作者：shiyi18

Designing rewards
设计奖励
Carrots dressed as sticks
披着大棒外衣的胡萝卜政策
Jan 14th 2010
From The Economist print edition
An experiment on economic incentives
经济激励试验
PEOPLE are contrary creatures. A man may say he would not pay more than $5 for a coffee mug. But if he is told that the mug is his, and asked immediately afterwards how much he would be willing to sell it for, he typically holds out for more. Possession, it appears, lends things an added allure.
人是一种矛盾的动物。一个人可能声称他最多只愿为一个咖啡杯付上5美元。但当他被告知这个咖啡杯是他自己的，并被询问期望以多少价钱卖出时，他一般情况下所要的价钱肯定比5美元更高。由此可见，人们对某物的拥有赋予了该物更高的价值。

This makes little sense in the world of standard economic theory, where the value of something depends on what it is. But it can be explained by behavioural models in which the value people attach to objects is affected by what they already have, and people abhor losses more than they like equivalent gains.
这在标准的经济学理论中站不住脚，在标准理论中，物品的价值取决于它是什么。但是这种现象可以通过行为模型来解释，在行为模型中，人们对于物品价值的判断受到他们已有物品的影响，而且人们对于损失的反应往往比等价的利得的反应要大的多。

In a new paper Tanjim Hossain of the University of Toronto and John List of the University of Chicago explore a real-world use of these insights. The economists worked with the managers of a Chinese electronics factory, who were interested in exploring ways to make their employee-bonus scheme more effective. Most might have recommended changes to the amounts of money on offer. But Mr Hossain and Mr List chose instead to concentrate on the wording of the letter informing workers of the details of the bonus scheme.
多伦多大学的丹极-侯赛因和芝加哥大学的约翰-李斯特在他们的新文章中探讨了这个观点在现实世界中的应用。这两位经济学家以一家中国电子制造厂的经理作为研究样本，这些经理人正致力于如何使得他们员工奖金机制更加有效。大多数人的观点是增加能够支出的奖金的数量。但是侯赛因和李斯特认为应该在给员工奖金方案细节的通知信的措辞上下功夫。

At the beginning of the week, some groups of workers were told that they would receive a bonus of 80 yuan ($12) at the end of the week if they met a given production target. Other groups were told that they had “provisionally” been awarded the same bonus, also due at the end of the week, but that they would “lose” it if their productivity fell short of the same threshold.
其中一组工人在一周（的工作）开始时获知，如果他们能够完成既定的生产目标，则在周末将获得80元人民币（约合12美元）的奖励。另外一些工人在一周的开始就得到了同样数字的“临时性”奖金，但是如果到周末，他们的工作没有达到和前面的那些工人相同的目标，这些奖金将被收回。

Objectively these are two ways of describing the same scheme. But under a theory of loss aversion, the second way of presenting the bonus should work better. Workers would think of the provisional bonus as theirs, and work harder to prevent it from being taken away.
客观上说，有两种方法来描述同一种方案。但是基于对损失厌恶的理论来说，第二种奖金方案更能激励员工。员工们会认为这个“临时”的奖金是归他们所有的，并且更加努力的工作来防止奖金被收回。

This is just what the economists found. The fear of loss was a better motivator than the prospect of gain (which worked too, but less well). And the difference persisted over time: the results were not simply a consequence of workers’ misunderstanding of the system. Economists have always been advocates of using carrots and sticks. But they may not have emphasised appearances enough. Carrots, this research suggests, may work better if they can somehow be made to look like sticks.
这就是经济学家们所发现的。对于损失的恐惧相对于利得的前景（这种方法也有效，但是效用不如前者）来说，是更有利的激发因素。这种差别始终存在：以上所得出的结果不仅仅是由于员工对于奖金系统的认知误差所引起的。经济学家们一直以来都是胡萝卜政策（奖励政策——译者注）和大棒政策（惩罚政策——译者注）的拥护者。但是他们没有对于政策的表象给予足够的重视。这个研究的结果说明，如果给胡萝卜政策披上大棒的外衣的话，可能会更加有效。
译者：tinawang

Bahrain’s labour market 巴林的劳动力市场

Bridging the gulf
缩小鸿沟

Jan 14th 2010 | MANAMA
From The Economist print edition

One country in the Gulf tries to wean itself off foreign workers
海湾某国尝试不再依赖外国劳工

THE newly opened Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building, is a monument to Dubai’s audacity. It is also a stark illustration of its dependence on foreign labour. Designed by an American, overseen by a New Zealander and built by mostly South Asian labourers, the 200-storey tower was the work of more than 100 nationalities. Indeed, 90% of the workforce in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is foreign. In neighbouring Qatar and Kuwait, the figure is over 80%. Even in Saudi Arabia, which has more than 22m locals, foreigners fill almost half the country’s jobs.

新近开放的世界第一高塔博芝•哈里发塔，是迪拜无畏勇气的象征，也是其依赖国外劳工的显著例证。这座200层的高塔是由美国人设计，新西兰人监督，并主要由南亚劳工修建的。建造这个200层塔的工作人员来自100多个国家。事实上，阿联酋90%的劳动力都是外国人。在邻国卡塔尔和科威特，这个比例也大于80%，甚至在有2200多万本地居民的沙特阿拉伯，外国劳动力也占据了近半数的工作岗位。

Policymakers in the region fret about citizens who cannot find a government job and will not settle for private employment at the low wages foreigners accept. One observer likens the chasm in wages between Gulf nationals and poor migrants to the Mariana Trench. Rather than restrict expatriate hiring, governments typically respond by prodding companies to hire locals, imposing “Emiratisation” or “Saudisation” quotas. During the downturn the UAE and Saudi authorities instructed firms to fire foreigners first.

本地区有些居民无法在政府找到工作，又不愿勉强接受私营企业提供的与国外劳工同等的低薪，这让决策者苦恼不已。一位观察者将海湾国民与穷苦移民者的薪金差别比作是马里亚纳海沟。为应对这一切，政府采取推动企业雇佣本地人以及实行“酋长国化”或者“沙地化”限额的政策(实行“酋长国式”或者“沙特式”配额的政策)，而不是限制聘用外籍人员。经济低迷时期，阿联酋与沙特政府指示企业应首先解雇外国人（真悲惨啊。。。）。

Gulf officials are therefore paying close attention to an experiment in Bahrain, an island kingdom where expatriates hold 80% of private-sector jobs. Since July 2008 the government has charged firms 200 Bahraini dinars ($530) for a work visa and ten dinars a month for every foreign employee on their payroll. Since August 2009 it has also allowed foreigners to quit their sponsoring employer, giving them four weeks to find a new job before they must leave Bahrain.

因此，巴林的一项实验便成了海湾官员密切关注的焦点。巴林是一个岛国，其外籍人员比例在私营企业中占80%。巴林政府自2008年7月份开始，每张工作证要收取企业200巴林第纳尔（530美元）的费用，每名外国雇员还要从月薪里扣除10第纳尔上缴。2009年8月起，外国雇员可以中止与巴林雇主的雇佣关系，在被迫离开巴林之前还会获得四周时间来寻找新工作。

Since the levy came in the chasm in labour costs has begun to close, but at a geological pace at best (see chart). The gap narrowed from 252 dinars a month in the second quarter of 2008 to 225 in the third quarter of 2009. In September 159 workers switched employers; another 140 moved the next month, earning an extra 69 dinars a month on average. But these foreigners were already paid more than most.

（这句好难）自那时开始，两者的劳动力成本课税差距以缓慢的速度开始减少（如曲线图）。(自该税开征，劳动力征税分歧已开始减缓。)从2008年第二季度的252第纳尔减少到2009年第三季度的225第纳尔。9月份，有159位外籍雇员换了雇主，10月份则有140位，他们平均比以往每月多挣69第纳尔。相比其他人，这些外籍雇员已经算挣得多的了。

Bahrain’s businessmen, some of whom double as policymakers, could not stop the levy but they did succeed in limiting it to a paltry ten dinars. In paying the tax, businessmen hoped to buy the freedom to hire foreigners as they saw fit. But because the levy is so low, the authorities cannot rely on it to stem the influx of foreign labour. So some businessmen complain that requests for visas are still subject to bureaucratic humming and hawing.

巴林的商人中，有些还兼任决策者（政策制定者，下同）。他们不能免除课税，（不能阻止这项征税）却成功地将之降到微不足道的10第纳尔。商人们希望能通过缴清税收获得雇佣合适外国劳力的自由。由于税收很低，政府无法藉此阻止外国劳力蜂拥而入。有商人抱怨工作证的获取仍然受限于官僚政治的模棱两可（哼哼哈哈）。

As well as making foreigners more expensive, the government is trying to make locals more employable. Of the roughly 90m dinars the levy raises in a year, 80% goes to Tamkeen, an agency dedicated to improving the productivity of Bahraini firms and workers, partly through cheap loans and training. It hopes to equip 19,000 lower-paid Bahrainis for better positions, training receptionists to also perform data-entry tasks, for example. Tamkeen will even pay a wage increment for local employees for the first year. Thanks to these sweeteners, one Bahraini publisher says he can now persuade his countrymen to do jobs previously confined to foreigners, such as delivering newspapers to subscribers (but only by car; motorbikes are still strictly for immigrants).

政府在提高外国人待遇的同时，也在努力帮助当地人就业。一年来增长的9千万第纳尔的税收，80%都给了旨在提高巴林企业与工人生产力的机构—塔姆基。通过低息贷款和培训，塔姆基希望能帮助一万九千名巴林低收入者胜任更好的工作岗位。比如，训练前台接待员使之能完成数据输入工作。塔姆基甚至会在头年付给本地雇员递增工资。一名巴林出版商说，多亏了这些益处，现在他能够说服他的老乡去做以前只能外国人做的工作，比如将报纸发送给订阅人（但是只能坐汽车；摩托车仍然只有外国移民能开）

“Cheap labour is preventing investment in training and technology,” says Majeed Al Alawi, the minister for labour. “Therefore productivity is low, pay is low, and the private sector is not attractive to Bahrainis.” Bahrain hopes to build, storey by storey, a workforce that is worth the higher wages locals expect. As one policymaker told his Dubai counterpart: “It’s not how tall your building is; it’s what goes inside it that matters.”

巴林劳工大臣马吉德•阿拉维说：“劳动力的廉价阻碍了培训和技术投资。因而导致了生产力底下，薪水微薄，私营企业对巴林人失去吸引力。”
巴林希望逐渐建立如当地人期待的高薪工作人口群（员工梯队）。正如一位决策者告诉迪拜同仁的那样：“关键不是在于楼建多高，而是里面的东西。
译者：nuvia

Cancer and stem cells
癌与干细胞

A strand apart
一链之差

Jan 14th 2010 | SAN FRANCISCO
From The Economist print edition

More evidence that tumours, like healthy organs, grow from stem cells
更多证据显示，肿瘤同健康器官一样，由干细胞发育而成。

THE notion that tumours are chaotic masses of anarchic cells has been falling by the wayside recently. Many researchers now think, by contrast, that cancers actually resemble normal, well-regulated organs in several important ways. One of these is that they are believed to have a small population of stem cells which keep them going when other cells die or are killed off. The existence of such cancer stem cells is still a matter of debate. But this week the discussion may have taken an important turn. Brid Ryan, Sharon Pine and Curtis Harris, of America’s National Cancer Institute, reported that some lung-cancer cells do, indeed, seem to behave like stem cells during the process of cell division.

认为肿瘤是一堆杂乱无章的异常细胞的观点，最近已经遭到摒弃。许多研究者认为，恰恰相反，肿瘤在几个重要方面都与正常有序的器官相似。其中一个方面就是，人们认为肿瘤内也有一定数量的干细胞，这些干细胞使得肿瘤能够在其他细胞死亡或被消灭的情况下还能继续生长。这种肿瘤干细胞是否存在，目前仍存在争议。但是，这种争论在本周或许已经发生重大变化。美国国家癌症研究所布里德·瑞安、沙农·派恩和柯蒂斯·哈里斯报道，一些肺癌细胞在细胞分裂过程中确实表现得像干细胞。

Unlike normal cells, stem cells can divide in two different ways. They may do so symmetrically, thereby producing identical daughter cells, each of which resembles the mother cell. Or they may do so asymmetrically, and give rise to two very different daughters. In such cases, one of the daughters is identical to the original stem cell, while the other takes on new characteristics and can then differentiate into whatever cell type the tissue it inhabits requires.

与普通细胞不同，干细胞分裂有两种途径。干细胞可进行对称分裂，从而产生完全相同的子细胞，每个子细胞与母细胞相似。干细胞也可进行不对称分裂，产生两个完全不同的子细胞。在第二种情况下，其中一个子细胞与原始干细胞相同，而另一个子细胞则具有了新特征，并能分化成所在组织需要的任何细胞类型。

During asymmetrical divisions, some stem cells take an extra step to preserve the integrity of their DNA. Part of the process of cell division involves the duplication of a cell’s chromosomes, so that each daughter can have a full set of these strands of DNA. Instead of sending old and new chromosomes into the daughter cells at random, the dividing stem cell carefully shuttles all of its old chromosomes into the daughter that remains a stem cell. The newly synthesised DNA, which may contain errors, is put into the daughter that is destined to differentiate. That way, any mutations which have arisen during DNA replication will not affect the all-important stem cell population.

为了保留DNA的完整性，一些干细胞的不对称分裂过程要多经历一个步骤。细胞分裂过程包含细胞染色体的复制，以使每个子细胞具有完整的DNA链。分裂的干细胞并不是将原来的染色体和新生成的染色体随机分配给子细胞，而是精心地将原来的染色体封装到仍充当干细胞的子细胞中。可能含有错误片段的新合成DNA则被分配给分化子细胞。通过这种方式，DNA复制过程中出现的任何错误都不会影响到极为重要的干细胞群。

Until now, the main evidence supporting the cancer-stem-cell hypothesis has been the observation that many different types of tumour contain a small group of cells, identifiable by special types of protein found on their surfaces, that can form new tumours with high efficiency. (By contrast, the cells that comprise the bulk of most tumours lack these surface proteins and are poor at creating new tumours.)

到目前为止，支持肿瘤干细胞假说的主要证据是发现许多不同类型的肿瘤都含有能高效率生成新肿瘤的一小群细胞，通过细胞表面的特殊类型的蛋白质能够识别这些细胞。（与之相比，组成大部分肿瘤主体的细胞没有这种表面蛋白，生成新肿瘤的能力也很弱。）

Dr Ryan, Dr Pine and Dr Harris reasoned that if such cells really are stem cells then they should be able to undergo both symmetrical and asymmetrical divisions, just like the stem cells in healthy tissue. They looked in samples taken directly from patients with lung cancer, and also in lung-cancer cells from laboratory cultures. In both cases, when they grew the cells in the presence of a chemical that infiltrates newly synthesised DNA, they could see that the unlabelled template strands of DNA went into one daughter cell and the new strands went to the other. Moreover, the daughter that retained the old DNA also retained the cell-surface proteins that mark the putative cancer stem cells.

瑞安、派恩和哈里斯三位博士推论认为，若此类细胞真是干细胞，它们就应该像健康组织中的干细胞一样，既能进行对称分裂，又能进行不对称分裂。他们观察了直接取自肺癌患者的样本，也观察了实验室培养的肺癌细胞。他们在培养基中添加能渗入新合成DNA的化学试剂，结果，两种情况下都观察到未标记的模板DNA链进入了一个子细胞，而新合成的DNA链进入了另一个子细胞。而且，保留了原来DNA的子细胞同时也保留了假定的肿瘤干细胞特有的细胞表面蛋白。

The team, who presented their results at a joint meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research and the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer in Coronado, California, this week, are now investigating whether their putative cancer stem cells are more resistant than run-of-the-mill cancer cells to chemotherapy or radiation, as research on other putative stem cells has suggested. What they do know is that when they grow these cells in culture, they can push them toward either asymmetrical or symmetrical division by controlling the density of cells and the amount of oxygen available. If they can find a similar way to control the cells’ fate in patients’ tumours, they may have opened a new avenue for cancer therapy.

本周，在加利福尼亚州科罗纳多举行的美国癌症研究学会和国际肺癌研究学会联合会议上，该小组公布了他们的研究结果。他们现在正在研究假定的肿瘤干细胞是否像其他假定干细胞上的研究显示的一样，比普通癌细胞更耐化疗及放疗。目前他们所知道的是，人工培养这些细胞时，可以通过控制细胞密度和氧通量来强制细胞进行不对称分裂或是对称分裂。如果能找到类似的方法来控制患者肿瘤细胞，或许，他们就开启了癌症治疗的新途径。
译者：hddmail126

Art.view
Eastern eyes

The rarefied world of Chinese export porcelain
中国瓷器，一个珍贵而稀有的世界
Jan 13th 2010
From Economist.com

                                                  Sotheby’s

THE West’s trade with China has been at the forefront of globalisation since the days of Marco Polo. Pieces of eight, minted out of South American silver, crossed the Pacific and were used up and down the coast of Asia. Indeed, interruptions in this silver trade ultimately helped bring on the collapse of the Ming dynasty in China in the early 17th century. Later exchanges of tea, spices and then opium served to enrich Western merchants, particularly from Britain.
西方同中国的贸易自从马可波罗时代开始，就走在了全球化的最前端。以产于南美的银铸造的西班牙古银币跨越了太平洋，被往返于亚洲沿岸的人所使用。这种金属银贸易的打断最终加速了十七世纪早期明朝的灭亡。之后，茶叶、香料和鸦片的贸易使得西方—尤其是英国—的商人变得更加富裕。
继续阅读“The rarefied world of Chinese export porcelain”

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Obituary
逝者

Tsutomu Yamaguchi
山口疆

Jan 14th 2010
From The Economist print edition

Tsutomu Yamaguchi, a double nuclear survivor, died on January 6th, aged 93

山口疆，一个经历过两次原子弹爆炸的幸存者，于1月6日逝世，享年93岁

WHEN he had stopped crying, Tsutomu Yamaguchi would tell you why he called his book of poems “The Human Raft”. It had to do with the day he forgot to take his personal name-stamp to work, and had to get off the bus. Much was on his mind that morning. He had to pack his bags to leave Hiroshima after a three-month assignment as an engineer in the Mitsubishi shipyard; there were goodbyes to say at the office, then a 200-mile train journey back to Nagasaki to his wife Hisako and Katsutoshi, his baby son. He was slightly stressed when he got to his stop, still with half-an-hour’s walk ahead of him on a track that led through featureless potato fields. But it was a beautiful August day; the sky was clear, his spirits high. And then—readers will feel a tremor, but he felt none—he noticed an aircraft circling, and two parachutes dropping down.

哭泣止住之后，山口疆就会告诉你们他为什么要把他这本诗集叫作《人筏》。全是因为那天，那个“他忘了带自己的姓名章去上班，所以不得不中途下车”的那天。那天早上，他的脑子里全是事儿。那天，他必须要打包离开广岛；他作为工程师已经完成了在三菱造船厂为期三个月的任务；他要向办公室其他的同仁告别，然后乘坐火车回到长崎，回到200英里以外的家中，回到妻子尚子和还在嗷嗷待哺的儿子胜敏的身边。当他到站时，不觉有些厌烦，因为前面还有半小时的脚程，要经过一片单调无奇的马铃薯地。但是美丽的八月和清澈的天空让他精神振作了起来。然后——读者读到这里会感觉脊背发颤，而他却麻木无觉——他注意到一个绕圈的飞机，还有两个正在下落的降落伞。

The next thing he knew was a blaze of white magnesium light, and a huge ball of fire. He dived to the ground. The fireball, roaring upwards, sucked him up again and threw him, blinded, face-down into the mud of the potato field. He was two miles from the epicentre of the blast, in a rain of flaming scraps of paper and clothes. His upper body and half his face were badly burned, his hair gone and his eardrums ruptured. In this state, he made his way back to the devastated city to try to do what he had meant to do that day: catch the train. The river bridges were down. But one river was full of carbonised naked bodies of men, women, children, floating face-down “like blocks of wood”, and on these—part treading, part paddling—he got to the other side. His human raft.

接下来，他感到眼前一阵炫目的镁光，还很有一颗巨大的火球。他就地扑倒。腾起的火球把他再次吸起，他眼前一黑，脸朝下被扔进土豆田的泥当中。他所处位置距离爆炸中心两英里，这里下起一阵“碎片雨”——燃烧的纸片和衣服碎片。他的上身和半张脸被严重烧伤，头发没了，耳鼓破了。在这样的情形下，他依然设法回到了被摧毁的城市，然后设法完成他那天原定的计划：赶火车。过河桥都塌了。但是却有一条河里满是碳化的裸露尸体，男人、女人、小孩，脸朝下浮在水面之上，好像“一块块木头”。借着这些“木块”——半是踏，半是划——他过到了另一边。他的人筏。

At this point in his story he would weep uncontrollably. It was by no means the end of it. When he reached Nagasaki, barely pausing to get his burns dressed, he reported for work. His boss was sceptical: how could a single bomb have destroyed Hiroshima? Then the same white magnesium light blazed in the window, and Mr Yamaguchi was tossed to the ground again. A reinforced-steel stairwell saved him. His bandages were blown off, and he spent the next weeks curled round his raw wounds in a shelter, close to death. His house was destroyed, his wife and son saved for no reason he could see. But when schoolchildren later asked him, in awed respect, “What was the most terrible thing?”, his answer was not the dangling tongues and eyeballs, not the skin that hung off the bodies of the living “like giant gloves”—but the bridge of bodies on which he had crossed the river.

故事讲到这，他会无法控制地哭泣。然而这绝不是故事的尾声。回到长崎，还未停歇来好好处理一下烧伤，他就回去单位报道。老板对于他的讲述满是问号：一颗炸弹就能把广岛给毁了？接着，窗口出现同样的白色炫目镁光，山口又一次被扔到地上。但是一段由高强度钢构建的楼梯井救了他。他的绷带被爆开，接下来的几周，他待在一个庇护所里，蜷着身子护着伤口，濒临死亡。他的家被毁了，妻子和儿子却奇迹般生还，虽然他看不到他们是如何逃脱的。之后，当小学生满是敬畏地问他，“最恐怖的事是什么？”，他的答案不是悬荡的舌头和眼球，不是活者“像巨型手套一样”悬在身体外的皮肤——而是他踩着过河的尸体桥。

He talked about all this to Charles Pellegrino, an American writer, and Richard Lloyd Parry of the London Times. He told them that he hated the atom bomb because of “what it does to the dignity of human beings”. Walking into Hiroshima, he noticed that the bewildered crowds on the streets were mostly naked, limping children. They made no sound; indeed, no one made a sound. They were reduced—like him, as he was flung into the furrows of the potato field—to the level of mute sticks or leaves, tossed in the wind and burned, or used as floats.

他把所有这些都讲述给美国作家查尔斯·佩莱格里诺和《伦敦时报》的理查得·劳埃德·佩里。他告诉他们说他恨原子弹，因为“原子弹践踏了人性”。走进广岛市区，他看到街道上这些不知所措的人群中大部分都是赤裸跛行的儿童。他们没有声音；不仅如此，所有人都没有声音。他们被原子弹弄成了呆哑的木头，或是如他被扔进土豆田垄沟一样被风卷起，接着被火着身，或是如河上一浮子。

Painting the Buddhas

为佛陀着色

Some argued that he was lucky. A deaf left ear and weak legs were the only after-effects until, late on, stomach cancer appeared. He worked as a translator, then a teacher, and eventually returned to Mitsubishi. But, as he wrote in 1969, he was not so sanguine inside.

有人认为他很幸运。唯一的后遗症是一只聋了的左耳和不灵便的双腿，直到后来出现了胃癌的症状。他作了翻译，然后作老师，最后回到三菱公司。但是，如他在1969年写到，他的内心并不安详乐观。

Thinking of myself as a phoenix,
I cling on until now.
But how painful they have been,
those twenty-four years past.

想象自己是一只凤凰，
坚持，坚持，坚持到现在这一刻。
但是时间多么苦长，
过去这二十四年间。

His emotions mostly emerged in these tanka, or 31-syllable poems. He wrote hundreds, each one an ordeal. When he composed them, he would dream of the dead lying on the ground. One by one, they would get up and walk past him.

他的情感大都表达在这些短歌（或曰“三十一音节诗”）里。他写了上百首，每一首都是一次折磨。他在创作时会看见死者躺在地上，然后一个一个站起来，从他身边走过。

Carbonised bodies face-down in the nuclear wasteland
all the Buddhas died,
and never heard what killed them.

原子核爆后的焦土
面地碳焦的尸体
诸佛皆死
是什么杀死了他们
他们再也不会知道

He published these poems himself in 2002, and they might have been his only testimony. But in 2005 his son Katsutoshi died of cancer at 59, killed by the radiation he had received as a baby. Mr Yamaguchi began to feel that fate had spared him to speak out against the horrors of nuclear weapons: in schools, in a documentary, in a letter to Barack Obama and even, at 90, on his first trip abroad, in front of a committee of the United Nations in New York.

他在2002年出版了这些诗，本来很可能就此是他对于这场灾难唯一的见证词。但是2005年他的儿子胜敏在59岁的年纪死于癌症，凶手是婴儿阶段受到的辐射。这时，山口开始感到命运要他大声疾呼核武器的恐怖：在学校里，在一个纪录片里，在给巴拉克·奥巴马的一封信里，甚至在九十高龄首次国外行在纽约联合国总部的一群委员面前。

If there exists a GOD who protects
nuclear-free eternal peace
the blue earth won’t perish

如果存在这样一个上帝
可以叫原子弹无踪无迹
可以让和平天长且地久
这个蓝星球将不会毁灭

At his insistence, his status was recognised by the Japanese government: he became officially (though there had been more than 100 others) the only nijyuu hibakusha, or twice-victim of the atom bomb.

在他的坚持下，他的位置得到了日本政府的承认：他成为官方认定（尽管还有另外100多人）唯一一名“原子弹双重受害者（nijyuu hibakusha）”。

He began to be comforted by three things. One was a set of drawings of the 88 Buddhas of the Shikoku pilgrimage, whose outlines—robes, haloes, calm hands—he devoutly painted in. The carbonised, face-down Buddhas of his tanka found peace again. The second comfort was in “simple acts of kindness”. And the third was an image of his life as a baton, passed on every time anyone heard or read his testimony. All these batons might form, together, another human raft.

有三样东西开始让他的心灵得到抚慰。一个是四国朝圣路上八十八尊佛的一组白描像，他虔诚地将他们的轮廓——佛袍，晕环，静安的手——着上颜色。他诗中那些面地碳焦的佛陀再次找到了静谧和安详。第二个安慰在“简简单单的善举”中。第三个是他把自己的生命想象成一根接力棒的图景，每当有人听到或是读到他的见证之语，也就是接到了接力棒。所有这些接力棒合在一起，可能就会组成另外一只人类之筏。

译者：eastx

William Safire
威廉•赛菲尔

Oct 1st 2009
From The Economist print edition

William Safire, pundit and lexicographer, died on September 27th, aged 79
权威政治评论家、词典编纂家威廉•赛菲尔于九月二十七日辞世，享年79岁

HAD William Safire written his own obituary, he would have laid down a few simple rules. First, use the active, not the passive voice, no matter how inert the corpse. Second, taking the bull by the hand, nix those mixed metaphors. Third, kill all sentences starting with conjunctions, or ending in “by”, “with”, or “on”. De mortuis nil nisi bonum? Preferably not; swaydo-intellectual Latinisms cut no ice with him, unless he allowed himself a silkily Catulline ave atque vale.

如果让威廉•赛菲尔写自己的讣告，他会立下几条简单的规矩。首先，要用主动而非被动语态，甭管死者的躯体如何僵硬不动。其次，类似“降牛要抓手”[注1] 这样的混杂隐喻要不得。第三，毙掉所有用连词开头或是用“by”、“with” 或“on”结尾的句子。那能不能用用拉丁文，比如“对于死者唯有赞美”(De mortuis nil nisi bonum”)？最好别；他对被人拉来伪装智识的拉丁文词句不以为然[注2]，除非他愿意用拉丁文为自己写一首像卡图卢斯的“敬礼和道别”那样珠圆玉润的 悼亡诗[注3]。
继续阅读“William Safire 威廉•赛菲尔”

The Obama presidency, one year on

奥巴马就任总统一周年

Time to get tough

刚毅此其时

Jan 14th 2010
From The Economist print edition

Barack Obama’s first year has been good, but not great—and things are going to get a lot harder

奥巴马就任第一年表现尚可，但并不出色，而且面临的挑战将棘手得多

HOW far away it seems, that bitingly cold, crystal-clear morning when almost 2m people filled the Mall from Capitol Hill to the Washington Monument to hear the new president talk of the victory of hope over fear, of unity of purpose over conflict and discord. Recalling the dark days of the war of independence, he pledged, like George Washington, that in the face of common danger Americans under his leadership would come forth to meet it. One year on, how well has he done?

无论多久远，人们都能记得那个早晨，寒气刺骨，天廓澄明。从国会山到华盛顿纪念碑之间，近二百万人聚集在国家广场，聆听新任总统演讲。他谈到以希望战胜恐惧，以万众一心克服纷争龃龉。忆及独立战争时的黑暗岁月，他与当年的华盛顿一样做出保证：在共同的危险面前，他将带领美国人民向前迎战。时已一年，他做得如何？
继续阅读“Time to get tough 刚毅此其时”

Banyan

菩提

Mad, bad and dangerous to know

疯狂，糟糕，危险重重

Jan 14th 2010

From The Economist print edition

Monetary folly is the latest affliction visited on North Korea’s people by the world’s worst government

在世界上最恶劣的政府统治下，朝鲜民众近来又被荒唐的货币政策所折磨。

JUST over a month ago North Korea announced a currency reform. All notes and coins in circulation were replaced by a new currency that lopped a couple of zeros from the old North Korean won. New currencies for old, as Ghana and others have shown, can send a strong signal from governments breaking with an inflationary past and putting sound money back into citizens’ pockets. In North Korea things are different. As Nicholas Eberstadt, a scholar of the country, puts it, the state has “a deep philosophical problem” with money in anyone’s pockets but its own.

就在一个月前，朝鲜宣布进行货币改革。所有流通中的纸币和硬币都被新货币所取代，新朝鲜圆的面值是旧币的100倍。根据加纳和其他地方的经验显示，货币的更新换代是政府发出的强烈信号，即打破过往的通货膨胀，使得公民再次拥有健全货币。而朝鲜的情况则恰恰相反。就像朝鲜问题学者Nicholas Eberstadt指出的那样，朝鲜政权不放心把钱放在任何人的口袋里，除了自己本身，这是个“深刻的哲学问题”。

继续阅读“Mad, bad and dangerous to know 疯狂，糟糕，危险重重”

Albert Camus, 50 years on
阿尔贝•加缪逝世50周年

Prince of the absurd
荒诞之王

Jan 7th 2010
From The Economist print edition

In search of the real Camus
寻觅真实的加缪

Albert Camus: Solitaire et Solidaire. By Catherine Camus. Michel Lafon; 206 pages; 39.90. Buy from Amazon.fr 《阿尔贝•加缪：隐居者》卡特琳娜•加缪。米歇尔拉封出版社；206业；定价39.9欧元

Les Derniers Jours de la Vie d’Albert Camus. By José Lenzini. Actes Sud; 144 pages; 16.50. Buy from Amazon.fr 《阿尔贝•加缪一生的最后岁月》若斯•伦兹尼；144页；定价16.5欧元

Albert Camus, Fils d’Alger. By Alain Vircondelet. Fayard; 396 pages; 19.90. Buy from Amazon.fr 《阿尔贝•加缪，阿尔及利亚之子》阿兰•威孔德莱特，费亚荷出版社；396页；定价19.9欧元

Albert Camus. By Virgil Tanase. Gallimard; 416 pages; 8.10. Buy from Amazon.fr《阿尔贝•加缪》维吉尔•塔纳斯；416页；定价8.10欧元
继续阅读“Prince of the absurd 荒诞之王”