oo High a Price

更新：2023-11-22

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[00:01.46]Lesson 47
[00:03.61]Too high a price?
[00:11.91]What does the writer describe as an 'amusing old-fashioned source of noise' ?
[00:19.69]Pollution is the price we pay for an overpopulated, overindustrialized planet.
[00:25.63]When you come to think about it, there are only four ways you can deal with rubbish:
[00:30.50]dump it, burn it, turn it into something you can use again, attempt to produce less of it.
[00:37.66]We keep trying all four methods, but sheer volume of rubbish we produce worldwide threatens to overwhelm us.
[00:46.09]Rubbish, however, is only part of the problem of polluting our planet.
[00:50.42]The need to produce ever increasing quantities of cheap food leads to a different kind of pollution.
[00:57.41]Industriallized farming metheods produce cheap meat products: beef, pork and chicken.
[01:04.44]The use of pesticides and fertilizers produces cheap grain and vegetables.
[01:10.57]The price we pay for cheap food may be already too high:
[01:14.98]Mad Cow Disease (BSE) in cattle, salmonella in chicken and eggs, and listeria in dairy products.
[01:24.62]And if you think you'll abandon meat and become a vegetarian,
[01:28.38]you have the choice of very expensive organically-grown vegetables
[01:33.01]or a steady diet of pesticides every time you think you're eating fresh salads and vegetables,
[01:39.52]or just having an innocent glass of water!
[01:43.05]However, there is an even more insidious kind of pollution
[01:47.14]that particularly affects urban area and invades our daily lives, and that is noise.
[01:54.39]Burglar alarms going off at any time of the day or night
[01:58.16]serve only to annoy passers-by and actually assist burglars to burgle.
[02:04.00]Car alarms constantly scream at us in the street and are a source of profound irritation.
[02:10.25]A recent survey of the effects of noise revealed (surprisingly?)
[02:15.26]that dogs barking incessantly in the night rated the highest form of noise pollution on a scale ranging from 1 to 7.
[02:24.20]The survey revealed a large number of sources of noise that we really dislike.
[02:30.51]Lawn mowers whining on a summer's day, late-night parties in apartment blocks,
[02:36.76]noisy neighbours, vehicles of all kinds,
[02:40.53]especially large container trucks thundering through quiet villages,
[02:45.28]planes and helicopters flying overhead, large radios carried round in public places and played at maximum volume.
[02:54.17]New technology has also made its own contribution to noise.
[02:58.64]A lot of people object to mobile phones, especially when they are used in public places like restaurant or on public transport.
[03:07.42]Loud conversations on mobile phones invade our thoughts or interrupt the pleasure of meeting friends for a quiet chat.
[03:15.54]The noise pollution survey revealed a rather surprising and possibly amusing old-fashioned source of noise.
[03:23.42]It turned out to be snoring! Men were found to be the worst offenders.
[03:29.65]It was revealed that 20% of men in their mid-thirties snore.
[03:34.60]This figure rises to a staggering 60% of men in their sixties.
[03:40.22]Against these figures, it was found that only 5% of women snore regularly,
[03:46.21]while the rest are constantly woken or kept awake by their trumpeting partners.
[03:51.79]Whatever the source of noise, one thing is certain:
[03:55.31]silence, it seems, has become a golden memory.