Return to An Inconvenient Truth

I – Chapter 02

0100 [00:06:33] "I had a grade school teacher who taught geography by pulling a map of the world down in front of the blackboard. I had a classmate in the sixth grade who raised his hand and he pointed to the outline of the east coast of South America and he pointed to the the west coast of Africa and he asked, "Did the ever fit together?" And the teacher said, "Of course not. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard." " (Al Gore)

geography: 地理
grade school: 小学校
map of the world: 世界地図
ridiculous: 馬鹿げた

0200 [00:07:00] "That student went on to become a drug addict and ne'er-do-well. The teacher went on to become science adviser in the current administration. " (Al Gore)

administration: 政権
current: 現在の
go on to: 次に〜する
ne'er-do-well: ろくでなし

0300 [00:07:17] "But you know the teacher was actually reflecting the conclusion of the scientific establishment of that time. Continents are so big, obviously they don't move. But actually as we now know they did move. Uh...they moved apart from one another. But one time they did, in fact, fit together. " (Al Gore)

conclusion: 結論
continent: 大陸
establishment: (理論、学説などの)確定、確立 → 確立した理論
obviously: 明らかに、一目瞭然で、言うまでもなく
of that time: その当時の
reflect: 反映する、表す

0400 [00:07:38] "But that assumption was a problem. It reflected the well-known wisdom that what gets us into trouble is not what we don't know, it's what we know for sure that just ain't so. " (Al Gore)

assumption: 思い込み、仮定、前提
for sure: 確実に、確かに
wisdom: 金言、格言

0500 [00:07:50] "This is actually an important point, believe it or not, because there is another such assumption that a lot of people have in their minds right now about global warming that just ain't so. The assumption is something like this. The Earth is so big, we can't possibly have any lasting harmful impact on the Earth's environment. And maybe that was true at one time, but it's not anymore. " (Al Gore)

believe it or not: 信じられないような話だが、まさかと思うかもしれないが
environment: 環境
global warming: 地球温暖化
harmful: 有害な
have an important on: 〜に影響を及ぼす
lasting: 長続きする、持続的な

0600 [00:08:13] "And one of the reasons it's not true anymore is that the most vulnerable part of the Earth's ecological system is the atmosphere. Vulnerable because it's so thin. " (Al Gore)

atmosphere: 大気、大気圏
ecological: 生態学的な、環境保護の
ecological system: 生態系
vulnerable: 弱い、傷つきやすい、脆弱な

0700 [00:08:27] "My friend, the late Carl Sagan used to say, "If you had a big globe with a coat of varnish on it, the thickness of that varnish relative to that globe is pretty much the same as the thickness of the Earth's atmosphere compared to the Earth itself." And it's thin enough that we are capable of changing its composition. " (Al Gore)

Carl Sagan: アメリカの天文学者で、1980年のテレビドキュメンタリー「コスモス」で有名になりました。驚くことに、その「コスモス」の中で既に地球温暖化の問題が触れられています。興味のある方はこちらもどうぞ。
coat: 皮膜
composition: 構成、組成、配合
globe: 「地球」ですが、ここでは「地球儀」の意味です
late: 今は亡き、故人の
varnish: ニス
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