【每日阅读训练第四期——速度越障20系列】【20-19】文史哲

ElenW

SPEED
[Time1]

One of the world's most visited cities but also famous for its rudeness, Paris has embarked on a campaign to improve its reputation and better cater to the needs of tourists.
Waiters, taxi drivers and sales staff in the French capital all too often come off as impolite, unhelpful and unable to speak foreign languages say local tourism chiefs, who are handing out a manual with guidelines on better etiquette.
A six-page booklet entitled "Do you speak Touriste?" contains greetings in eight languages including German, Chinese and Portuguese and advice on the spending habits and cultural codes of different nationalities.
"The British like to be called by their first names," the guide explains, while Italians should be shaken by the hand and Americans reassured on prices.
Of the Chinese, the fastest-growing category of tourists visiting the City of Light, the guide says they are "fervent shoppers" and that "a simple smile and hello in their language will fully satisfy them."
France is the world's top destination for foreign tourists, with Paris visited by 29 million people last year. The business tourists bring to hotels, restaurants and museums accounts for one in 10 jobs in the region and is a welcome boost to the economy at a time of depressed domestic consumption.
The Paris chamber of commerce and the regional tourism committee have warned, however, that growing competition from friendlier cities like London meant Paris needed to work harder to attract visitors, especially from emerging market countries.
Some 30,000 copies of the handbook on friendly service is being distributed to taxi drivers, waiters, hotel managers and sales people in tourist areas from the banks of the Seine river up to Montmartre and in nearby Versailles and Fontainebleau.
Setting realistic linguistic ambitions, it suggests offering to speak English to Brazilians - who it describes as warm and readily tactile and keen on evening excursions - by telling them: "Nào falo Português mas posso informar Inglês (I don't speak Portuguese, but I speak English)."
(331)
[Time2]
I
It was a more muted affair for President Obama in Berlin today as he spoke at Berlin's iconic Brandenburg Gate before an invite-only crowd of 4,500 guests - a remarkable difference from the rock-star welcome he received five years ago in front of 195,500 cheering supporters.
Then, Obama had it all to play for - the glowing presidential candidate symbolizing America's revived hope for the future. This time, he arrived back in Berlin under the cloud of NSA surveillance programs which have outraged many Europeans and the ever-growing crisis in Syria.
The President removed his jacket and rolled up his sleeves as he battled the 86F temperature on Wednesday, quipping: 'People of Berlin, your welcome is so warm I'm going to take off my jacket.'
At times wiping away beads of sweat, the President read from paper because the teleprompter wasn't working.
He used the bulk of his speech to call for a reduction in the world's nuclear stockpiles - as he stood  behind high walls of bullet-proof glass in the public square. The two-inch thick sheets are routinely used when the President appears before large crowds in public spaces.
Appealing for a new citizen activism, Obama renewed his call for the world to confront climate change, a danger he called 'the global threat of our time'.
In a wide-ranging speech that enumerated a litany of challenges facing the world, Obama said he wanted to reignite the spirit that Berlin displayed when it fought to reunite itself during the Cold War.
'Today's threats are not as stark as they were half a century ago, but the struggle for freedom and security and human dignity, that struggle goes on,' Obama said at the city's historic Brandenburg Gate under a bright, hot sun.
'"And I come here to this city of hope because the test of our time demands the same fighting spirit that defined Berlin a half-century ago.'
The German press had mixed reviews for Obama on Wednesday, a marked difference from five years ago when 'Obama-mania' greeted him in the streets.
(341)
[Time3]
National newspaper Die Zeit published an article online on the Berlin speech, saying that Obama appeared to be the 'young, fresh, uninhibited' political force he was five years ago - but that the time between his speeches has been marked by 'bitter disappointment'.
The article said Obama's battles over gun control and equality for same-sex marriage must be remembered, otherwise his speech in Berlin could be seen as just 'nice words' in light of his decisions on Guantanamo and the NSA surveillance.
The president called for a one-third reduction of U.S. and Russian nuclear stockpiles in his speech, saying it is possible to ensure American security and a strong deterrent while also limiting nuclear weapons.
Obama's address comes nearly 50 years after John F. Kennedy's famous Cold War speech in the once-divided city.
Obama told Berlin that countries should not focus inwards and that in order to be stronger we need to break down the walls in our hearts.
He added: 'When Europe and America lead with our hopes instead of our fears we achieve things no other nations can do.'
He challenged Americans and Europeans not to become complacent even though the Cold War is over.
Obama says there's a temptation to turn inward now that barbed wire and concrete walls no longer separate East and West in Berlin.
He said that he returned to Berlin because the tests of our time require the same fighting spirit.
Obama added: 'Our work is not yet done.'
Other than his landmark speech, the President spent Wednesday in talks with German chancellor Angela Merkel and other top politicians including president Joachim Gauck.
He touched down with his family in the German capital on Tuesday night, waving to the crowds gathered at Tegel Airport.
His wife Michelle and daughters Malia and Sasha visited the city's Holocaust memorial on Wednesday, accompanied by the President's half-sister Auma, who studied in Germany.
Five years ago, when he was still seeking election as President, Obama received a rapturous reception on a brief tour of Europe where he was greeted as a leader who could give the world a fresh start after the controversial presidency of George W. Bush.
Now he is a much more divisive figure - although his re-election last year was welcomed by most Europeans, recent revelations about his administration's spying on internet communications have tarnished his record in the eyes of many.
Mr Obama's speech tomorrow will inevitably be compared with JFK's, which took place on June 26, 1963 at the Rathaus Schöneberg, a few miles away from the Berlin Wall which had been under construction over the previous two years.
Kennedy's speech, considered one of his best, held up West Germany as a symbol of freedom on the front line of the battle against communism.
It featured the famous line: 'All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words, "Ich bin ein Berliner!"'
(494)
[Time4]
IF HOLLYWOOD is even half-right about America’s mood, the rich and powerful have a problem. Films opening this summer are steeped in distrust of the ruling classes. One (“World War Z”) is about a pandemic that topples governments and leaves America under martial law. Another (“Elysium”) portrays a selfish elite which has retreated to a fortified, orbiting paradise, leaving the other 99% to suffer on a slum-like Earth. In a third (“The Hunger Games: Catching Fire”) decadent bigwigs loll about in a thinly disguised Washington, DC, oppressing the masses and making youngsters kill one another on reality TV.
One film offers some cheer: the new Superman flick, “Man of Steel”, which opened on June 14th. True, it shows America looking impotent, as aliens hurl fighter jets about like Tonka toys and lay waste to Metropolis (a city that bears a striking resemblance to Manhattan). The final body-count must be close to six figures. But the film is oddly optimistic, and in just the right way to assuage some of America’s deepest anxieties.
This is the umpteenth time, since his appearance in 1938, that Superman has pulled off this feat. Though a bland, priggish sort—dubbed the Big Blue Boy Scout by detractors—he keeps evolving to meet the emotional needs of his adopted home. During the Great Depression he battled capitalist bullies. During the second world war, he walloped Nazis. During the cold war he confronted villains with atomic bombs. In the primary-hued 1978 hit starring Christopher Reeve, he tackled an urban crime-wave as a sort of super-cop, his heroism wrapped in just enough camp irony to win over jaundiced, post-Watergate, post-Vietnam audiences.
A whole industry of scholarship has sprung up around Superman. Echoes of Moses have been detected in his lonely journey from the planet Krypton as a baby. Fans have spotted hints of Superman-as-Christ (they are glaring in the latest film). Larry Tye, a Superman biographer, has said that as a rule the character “does best when America is doing worst”. He is a hero for hard times.
More than 14m people paid to see “Man of Steel” in its opening weekend. They saw a film filled with nods to modern anxieties, from global terrorism to climate change. Rather than the comic, boastful villainy of earlier versions, this film portrays a clash of civilisations, in which the enemy are fanatics bound to a grimly hostile ideology. On the doomed planet Krypton, doddery politicians squabble in the face of an ecological disaster caused by using too much energy. Subtle, it is not. But it strikes a chord when just one American in ten trusts Congress. (That recent Gallup poll result was the worst score for any American institution, ever.) Once the action switches to Earth, human institutions are little use. Political leaders are absent, the police are no help, and—painfully for a watching journalist—Superman’s employer, the Daily Planet newspaper, is struggling to survive against scrappier internet competitors.
Yet the film is still strangely upbeat. Like all Superman films, it is a paean to immigrant success. Superman, having crashed to Earth as an infant, discovers that he has super powers: ie, an outsider moves to America and makes good. And in this version, Superman is played by a Briton (Henry Cavill) while his father Jor-El is played by an Australian (Russell Crowe). Politicians debating immigration in Washington should pay heed.
(562)
[Time5]
“Man of Steel” is a tale for an age of complicated patriotism. In real-life America no institution is more trusted than the armed forces, even though the public no longer really supports the wars its troops have been fighting for more than a decade. That ambivalence is reflected on screen. The film’s few impressive authority figures are military folk. But they must earn the audience’s respect through acts of individual courage, because their weapons are ill-adapted to the fight at hand.
One can read too much into “Man of Steel”. In the end it is a summer film about a superhero, much of which is taken up with aliens throwing large objects, such as trains, at each other. Yet even popcorn flicks can have serious undertones. Every Superman film sees the American way come under attack, before reasserting its primacy. In a nod to today’s anxieties, the 2013 version raises the possibility that the American way—involving such virtues as openness, loyalty and respect for the value of each life—might be a source of weakness, rather than strength.
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s an allegory
The enemy—ruthless, pre-programmed, collectivist super-competitors—mock Superman when he interrupts a spectacular, town-levelling bout of combat to save a few soldiers. For every human saved we will kill a million more, scoff the aliens. Cold logic is on their side, not least because crowds of extras have just been squished and slammed to death, unmourned. Yet it is Superman’s compassion that earns him the confidence of American troops, who declare: “This man is not our enemy.” And at the 11th hour American pluck, along with a dose of creative improvisation, defeats the enemy’s well-drilled master-plans. The plot makes little sense, yet it makes all the sense in the world. In an age of confusion and unprecedented outside competition, when Americans trust their instincts and do their best, they can still win. The 1978 Superman caper, a classic of the genre, was about glibly reasserting the prevailing order. The 2013 version has a more modest ambition: keeping faith with the American way. Given that the government cannot control Superman, a debate arises as to whether the authorities can trust the hero, and he them. “I grew up in Kansas,” the hero replies, brushing the question aside. “I’m about as American as it gets.” It is a perfectly sensible answer, and helps explain why “Man of Steel” is much more fun than its dystopian rivals. It is also a cracking film. In the battle of the summer box office, root for the man in the cape.
(436)

OBSTACLE

J. Robert Oppenheimer (April 22, 1904 – February 18, 1967) was an American theoretical physicist and professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley. He is best known for his role as the scientific director of the Manhattan Project, the World War II effort to develop the first nuclear weapons at the secret Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. For this reason he is remembered as "The Father of the Atomic Bomb". In reference to the Trinity test in New Mexico, where his Los Alamos team first tested the bomb, Oppenheimer famously recalled the Bhagavad Gita: "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one." and "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."
After the war Oppenheimer was a chief advisor to the newly created United States Atomic Energy Commission and used that position to lobby for international control of nuclear power and to avert the nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union. After provoking the ire of many politicians with his outspoken political opinions during the Red Scare, he had his security clearance revoked in a much-publicized and politicized hearing in 1954. Though stripped of his direct political influence Oppenheimer continued to lecture, write, and work in physics. A decade later President John F. Kennedy awarded (and Lyndon B. Johnson presented) Oppenheimer the Enrico Fermi Award as a gesture of political rehabilitation.
Oppenheimer's notable achievements in physics include the Born–Oppenheimer approximation, work on electron–positron theory, the Oppenheimer–Phillips process, and a first prediction of quantum tunneling. With his students he also made important contributions to the modern theory of neutron stars and black holes, as well as work on the theory of quantum mechanics, quantum field theory, and the interactions of cosmic rays.
As a teacher and promoter of science, Oppenheimer is remembered most for being the chief founder of the American school of theoretical physics while at the University of California, Berkeley, contributing significantly to the rise of American physics to its first era of world prominence in the 1930s. After the second World War, he contributed to American scientific organizations again, as director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, where he held Einstein's old position of Senior Professor of Theoretical Physics.
J. Robert Oppenheimer in Europe
After graduating from Harvard, Oppenheimer was encouraged to go to Europe for further study. He was accepted for postgraduate work at Ernest Rutherford's Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge under J.J. Thomson.
Oppenheimer's clumsiness in the laboratory made it apparent his forte was not experimental but rather theoretical physics. He developed an antagonistic relationship with his tutor, Patrick Blackett, who was only a few years his senior. Oppenheimer once doused an apple with noxious chemicals and put it on Blackett's desk; Blackett did not eat the apple, but Oppenheimer was put on probation and ordered to go to London for regular sessions with a psychiatrist.
In 1926 he left Cambridge for the University of Göttingen to study under Max Born. Göttingen was one of the world's leading centers for theoretical physics. Oppenheimer made friends who would go on to great success, including Werner Heisenberg, Pascual Jordan, Wolfgang Pauli, Paul Dirac, Enrico Fermi and Edward Teller. Oppenheimer was known at Göttingen for being a quick student. However, he was also known for being too enthusiastic in discussions, sometimes to the point of taking over seminar sessions. This irritated some of Max Born's pupils so much that they signed a petition to make Oppenheimer be quiet in class. Born left it out on his desk where Oppenheimer could read it, and it was effective without a word being said.
Oppenheimer obtained his Ph.D. in 1927 at the age of 23 at the University of Göttingen, supervised by Born. After the oral exam for his degree, the professor administering reportedly said, "I'm glad that's over. He was on the point of questioning me."[9] Oppenheimer published more than a dozen articles at Göttingen, including many important contributions to the then newly-developed quantum theory. He and Born published a famous paper on the so-called "Born-Oppenheimer approximation", which separates nuclear motion from electronic motion in the mathematical treatment of molecules, an action allowing nuclear motion to be neglected in order to simplify calculations. It remains his most cited work.
Atomic Energy Commission
After the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) was created in 1946, as a civilian agency in control of nuclear research and weapons issues, Oppenheimer was immediately appointed as the Chairman of its General Advisory Committee (GAC) and left the directorship of Los Alamos. From this position he advised on a number of nuclear-related issues, including project funding, laboratory construction, and even international policy—though the GAC's advice was not always implemented.
As a member of the Board of Consultants to a committee appointed by President Truman to advise the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission, Oppenheimer strongly influenced the Acheson-Lilienthal Report. In this report, the committee advocated creation of an international Atomic Development Authority, which would own all fissionable material, and the means of its production, such as mines and laboratories, and atomic power plants where it could be used for peaceful energy production. Bernard Baruch was appointed to translate this report into a proposal to the United Nations, resulting in the Baruch Plan of 1946. The Baruch Plan introduced many additional provisions regarding enforcement, in particular requiring inspection of the USSR's uranium resources. The Baruch Plan was seen as an attempt to maintain the United States' nuclear monopoly, and was rejected by the USSR. With this, it became clear to Oppenheimer that an arms race was unavoidable, due to the mutual distrust of the U.S. and the USSR.
While still Chairman of the GAC, Oppenheimer lobbied vigorously for international arms control and funding for basic science, and attempted to influence policy away from a heated arms race. When the government questioned whether to pursue a crash program to develop an atomic weapon based on nuclear fusion—the hydrogen bomb—Oppenheimer initially recommended against it, though he had been in favor of developing such a weapon in the early days of the Manhattan Project. He was motivated partly by ethical concerns, feeling that such a weapon could only be used strategically against civilian targets, resulting in millions of deaths. But he was also motivated by practical concerns; as at the time there was no workable design for a hydrogen bomb, Oppenheimer felt that resources would be better spent creating a large force of fission weapons; he and others were especially concerned about nuclear reactors being diverted away from producing plutonium to produce tritium. He was overridden by President Truman, who announced a crash program after the Soviet Union tested their first atomic bomb in 1949. Oppenheimer and other GAC opponents of the project, especially James Conant, felt personally shunned and considered retiring from the committee. They stayed on, though their views on the hydrogen bomb were well known.
In 1951, however, Edward Teller and mathematician Stanislaw Ulam developed what became known as the Teller-Ulam design for a hydrogen bomb. This new design seemed technically feasible, and Oppenheimer changed his opinion about developing the weapon. As he later recalled:
“ The program we had in 1949 was a tortured thing that you could well argue did not make a great deal of technical sense. It was therefore possible to argue that you did not want it even if you could have it. The program in 1951 was technically so sweet that you could not argue about that. The issues became purely the military, the political, and the humane problems of what you were going to do about it once you had it.”
Oppenheimer's critics have accused him of equivocating between 1949, when he opposed the development of the hydrogen bomb, and 1951, when he supported it. Some have made this a case for reinforcing their opinions about his moral inconsistency. Historian Priscilla McMillan has argued,[50] however, that if Oppenheimer has been accused of being morally inconsistent, then so should Rabi and Fermi, who had also opposed the program in 1949. Most of the GAC members were against a crash hydrogen bomb development program then, and in fact, Conant, Fermi and Rabi had submitted even more strongly worded reports against it than Oppenheimer. McMillan's argument is that because the hydrogen bomb appeared to be well within reach in 1951, everybody had to assume that the Russians could also do it, and that was the main reason why they changed their stance in favor of developing it. Thus this change in opinion should not be viewed as a change in morality, but a change in opinions purely based on technical possibilities.
The first true hydrogen bomb, dubbed "Ivy Mike", was tested in 1952 with a yield of 10.4 megatons, more than 650 times the strength of the weapons developed by Oppenheimer during World War II.
（1001）

yyjfantasy

坐个小板凳~~~
速度：
1.1'39''
2.1'42''
3.2'14''
4.2'26''
5.2'04''
越障：7'48''

nannanfeng

板凳 LZ 谢谢 辛苦了

aillen922

多谢楼主~~~

T1-2’15
Paris is taking actions to improve its own reputation to the needs of tourists through publication of a manual that help staff to speak different languages.

T2-2’31
Obama who came to Bering under the cloud of NSA surveillance programs received a remarkable welcome different from five years ago. He made a speech over such topics as nuclear stockpiles, climate changes.

T3-3’36
The press compared Obama’s speech with JFK’s and considers Obama’s bitter disappointments only with nice words.

T4-3’58
Superman: man of steel is different from the films focusing on ruling classes mentioned in the article. It gave optimistic thoughts while led us to consider modern anxieties.

T5-2’52
The passage described meaningful plots of the Superman to express its oriented idea, which keep faith with of American way.

OB-8’58
O is a famous theoretical physicist who invented the first nuclear weapons and had many academic achievements.
-O’s education background and his anecdotes to show his personality
-His job duty and personal ground when he worked for atomic energy commission

iriswtzhang

哇第一次上了首页
┗|｀O′|┛ 嗷~~

SPEED
(1) 1.35.10
Paris has embarked a campaign on improving its tourist service, esp linguistically.

(2) 2.19.98
Obama visited Berlin and gave a speech.

(3) 3.09.15
Obama's visit is compared with his visit 5 years ago, now he's considered divisive in light of his lately dicision on Guantanamo and NSA survilliance scandal.

(4)3.36.80
American films Superman and Man of Steel are teeling real stories of America, all the anxieties and problems.

(5) 3.08.70
the films are allegories of today's America.

OBSTACLE
6.51
brief biography of Robert Oppenheimer.

luruisha

2'33
3'09
3'12
2'42
1'30
Ob:6'01

yangzexin

留名留名
1'55"
2'19"
3'11"
4'03"
2'47"

9'05"

jay871750293

谢谢ElenW~~
占座先...

Sherryfly

Part 1: SPEED
1.        Time: 1’25”: France’s efforts to improve its reputation and courtesy to tourists.
2.        Time: 1’26”: Obama visits Berlin and offers a speech.
3.        Time: 1’52”: The attitude of French people toward Obama.
4.        Time: 2’01”: New films shoot by Hollywood: Men of Steel.
5.        Time: 1’50”: The figure and tale of “Men of Steel”.

Part 2: OBSTACLE
Time: 5’14”
Main Idea:
1.        J. Robert O’s experience in the scientific field.
2.        J. Robert O’s opinion and different comments on his public speeches.

irvan

楼主辛苦〜

___________________________________
Speed
01:55
02:09
03:01
03:20
02:43

Obstacle

08:30

Main idea: Oppenheimer and nuclear power

Attitude:   Objective

Structure:

         1) Introduction to Oppenheimer

           ---What kind of man he is, how he became an effective researcher of nuclear power.

         2) What the relaitonship berween he and nuclear power is.

           ---From against it to supported it