料，婚礼的那天下起了雨。

Contemplate v.

1.     考虑；思量；思忖

例句:You're too young to be contemplating retirement. 你考虑退休还太年轻

2.考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）

3.深思熟虑；沉思；苦思冥想

eg:to contemplate your future 仔细盘算未来

Fit together 组装在一起

Fit in together 相配合

Both scourges bear this out. Some 200,000 deathbeds in 170 countries have been connected by an unbroken web of viral spread. So have bat caves in China and test tubes in California, as well as silent airports, deserted shops and crowded food banks all across the planet. The connections which underlie climate change are even more pervasive. They tie together almost all the 21st century’s means of transport, manufacture and growth, its buried geological past and its melting Arctic ice. The workings of the great round world, as revealed by pictures of the blue-white filigreed Earth from space that were so inspirational in 1970, really do link all its components.

两大灾难都证明了这一点。170个国家的20万张病床被一个完整的病毒传播网络连接起来。中国的蝙蝠洞、加州的试管，以及全球各地寂静的机场、废弃的商店和拥挤的食品银行都是如此。气候变化背后的联系更加普遍，它们将21世纪几乎所有的运输、制造和发展手段、被掩埋的地质历史和正在融化的北极冰层联系在一起。在1970年，从太空拍摄到的地球的蓝白色丝状图案非常鼓舞人心，揭示了这个大圆世界的运转方式，它确实将所有的组成部分连接在了一起。

Scourges n./v.

n. 1.祸害；祸根；灾害

eg:the scourge of war/disease/poverty 战争╱疾病╱贫穷之苦

2.（旧时用作刑具的）鞭子

v. 1.折磨；使受苦难；使痛苦

2. 鞭打；鞭

Deathbed n. 临终床

Viral n. 临终床 病毒的；病毒性的；病毒引起的

eg:a viral infection 病毒性感染

Desert n./v.

n.  沙漠；荒漠；荒原

v.1.抛弃，离弃，遗弃（某人）

例句: She was deserted by her husband. 她被丈夫遗弃了。

2.舍弃，离弃（某地方）

例句: The villages had been deserted. 这些村庄已经荒无人烟了。

3. 擅离（部队）；逃走；开小差

4.废弃；放弃；撇下不管

5.背离；使失望

Underliev.构成…的基础；作为…的原因

例句: These ideas underlie much of his work. 他的作品大部分都是以这些主题思想为基础。

Pervasive adj. 遍布的；充斥各处的；弥漫的

eg: a pervasive smell of damp 四处弥漫的潮湿味儿

Filigree n. 金银丝细工；金银丝工艺品

Bear out证实

Bear James out 保住了

Bear sth out 翻译;证明

Tie together  配合；缚在一起

Blue-white filigreed 蓝白色金银细丝工艺；华而不实的

Covid-19 and climate change are both global problems, and proper responses to both require levels of co-operation that the countries of the world find hard. Responses to the effects of covid-19 on the coal industry, among others, or to the need for economic stimulus once the virus has abated, will offer opportunities to further or impede decarbonisation. And both have their origin in a strange mixture of human action and the unbiddable, indifferent forces of nature, provoking contradictory feelings of culpability and a complete lack of control.

新冠病毒和气候变化都是全球问题，有效应对它们需要各国进行多层次合作，而这正是困难所在。应对新冠病毒对煤炭行业与其他行业的冲击，与在疫情爆发后经济所需的刺激，都可能会进一步推进或阻碍减少碳排放的进程。这二者都是一系列人类行动与自然自发力量的奇怪组合，使人产生“我们对此负有责任但完全无力控制”的矛盾情绪。

Economic stimulus：经济刺激

Abate：v. 减轻；减退。

Unabated，adj. 未减弱的；势头不减的，

eg:unabated enthusiasm for cinema, 对电影始终不减额热情。

例句：The fighting in the area shows no sign of abating. 这个地区的战事没有任何缓和的迹象。

Further：v. 改进；增进。

例句：He has probably done more to further the cause of interracial harmony than any other person.在推进种族和谐方面他可能比其他人做的都要多。

Impede：v. 妨碍；阻碍。

eg:Impede the career, 妨碍事业。

Decarbonisation：n. 脱碳，一种净化气体的过程，指脱除混合气体中的二氧化碳。

Unbiddable：adj. 不可抗拒的。

Biddable, adj. 顺从的。

Culpability：n. 责任。

Culpable, adj. 应受谴责的，应受惩罚的，难辞其咎的。Be culpable (blamed) for, 为…负责。

例句：He added there was clear culpability on the part of the government. 他补充说政府方面明显负有责任。

Connectedness, though, is no excuse for sloppy thinking. The two scourges are not usefully treated as the same problem—of excessive economic growth clogging the sky as it encroaches on the wildernesses where new pathogens lurk. There is no single rethinking or rejection of the way humans live today that will solve both. Nor is the pandemic a response to environmental degradation. To hear sweet birds singing in the streets of Vancouver as fish swim the unsilted canals of Venice and goats throng the streets of north Wales lifts locked-down spirits. But the pandemic is not, as some say, “nature’s reset”. Such thinking easily slips into the misanthropy that can lead environmentalists to see people themselves as the problem.

然而，这种联系不能成为草率思考的借口。这两个灾祸没有被有效地视为一个问题——过度的经济增长堵塞了天空，因为它侵犯了潜伏着新病原体的荒野。人们对现今生活方式没有反思或拒绝，可能解决这两个问题。流行病也不是对环境退化的反应。听到可爱的鸟儿在温哥华的街道上歌唱，鱼儿畅游在威尼斯那条未淤积的运河上里，山羊聚集在北威尔士的街道上，解放了被困住的灵魂。但是，正如一些人所说，流行病并不是"大自然的重置"。这种思维很容易陷入一种误区，导致环保主义者将他们自己视为问题。

Sloppy：adj. 草率的

例句：Another sloppy pass like that might lose them the whole match.再出现一次那样的草率传球，可能会使他们输掉整场比赛。

Scourge：n. 灾难；祸害。

例句：the best chance in 20 years to end the scourge of terrorism... 20 年来消灭恐怖主义祸害的最佳机会

Clog：v. 堵塞，阻塞。

Encroach：v. 侵蚀，蚕食。

Pathogen：n. 病原体。

Lurk：v. 潜伏、隐藏。

Unsilted：silt n. 淤泥、泥沙；v. 使（淤塞）。Unsilted可理解为没有被堵塞的。

Slips into：逐渐陷入（某种情况）；不知不觉转入（某种状态）。

例句：There was a 50-50 chance that the economy could slip back into recession. 经济再次陷入衰退的可能性是 50%。

Misanthropy：厌世。

To help readers appreciate each challenge for what it is, this week our newspaper, full of covid-19 news, makes room for the first of a series of six climate briefs. We begin by looking at the politics of climate change. Later themes will include climate science, carbon cycles and the energy transition. When they started in the 1970s, “Schools briefs” were intended as primers for students; this year they will be more along the lines of “Home- school briefs”. We hope they will help all generations seized with the importance of climate change—and not just Ms Thunberg’s—to further their understanding of what lies ahead.

为了帮助读者理解每一个挑战是什么，本周载满了covid-19新闻的刊物为六周气候简报的第一周腾出了空间。我们从研究气候变化的政策开始。之后的主题将包括气候科学、碳循环和能源幻化。从20世纪70年代开始，“学校简报”就作为学生的初识读物，今年他们更类似于“家庭-学校简报”。我们希望他们能帮助意识到气候变化重要性的所有人——不仅是Thunberg女士——还能帮助他们进一步了解未来的发展。

Primer：n. 初级读本；启蒙书。

Along the lines of sth. 类似于，与…近似

例句：I was thinking of doing a meal along the lines of that dinner I did for Annie and Dave. 我想做一顿类似那次给安妮和戴夫做的饭菜。

Lie ahead: （尤指不快或困难之事）将发生。

例句：The President's most serious challenges lie ahead.

对总统来说最为严重的挑战还在后面。

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