决战1010精英组Economist阅读汇——WeiLi分贴

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Innovation



原文链接：http://www.economist.com/debate/overview/168
今天开个头~

有问题的方面都加绿了，望授业+解惑，谢谢~

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About this debate

What is the right role for government in spurring innovation（刺激改革）? The outlines of this age-old debate will be familiar to many. One side argues that governments inevitably get it wrong when they get too involved in innovation: picking the wrong technology winners, say, or ploughing subsidies into politically popular projects rather than the most deserving ones. The other rebuts that given the grave global challenges we face today—in the 1960s America thought it was the Soviet race into space, today many countries worry about climate change and pandemic threats—governments need to do much more to support innovation.

The outlines of this age-old debate will be familiar to many.
和这个古老论题的主旨相近的话题有很多。
age-old
这种复合词怎么用，能不能自己造？如果可以，造词的原则是什么？


picking the wrong technology winners, say, or ploughing subsidies into politically popular projects rather than the most deserving ones（选择错误的技术赢家，或者扶植更有政治目的的项目而不是最优价值的）
句子中间有个say，以前倒是见过however, say是什么意思呢？

ploughing subsidies into 犁地，应该是政府参与过多，扶植培养政治有利的项目的意思，
The other rebuts that given（鉴于） the grave global challenges we face today—in the 1960s America thought it was the Soviet race into space, today many countries worry about climate change and pandemic threats—governments need to do much more to support innovation.
这句句子看了我半天，然后加“—”结构的句子该怎么写，看得懂，但是要写或许不行。

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Background reading

A

Private-sector space flight

Moon dreams

The Americans may still go to the moon before the Chinese

Feb 18th 2010 | From The Economist print edition

WHEN America’s space agency, NASA, announced its spending plans（支出计划）
in February, some people worried that its cancellation of the Constellation moon programme had ended any hopes of Americans returning to the Earth’s rocky satellite. The next footprints on the lunar regolith（表土皮） were therefore thought likely to be Chinese. Now, though, the private sector is arguing that the new spending plan actually makes it more likely America will return to the moon.

The new plan encourages firms to compete to provide transport to low Earth orbit (LEO). The budget proposes $6 billion over five years to spur the development of commercial crew（商业集团） and cargo services（货运服务） to the international space station. This money will be spent on “man-rating” existing rockets, such as Boeing’s Atlas V, and on developing new spacecraft that could be launched（发动）on many different rockets. The point of all this activity is to create healthy private-sector competition for transport to the space station—and in doing so to drive down the cost of getting into space.

Eric Anderson, the boss of a space-travel company called Space Adventures, is optimistic about the changes. They will, he says, build “railroads into space”. Space Adventures has already sent seven people to the space station, using Russian rockets. It would certainly benefit from a new generation of cheap launchers.

Another potential beneficiary（受益者）—and advocate of private-sector transport—is Robert Bigelow, a wealthy entrepreneur（红包单词，老板） who founded a hotel chain called Budget Suites of America. Mr Bigelow has so far spent $180m of his own money on space development—probably more than any other individual in history. He has been developing so-called expandable space habitats, a technology he bought from NASA a number of years ago.

These habitats, which are folded up for launch and then inflated in space, were designed as interplanetary（行星之间） vehicles for a trip to Mars, but they are also likely to be useful general-purpose accommodation. The company already has two scaled-down versions in orbit.

Mr Bigelow is preparing to build a space station that will offer cheap access to space to other governments—something he believes will generate a lot of interest. The current plan is to launch the first full-scale habitat (called Sundancer) in 2014. Further modules will be added to this over the course of a year, and the result will be a space station with more usable volume than the existing international one. Mr Bigelow’s price is just under $23m per astronaut（宇航员）. That is about half what Russia charges for a trip to the international station, a price that is likely to go up after the space shuttle retires later this year. He says he will be able to offer this price by bulk-buying（大批购买）
launches on newly man-rated rockets. Since most of the cost of space travel is the launch, the price might come down even more if the private sector can lower the costs of getting into orbit.

The ultimate aim of all his investment, Mr Bigelow says, is to get to the moon. LEO is merely his proving ground. He says that if the technology does work in orbit, the habitats will be ideal for building bases on the moon. To go there, however, he will have to prove that the expandable habitat does indeed work, and also generate substantial returns on his investment in LEO, to provide the necessary cash.

If all goes well, the next target will be L1, the point 85% of the way to the moon where the gravitational pulls of moon and Earth balance. “It’s a terrific dumping off point(这是个极好的倾销手段),” he says. “We could transport a completed lunar base [to L1] and put it down on the lunar surface intact.”

There are others with lunar ambitions, too. Some 20 teams are competing for the Google Lunar X Prize, a purse（资金） of $30m that will be given to the first private mission which lands a robot on the moon, travels across the surface and sends pictures back to Earth. Space Adventures, meanwhile, is in discussions with almost a dozen potential clients about a circumlunar mission（环月任务）, costing $100m a head.

The original Apollo project was mainly a race to prove the superiority of American capitalism（资本主义） over Soviet communism. Capitalism won—but at the cost of creating, in NASA, one of the largest bureaucracies（官僚主义） in American history.
If the United States is to return to the moon, it needs to do so in a way that is demonstrably superior to the first trip—for example, being led by business rather than government. Engaging in another government-driven spending battle, this time with the Chinese, will do nothing more than show that America has missed the point.

c

costing $100m a head中的  a head  什么意思？？？

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B

Climate-change politics

Cap-and-trade's last hurrah(排放限制最后的欢呼)

The decline of a once wildly popular idea

Mar 18th 2010 | From The Economist print edition

Gaia lent an unhelpful hand

IN THE 1990s cap-and-trade—the idea of reducing carbon-dioxide emissions（排放） by auctioning off（拍卖） a set number of pollution permits, which could then be traded in a market（通过拍卖许可排放一定量的污染物的权益来减少二氧化碳的排放，这种排放权益可以在市场上交易）—was the darling of the green policy circuit. A similar approach to sulphur（硫磺？？？） dioxide emissions, introduced under the 1990 Clean Air Act, was credited with having helped solve acid-rain problems quickly and cheaply. And its great advantage was that it hardly looked like a tax at all, though it would bring in a lot of money.

The cap-and-trade provision expected in the climate legislation（法律法规） that Senators John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and Lindsey Graham have been working on, which may be unveiled（揭露） shortly, will be a poor shadow of that once alluring（诱人的） idea. Cap-and-trade will not be the centrepiece of（最引人注目的部分） the legislation (as it was of last year’s House climate bill, Waxman-Markey), but is instead likely to apply only to electrical utilities, at least for the time being. Transport fuels will probably be approached with some sort of tax or fee; industrial emissions will be tackled with regulation（以规章制度来处理） and possibly, later on, carbon trading. The hope will be to cobble together(迅速筹集) cuts in emissions similar in scope to those foreseen under the House bill, in which the vast majority of domestic cuts in emissions came from utilities.

This composite approach is necessary because the charms of economy-wide cap-and-trade have faded badly. The ability to raise money from industry is not so attractive in a downturn（工业区）. Market mechanisms have lost their appeal as a result of the financial crisis.（由于财政紧缺，市场机制失去了它的吸引力） More generally, climate is not something the public seems to feel strongly about at the moment, in part because of that recession, in part perhaps because they have worries about the science (see article), in part, it appears, because the winter has been a snowy one.

The public is, though, quite keen on（热衷于） new initiatives on energy, which any Senate bill（参议院议案） will shower with incentives and subsidies（刺激和衰落，起幅？？？）
whether the energy in question be renewable, nuclear, pumped out from beneath the seabed or still confined to research laboratories. So the bill will need to raise money, which is why cap-and-trade is likely to remain for the utilities, and revenues（收入） will be raised from transport fuels. A complex way of doing this, called a linked fee, would tie the revenues to the value of carbon in the utility market; a straightforward carbon tax may actually have a better chance of passing.

Energy bills have in the past garnered（囊括）
bipartisan support, and this one also needs to. That is why Senator Graham matters. He could bring on board both Democrats and Republicans. Mr Graham’s contribution has been to focus the rhetoric(修辞学) not just on near-term jobs, but also on longer-term competitiveness. Every day America does not have climate legislation, he argues, is a day that China’s grip on the global green economy gets tighter.

He also thinks action on the issue would be good for his party. While short-term Republican interests call for opposition, the party’s long-term interests must include broadening its support. Among young people, for example, polling suggests that the environment, and the climate, matter a great deal.

Unfortunately for this argument, tactics matter, and young voters are unlikely to play a great role in the mid-term election. Other Republicans may think it better to wait before re-establishing the party’s green credentials（绿色资格）. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, for example, is happy to talk about climate as a problem, and talks about the desirability of some sort of carbon restriction—perhaps a tax, or some version of Maria Cantwell’s “cap-and-dividend” scheme. But she expresses no great urgency about the subject. And she has introduced one of two measures intended to curtail（限制） the power the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) now has to regulate carbon, on the ground that that is a matter for legislation sometime in the future.

The EPA’s new powers undoubtedly make the charms of legislation greater. Some industrial lobbies may decide that the bill will provide the certainty they need to decide about future investment, and get behind it. The White House has been supportive of late, inviting senators（参议员） over to talk. But it remains an uphill struggle（山上的挣扎，极尽努力）, and the use of reconciliation to pass health care could greatly increase the gradient of the hill（增加山的梯度，引申为增加事情的难度？）, as Mr Graham has made abundantly clear.

If the bill does not pass, it will change environmental politics in America and beyond. The large, comparatively business-friendly environmental groups that have been proponents(提方案) of trading schemes will lose ground(失利), with organizations closer to the grassroots（基层）, and perhaps with a taste for civil disobedience（非暴力反抗）, gaining power. Carbon-trading schemes elsewhere in the world have already been deprived（剥夺） of a vast new market—Waxman-Markey, now dead, would have seen a great many carbon credits bought in from overseas—and if America turned away from cap-and-trade altogether they would look even less transformative than they do today. And as market-based approaches lose relevance（关联）, what climate action continues may come to lean more heavily on the command-and-control techniques they were intended to replace.

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C

Genetically modified food

Attack of the really quite likeable tomatoes

The success of genetically modified crops provides opportunities to win over their critics

Feb 25th 2010 | From The Economist print edition

IN THE 14 years since the first genetically modified crops were planted commercially, their descendants（后代）, relatives and remixes have gone forth and multiplied like profitable, high-tech pondweed（眼子菜）. A new report (see article) shows that 25 countries now grow GM crops, with the total area under cultivation now larger than Peru. Three-quarters of the farmland used to grow soya（大豆） is now sown with（播种） a genetically modified variant, and the figures for cotton are not that far behind, thanks to its success in India. China recently gave the safety go-ahead to its first GM rice variety and a new GM maize（玉米） that should make better pig feed. More and more plants are having their genomes sequenced（基因序列）: a full sequence for maize was published late last year, the soya genome in January. Techniques for altering genomes are moving ahead almost as fast as the genomes themselves are stacking up（改造基因的技术进步得就如同基因本身组成一样快）, and new crops with more than one added trait（特质） are coming to market.

Such stories of success will strike fear into some hearts（带来一些恐慌心理）, and not only in GM-averse Europe; a GM backlash（对抗性反应） is under way in India, focused on insect-resistant aubergines（茄子）. Some of these fears are understandable, but lacking supporting evidence they have never been compelling. On safety, the fear which cuts closest to home, the record continues to look good. Governments need to keep testing and monitoring, but that may be becoming easier. More precise modifications, and better technologies for monitoring stray（零散、迷失） DNA both within plants and in the environment around them, mean that it is getting easier to be sure that nothing untoward is going on.

Then there is the worry that GM crops are a way for big companies to take over the livelihoods（生计） of small farmers and, in the end, a chunk of nature itself. Seen in this light（从这个角度看） the fact that 90% of the farmers growing GM crops are comparatively poor and in developing countries is sinister(有害), not salutary（有益）; given Monsanto’s dominance（优势，控制力） in America’s soyabean market, it seems to suggest incipient world domination（这似乎暗示着统治世界的初始）. It is certainly true that big firms make a lot of money selling GM seeds: the GM seed market was worth $10.5 billion in 2009, and the crops that grew from that seed were worth over $130 billion. But multinationals（跨国公司） are not the only game in town. The governments of China (which has increased agricultural research across the board), India and Brazil are also developing new GM crops. In 2009 a GM version of an Indian cotton variety, developed in the public sector, came to market, and a variety engineered by a private Indian firm has been approved for commercialisation（商业化）. Charities, such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, are also funding efforts in（资金援助） various countries to make crops more hardy or nutritious. GM seeds that come from government research bodies, or from local firms, may not arouse quite so much opposition as those from large foreign companies, especially when they provide characteristics that make crops better, not just easier to farm.

Moreover, where the seeds come from is a separate question from who should pay for them, as Mr Gates points out. As with drugs and vaccines（疫苗）, it is possible to get products that were developed with profit in mind to the people who need them using donor money and clever pricing and licensing deals. In the longer term, if the seeds deliver what the farmers require, the need for such special measures should diminish. After all, the whole idea is not that poor farmers should go on being poor. It is that poor farmers should get a bit richer, be able to invest a bit more, and thus increase the food available to a growing and predominantly（显著的，占主导地位的） urban population.

More than strange fruits

There is another worry about GM technology, though, that should be taken seriously. It is that its success and appeal to（呼吁）
technophiles may, in the minds of those who pay for agricultural research, crowd out other approaches to improving farming. Because it depends on intellectual property（知识产权） that can be protected, GM is ripe for private investment. There is a lot of other agricultural research that is less amenable（愿意接受的） to corporate ownership but still needs doing. From soil management to weather forecasts to the preservation, study and use of agricultural biodiversity（生物多样性）, there are many ways to improve the agricultural systems on which the world’s food supply depends, and make them more resilient as well as more profitable（使它们更有弹性和利润）. A farm is not a just a clever crop: it is an ecosystem managed with intelligence. GM crops have a great role to play in that development, but they are only a part of the whole.

On safety, the fear which cuts closest to home, the record continues to look good.这句话读不通。。。

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opening statements
The moderator's opening remarks

What is the right role for government in spurring innovation? The outlines of this age-old debate will be familiar to many. One side argues that governments inevitably get it wrong when they get too involved in innovation: picking the wrong technology winners, say, or ploughing subsidies into politically popular projects rather than the most deserving ones. The other rebuts that given the grave global challenges we face today—in the 1960s America thought it was the Soviet race into space, today many countries worry about climate change and pandemic threats—governments need to do much more to support innovation.

Happily for us, gentle reader, the two sides in the Economist's latest debate are moving beyond such platitudes（陈词滥调） to novel arguments. Arguing in favour of（为。。。而征战） the motion that innovation works best when government does least is Amar Bhide, a professor at Harvard and author of "The Venturesome Economy". His opening statement roundly（严厉地） denounces the visions of home-grown Silicon Valleys that dance in the heads of bureaucrats worldwide as "a dubious（靠不住的） conception of paradise（天堂）". California's bloated（膨胀） government is bankrupt and Japan's once formidable MITI agency is in tatters（破烂）, he observes, but market-minded Hong Kong is flourishing (and its hyper-commercial denizens far richer than their coddled（溺爱） Japanese counterparts).

He adds for good measure that the "techno-fetishist"（崇拜技术？） view of innovation represented by the top-heavy Japanese model pales in comparison with a robust, bottom-up version of innovation that harnesses（利用） the creativity and enterprise of the many, including the "venturesome consumers". He does acknowledge that governments have a role to play: "Doing the least doesn't mean doing nothing at all." However, his advocacy of a least is best policy, though conceptually elegant（简明）, seems a bit slippery（含糊、圆滑） and is probably unhelpful in practice. In future postings, perhaps he will explain how exactly governments should decide whether they are doing too little or too much to help innovation.

David Sandalow, author of "Freedom from Oil" and a senior official in America's Department of Energy, presents a robust defence of government. He does make the familiar points about the need for governments to invest in education and fundamental research. He also adds slightly more controversial（有争议的） arguments about why government policies are required to overcome market failures (such as the recent financial crisis, which unfairly sapped innovators of credit) and misaligned incentives that hold back the adoption of worthwhile innovations（集中那些阻碍有价值的改革的激励） (like energy-saving technologies with speedy paybacks).

More striking is Mr Sandalow's linkage of the global trend towards open innovation, which means companies increasingly rely on ideas from outside their own research laboratories, with the need for greater government spending on innovation. He argues that open innovation will get technologies faster to market, but at the expense of fundamental research of the sort that AT&T Bell Labs or Xerox Parc used to do. He insists that "without government support for such research, the seed corn for future generations would be at risk". That is a clever point, but it does not answer the obvious rebuttal that governments would inevitably invest in the wrong sorts of research (think, to stick with his analogy, of the money spent by the American government subsidising（补贴）corn ethanol（乙醇）, an environmentally questionable but politically popular fuel).

Are you waiting for further rounds of jousting（格斗） to decide which side to support? Don't be a mugwump, sitting on the fence with your mug in one hand and your wump on the other. Cast your vote now.

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Background reading文章中心
A 、Moon dreams：
美国宇航局决定改革费用支出计划使得很多人认为美国政府不再计划登月，但投资人士认为这反而能使美国人重返月球。该新计划鼓励提供前往近地轨道的商业性服务，并拨款促进相关商业集团的发展和往空间站物资运输服务。接下来列举了一些商人们的看法。早期的阿波罗登月计划出于政治目的：证明资本主义的美国优于社会主义的苏联，美国最终获胜，但是是美国史上最大的一次资本输出。如果美国想要重返月球，它必须要做出一些优于前次的改革：例如有商业而非政府引导。沉迷于有政府驱使的开销战争（这次是和中国）只会表明美国没有抓住要点。
B 、Cap-and-trade's last hurrah
The decline of a once wildly popular idea
由于经济衰退的问题，Cap-and-trade不再受欢迎。当下，人们更多得关注经济衰退和科技。公众期待新能源，但这仍在实验阶段，议会需要挣钱，因此CO2收税可能很有机会通过。能源议案要两党的支持，Senator Graham将他的雄辩着眼于长期竞争。美国一天没气候法案，中国的绿色经济就一天天紧缩（一天比一天糟？）。工业界的游说团体决定议案要有利于他们将来的投资，但这将很难，尤其加上与医护服务的协调。如果议案通不过，这将改变美国的环境政策，造成相关行业的反抗。Carbon-trading schemes已经没什么市场了，如果美国完全放弃这个计划，他们将看到比今天更少的变革，并且由于基于市场的方案失去了相关性，环境政策将更加依赖于他们想要替换掉的指挥与控制技术。

C：
基因作物发差快，也带来了安全可靠性的恐慌。不过由于缺乏证据，对其抵触不是强制性的。现在更好的技术保证转基因技术的安全性，但是人们担心大公司会抢了穷人的饭碗。现在跨国公司，中国，巴西，印度也在发展转基因技术，而本国或本国公司的产品不太会引起人们的反抗。另一个令人担忧的是它的成功和对技术的要求。知识产权的问题来了，GM也成熟于私人投资。有很多方法去提高农业系统的供给和利润。农场不仅仅要种好植物，更要注重生态。转基因作物在将来的农业发展扮演重要的角色，但只是整体中的部分。


B篇大意：
碳排放限制受到绿色循环政策的青睐。
类似的SO2政策被认为能有效而便宜得解决酸雨问题。
它最大的成功在于它看上去不向一个税款，尽管它能带来很多钱。
碳排放限制条款期望XXX等人研究的将要公布的气候法规能够仅仅是一个原先排放限制协议的小小的影子。
排放限量将不再是法案中最引人注目的不妨，但是暂时可用于电力应用。
燃料运输将要收取一些税收，工业排放将要以规章制度来处理，今后炭贸易可能也是。
这个复合的趋势是必要的因为排放限量的吸引力下降了。
在工业区通过工业赚钱不在吸引人了。由于财政紧缺，市场机制失去了吸引力。
更普遍的，气候不再是当下人们主要关心的问题，可能因为经济萧条、人们对科学的担忧、胜者可能会雪？？
公众热衷于对新能能源的刺激。参议院议案会大力刺激和拨款有关新能源的项目，不管能源在再生上是否有问题，
也可能仍旧限于实验室研究。因此那个议案要很多钱，这就是为什么排放限量法案仍旧在使用，而其收入将通过燃料运输税收来提高。
一个复杂的实现方式，链接收费，将把收入和应用市场上的炭价格联系起来，一个直接的炭税可能更有机会通过。
能源议案过去需要两党的支持，这个也是。这就是为何Graham担心。他可以让两党都支持。他的贡献在于他的游说不仅仅着眼于短期利益，
而是考虑的长期竞争性。
他同时认为在这个问题上的争论对他的政党有利。但是短期共和党利益相反，党的长期利益包括扩大它的支持率。
调查认为在年轻人中，他们更关心环境气候这类问题。
不幸的是对于此争论，年轻的投票人不太喜欢在选举中间时刻扮演重要的角色。其他共和党人士认为等到党的证书再说。
Lisa Murkowski 很乐意将气候作为一个问题来讨论，并交流对一些炭限制的希望，比如税收、货一些类似排放限量的方案。
但她对此并不急。她也介绍了2中方案用于限制EPA的权力。EPA现在有权管理炭，这表明将来将有相关立法。

EPA的新权利无疑使得立法更有吸引力。许多工业集团可能决定议案要确保他们能决定将来的投资。
白宫已经支持并邀请参议员讨论。但这仍是很困难的，再加上通过健康保障，这一点Graham已经说得很清楚。

如果议案不通过，这将改变美国的环境政策。已经提出贸易方案的商业结盟的环境团体会失利，包括基层组织。
炭贸易被更大的市场所剥夺，如果美国不采用排放限制政策，他们将看到比今天更少的转变。
由于基于市场的方案失去了关联，环境行动能够继续的就是加重对他们想要替换掉的关键性技术的依靠。

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The proposer's opening remarks

Mar 22nd 2010 | Amar Bhidé

Innovation now attracts innumerable worshippers（无数的崇拜者） but their prayers are often quite narrow and sectarian（宗派的，狭隘的）. Silicon Valley or possibly the Israeli high-tech industry is the promised land: a wondrous combination（完美结合） of private high-tech enterprise underpinned by（受支持于） government-financed universities and research labs.（改革收到很多目光狭隘人的支持，硅谷和伊拉克工业区是令人期望的私人公司和政府支持的高校研究所的完美结合）

This is, alas, a dubious conception（靠不住的构想） of paradise（天堂）. For all the high-tech prowess（技艺） of Silicon Valley, the economy of California is on the edge of disaster. Unemployment in eight counties now tops 20% and the government pays its bills in IOUs. And in spite of its extraordinary concentration of scientific and engineering talent and entrepreneurship, Israel's GDP per head（每人） in 2009 was lower than of Cyprus, Greece and Slovenia.（该想法很荒唐，加利福尼亚处于灾难的边缘，失业率很高，伊拉克虽然致力于技术发展GDP也不高）

Or remember Japan's omnipotent（全能）, visionary MITI working hand and glove with the likes of NEC, Hitachi and Fujitsu? Put aside fiascos（惨败） such as the ten-year Fifth Generation Computer Systems Project, by standard measures the overall level of Japanese engineering and scientific performance, either because of or in spite of government subsidies, is impressive. （昏过去了。。。。）More tellingly, Hong Kong's GNP per head is nearly 30% higher than Japan's, 24% higher than Germany's and 505% higher than Israel's. Yet Hong Kong's government and private businesses pay scant（不足的） attention to cutting-edge scientific and technological research.（香港政府对技术投入不多，但是GNP高于日本和伊拉克两个重视技术的国家）

The techno-fetishist（盲从者） view of innovation and the kind of government support it demands fails to appreciate the enormous variety of innovations that we need.（技术盲从者对改革的看法和政府对改革的支持方式决定了不能够正确看待各种各样我们需要的改革。）

The measure of a good economy lies in the satisfaction it provides to the many, not a few, not in the wealth or accomplishment of a few individuals or organisations.（对好的经济体系的评判基于大众对它的满意度，而非个人、部分或部分个人或组织的成就或是财富） And these satisfactions go beyond the material or pecuniary rewards earned: they include, for instance, the exhilaration of overcoming challenges.（这些满意度超过了物质金钱上获得的奖励，它们包括克服挑战的喜悦） Indeed they go hand in hand（密切合作）: a good economy cannot provide widespread prosperity without harnessing the creativity and enterprise of the many. All must have the opportunity to innovate, to try out new things: not just scientists and engineers but also graphic artists, shop floor workers, salespersons and advertising agencies; not just the developers of new products but their venturesome consumers. The exceptional performance of a few high-tech businesses, as the Silicon Valley and Israeli examples show, is just not enough.
（对好的经济体系的评判基于大众对它的满意度，而非个人、部分或部分个人或组织的成就或是财富。这些满意度超过了物质金钱上获得的奖励，它们包括克服挑战的喜悦。事实上它们是密切合作的，好的经济不可能在不利用广大群众的创造和财富而获得繁荣。各项都需要有机会去改革去尝试，而非仅仅是科学和工程。一些高技术公司的突出表现是不够的。）

This widely diffused, multifaceted form of innovation
entails（遗留） a circumscribed role（受限的角色） for governments: they should not to put their finger on
the scale
bribing（贿赂、诱惑） people to do basic research instead of, say, the kind of graphics design that has made Apple such an iconic（图像的、标志的） company. Mandating（命令） more math and science in high schools when most of us never use trigonometry or calculus in our working lives takes away（占用时间） time from learning skills that are crucial in an innovative economy: how to listen and persuade, think independently and work collaboratively（合作的）, for instance.（这个令众人困惑且有多面作用的改革留给政府一个受限的角色：政府不应该着手引诱人民去扩大基础研究，相反的图像设计成就了苹果这样一个标志性的公司。要求高校中开设更多的数学和科学，这种我们大部分人工作中使用不到的但是却占用我们学习利于经济改革的重要技术的时间：比如如何独立思考、如何说服劝告、如何共同协作。）

Yes, there is a problem with global warming, but that is best solved by innumerable tinkerers taking their chances with renewable energy and resourceful conservation, not by throwing money at projects that a few savants have determined to be the most promising. The apparent duplication（复制） of autonomous initiative（自主创新） isn't a waste: no one can foretell what is going to work. Even the most successful venture-capital companies（风投公司） have more misses than hits. Therefore putting many independent experiments in play raises the odds that one will work. When government gets into the game of placing bets, for instance, on new battery technologies, innovators who don't have the savvy（机智、见识）, credentials and connections with politicians or the scientific establishment（科研机构） are at a severe disadvantage. Yet history shows that it is often the nonconformist（不墨守陈规的人） outsiders who play a pivotal（关键的） role. Would Ed Roberts have been able to secure a government grant（津贴、许可） to build the world's first personal computer, a virtually useless toy when it was introduced in 1974?(是的，全球变暖问题严重，但是最好的方案是由许多工程师利用可再生能源和聪明的保护方法尝试着改变，而不是砸钱给那些少数片面分子推崇的最优希望的项目。明显得复制自主创新不见得是浪费：没人能预知去做什么。即使是最成功的风投公司也是错过得多，捕捉到得少。当政府介入这场押注的游戏时，例如在新电池技术中，若改革者没有见识，资格证和政治家与科研机构的联系就会处在非常不利的地位。甚至历史证明通常是不墨守成规的人扮演着重要的角色。罗伯茨能够获得政府的津贴来建立世界上第一个个人电脑么？在当时看来那只是个无用的玩具。)

Of course a government doing the least doesn't mean a government doing nothing at all. Moreover, the least is a moving and ever expanding target. The invention of the automobile, for example, necessitated driving rules and a system of vehicle inspections（检查）. The growth of air travel required a system to control traffic and certify the airworthiness（耐飞性） of aircraft. Similarly, radio and television required a system to regulate the use of the airwaves.

Modern technology created new forms of pollution that did not exist in agrarian（农业的） economies. Governments had to step in, in one way or the other, to make it unrewarding（不值得） to pollute. Likewise, antitrust（反托拉斯，反垄断） laws to control commercial interactions and conduct（行为举止） emerged after new technologies created opportunities to realise economies of scale and scope—and realise oligopoly（求过于供的市场情况）or monopoly（垄断） profits. These opportunities were largely absent in pre-industrial（工业革命前） economies.（当然，政府做最少不是指政府什么都不做。进一步，最少指一个有推动力和扩展力的目标。例如汽车的发明使得交通规则和交通工具的质检成为必须。空中旅行的发展要求一个用于控制交通和确保飞行器耐飞性的系统。类似的，无线电和电视要求一个系统来管理无线电波。现代技术产生了各种各样农业经济所不存在的污染。政府需要介入并采取措施来抑制污染。例如，反托拉斯法用于控制经济上的相互作用以及一些由于新技术产生而获取大量经济的行为，这些行为还包括供过于求的市场情况和垄断利益。这些机会再工业革命前很少。）

But the principle of the least is best remains a true compass. New technologies not only create the need for desirable new rules, they but also generate more opportunities for unwarranted meddling（瞎管（meddle干涉）） and a cover for rent-seeking. It is one thing for the Federal Aviation（航空） Administration to manage the air traffic control system, quite another for the Civil Aeronautics Board (b. 1938, d. 1985) to regulate airfares, routes and schedules. The construction of the interstate（州际）highway system may have been a great boon to the US economy, for example, but it did not take long for Congress to start appropriating funds for bridges to nowhere.（最少原则是最好的，这一点仍旧是一个正确的指向。新技术不仅要求有价值的新规定，它们也产生许多没有依据的瞎管和竞租。这是为什么联邦航空局管理飞行器控制系统不同于名航局管理飞机票价、路线和行程表。洲际公路系统是美国经济的一个重要命脉，但是没过多久国会就开始合适的基金用于桥梁。）

Entrepreneurial leaps into the dark are best sustained by great caution in expanding the scope of government intervention（干涉）; the private virtue（价值、优点） of daring can be a public vice（罪恶）. The US chief justice has often repeated the maxim: "If it is not necessary to decide an issue to resolve a case, then it is necessary not to decide that issue." Similarly, if it is not necessary to intervene to promote innovation, it should be considered necessary not to intervene. The government should focus on things that private enterprise simply cannot provide and stay away from promoting activities that would allegedly（被怀疑，被说成） be undersupplied. If nothing, this maxim frees up（空出来的） resources for crucial public goods. So traffic police, emission rules and carbon taxes: absolutely. Subsidising networks of hydrogen pumps and new engine or battery technologies: no thanks.（企业家进入黑暗主要是由于国家干涉的扩大，个人胆大优点可能成为罪恶，美国首要的公正常常被反复强调：如果没必要对争论作出决定来解决一个事件，那就没必要作出决定。类似的，如果没必要促进改革，政府着眼于私企不能够提供并原理优化行动，会被说成是供给不足。如果没什么事，这些被空出来的资源可以用于重要的公共商品。交通警察、排放规定和炭税：毫无疑问的。氢泵、新工程或电池技术的津贴网络：不用谢）

weili0612UID: 2767606

也掉色了。。。男人难。。。

weaselUID: 2739489

因为你着色的部分用了标题的样式，所以掉色，我刚刚也是同一个问题

weili0612UID: 2767606

11# weasel 3Q~~~~~~~~

lvruochenUID: 2792806

居然撞文章了

weili0612UID: 2767606

The opposition's opening remarks

Mar 22nd 2010 | David Sandalow  

Governments spur innovation. Governments shape innovation. Many of the most important innovations in recent decades grew from the work of governments.

In 1965, a US government employee named Bob Taylor had an idea about how computers could communicate. He took the idea to his boss Charles Herzfeld, head of the Pentagon's Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), who invested government funds in exploring it. That investment led to the ARPAnet and, in turn, to the internet, without which so many things (including this online debate) would not be possible.

An isolated example? Hardly. Among the innovations that grew directly from government funding are the Google search engine, GPS devices, DNA mapping, inexpensive mass data storage and even Teflon.

Why is government important to innovation?

First, the private sector underinvests（？？） in fundamental research. That is natural. Time horizons（投资期） in many businesses are short. Few companies are in a position to capture benefits from fundamental research they might fund on their own. In many fields, fundamental research requires resources available only to governments and the largest companies. As Professor Henry Chesbrough documents in his book "Open Innovation", the big corporate research labs of decades past have given way to more distributed approaches to innovation. That gets many technologies to market faster, but at the expense of fundamental research. Without government support for such research, the seed corn for future generations would be at risk.（1、私人企业不投资基础研究）

Second, innovation depends on an educated workforce（劳动力）, which is a job for governments. Biomedical research requires medical technicians. Energy research requires engineers. Computer research requires programmers. Although private companies often provide specialized training, an educated workforce is the essential starting point. Primary and secondary education is a vital precursor(重要的前提) to much innovation. That is a job for governments everywhere. And universities play a central role, with training of promising young innovators often made possible by government funding. (2、改革依赖于受过良好教育的劳动力，而教育基于政府投资)

Third, market failures stifle（窒息） innovative technologies. The recent financial crisis choked off capital for innovators. Without governments stepping in to provide backstop（最后担保） support, thousands of promising innovations would have been lost due to the unrelated vagaries（异想天开） of failing financial markets. There are many other examples. Lack of capital and information prevents homeowners from investing in energy-saving technologies with very short payback periods. Split incentives between architects, builders, landlords and tenants prevent widespread adoption of similar technologies in commercial buildings. Governments have a central role in overcoming these barriers, and more.（3、市场的失败会抑制技术的革新。政府应扮演重要角色，克服这些抑制技术改革的障碍并提供担保。）

Fourth, government policies and standards can lay a strong foundation for innovation. Last century, the United States benefited from government policies requiring near universal access（普及高等教育） to electricity and telephone services, laying the groundwork for a vibrant（有生机的） consumer electronics industry. This century, Finland and Korea (among others) are benefiting from government policies to promote broadband access（宽带接入）, helping position each country for global leadership in a vast global market. New technologies require standards that allow them to operate within larger systems. The NTSC television broadcast standard, 110V AC current and FHA housing loans, to pick just three examples, each helped market actors coordinate, encouraging innovation. Or consider Israel, which has a teeming（丰富的） innovation culture in which the Israeli government plays a central role, providing the foundation for startups(提供启动基础) that commercialize civilian uses of military technologies in materials, semiconductors, medical devices and communications.（4、政府政策能为改革打下坚实的基础）

Finally, because governments help make sure innovation delivers public benefits. Not all innovation is good. Collateralized（抵押） debt obligations（抵押债务权益） were an important financial innovation. Yet as the recent financial crisis demonstrated, financial markets cannot be relied upon to self-regulate innovation.（金融市场不能依赖于自我改革） As government encourages and promotes innovation, it also has a role in guiding it.（5、政府确保技术革新促进公众利益）

In the academic literature（学术文献） on innovation, the number of patents issued（发行）in a country is often used as a proxy（代表） for the rate of innovation.（技术革新水平的代表） Patents are, of course, issued by governments. As this suggests, governments play a central role in innovation.

In his inaugural（就职） address, President Obama said, "The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works…" That should guide us in thinking about this motion. The notion that "Innovation works best when government does least" is simplistic（过分单纯化） and wrong. There may be instances in which government meddling chokes off innovation.（政府介入抑制技术改革） (Past US government restrictions on stem cell research come to mind.) Yet governments can and do play a central role in spurring innovation and making sure innovation delivers benefits. We should embrace government's role in innovation, always seeking to refine(精炼) and improve it, not diminish（减小、贬低） it with broad generalities（概括的）.

weili0612UID: 2767606

又掉色了，不过这篇比较简单~

weili0612UID: 2767606

13# lvruochen
还有个人呢 也是这个文章 嘿嘿 一撞撞2个~