Month: February 2009

TOPIC: ISSUE70 – “In any profession-business, politics, education, government-those in power should step down after five years. The surest path to success for any enterprise is revitalization through new leadership.”
The speaker asserts that those in power in enterprise should step down after five years. It might be tempting to agree with the idea on the basis that permanent leadership would lead to company’s depression. However, the speaker overlooks certain negative effects brought about when those with experience are relegated.
The rules, making sure that the power should be under supervision, must be created so as to keep the whole enterprise from corruption. Without supervision, it is easy to make individual’s power out of control, always following with lack of justice. Consider Ancient China, where Emperor was managing the country with unshakable authority. In those years, what most ministers valued was not how to assist their Emperor in governing the country rightfully, but was how to build a strong relationship with the Emperor and the same time push others out. On the contrary, those ministers, who were really concerned about the state, were frequently enraging the Emperor for their straightforward words. Finally, the people around Emperor were inept while the capable were pushed out. In history, these countries were easy to corrupted and conquered by others. What was the main reason to this phenomenon? It was because of the absence of someone whose duty was to inspect the power from the Emperor and had capability to impeach the power if necessary.
But, when this system has been established, it is no need to set a rule that leader should be taken by others after period. Because a leader’s experience and influence sometimes is invaluable for the enterprise. We all are familiar with Apple Inc., which may be the most successful company in consumer electronic market for its aesthetic design. When we are talking about Apple, we would never forget to mention its CEO-Steve Jobs. Jobs played an important role in Apple’s growth. The company’s best-well known products, such as Macintosh, IPod and IPhone, which all are brought to us under Jobs’ impulsion. His aggressive management makes him the idol of Apple, for Apple’s price was decreasing when some newspaper reported his healthy problem. It is not sensible to resign such a genius, because Apple will keep vitalized as long as the company is under his leadership.
Additionally, the suggestion that leader should be relegated in after a period would lead to many other negative effects. When a CEO is resigned, it is not easy to look for another people to take place in a short time. And nobody can make sure the newer would do better than the older. What’s more, if the manager is frequently changed in a company, it is difficult to make company generate its unique culture, which is the symbol of a success company. For example, when we are talking about Microsoft, Bill Gates and his aggression would come to our mind.
In sum, a system of supervision is necessary in a company or country, because it is able to forestall the corruption from leadership. Nevertheless, whether a leader should be relegated is due to his capability and justice but not time. After all, the leader with rich experience is essential to enterprise’s vitalization.

这两天写了两篇Issue的作业，感觉不是很好，主要是速度提不上去，往往是需要70~80分钟才能完成。
今天上课听老师说，最主要的原因是因为写一句想一句所以会比较慢，正确的应该是在写每一段开头的时候把整段的结构先想好，写内容的时候就会比较自然地从一句过渡到另一句。
但是新的问题又出来了，现在速度慢的另外一个原因是因为写每一句话的时候都得花时间构思句子的结构，和用词是否恰当，而往往是想了半天实在想不出更好的替代只好接受初始方案，既浪费了时间又没有什么显著的正面效应。简单地说就是用英文遣词造句的能力还太弱。关于句子的结构，今明两天把填空里学过的一些句子好好研习一下，然后在改作文的时候看能不能改写一下文章里面的句子。用词的话就只好在改文章的时候查查同义词替换的同时，看能否多记住几个。
自己从小写作能力不强的弱点又浮现了上来。
话说GRE.AW看重的是考生的逻辑思维能力。从小学的数学到中学的理科到大学的计算机，在这方面怎样都不会查到哪里去吧。虽然kizenliang同学说：Issue难的原因是因为我们用英语写不习惯，用中文写的话就是小儿科。
我发现：我用中文有时也很难用文字表达清楚自己的观点，还是小时候写作基本功没打好，唉~~~
还有两个星期加一天的时间就机考了，保持良好的心态是很重要的:D
ps:每周一定要看一部电影，因为适当放松可以保证平常学习的张力，因为明晚要开会，所以只好选在今晚了。

TOPIC: ISSUE170 – “The surest indicator of a great nation is not the achievements of its rulers, artists, or scientists, but the general welfare of all its people.”
WORDS: 586 TIME: 00:73:34 DATE: 2009/2/13 17:51:46
The topic’s opinion is some partial about the definition of a “great” nation, which should be considered about more than welfare of its people.
Firstly, the people’s welfare should be a basic requirement for a country. For example, in Afghan, people are living in danger all the day. They are afraid of walking in the street at night, for they may be attacked by local insurgents. What they care most is how to safely move to tomorrow. It is also the most important part which government is caring about. You can read reports that leaders of the country are trying to sweep out the insurgents although they are usually failed. When a country’s people feel difficult to live here, government would not have extra energy to develop, such as science. At the same time, the country would not be recognized great in any way.
But a country which could make sure of its people’s welfare is still far from great. Sweden, which is ranked first Democracy Index by Economist, could not be better place for living, for its low unemployment and perfect sanitary system. Doors are left open in the night for nobody would break in. Sweden has met the goal, making sure the general welfare of its people. However, you may never hear that Sweden is a great country.
What makes Sweden not great? To answer this question, we would like to get the meaning of great and the definition of great nation. Let’s first get a easier question: what is a great human-being like? There must be some names initially come to your mind, such as Newton, Aristotle… And what is the common character of these great men? It is easy to get that they all make a huge difference all over the world, and rewrote the human history significantly. So we can get a conclusion a great country would make influence for the whole world rather than its people. Now the reason why Sweden is not called great is apparent. Sweden, which is a country filled with happiness of its people, makes little influence on the other parts of the world.
Not only welfare of citizens, the achievements of science and art also indicate whether a country is great. I want to explain my idea with another country: Ancient Greece. Ancient Greece, which lasted from 1100BC to 26BC, has been widely considered as the foundation of Western civilization, making powerful influence on science, philosophy, art etc. In that time, people living in that country didn’t need to care about food and other basic requirement. People are happy to devote to education and science, which leads to numbers of great men, such as Aristotle, Euclid, most of who made such achievements today we still get profit from them. In my opinion, only the country like Ancient Greece is deserved when we are talking about great country.
Actually it is divergent when talking about great country. Because most people couldn’t be objective on this topic, the fault of a country would be omitted. What’s more, facts sometime may be covered so as to make the country’s figure would be brighter in citizens. Like U.S government, called themselves as “world police”, that always invade other countries under the name of justice, it would not be recognized as great anytime by the people in Afghan or Iran.
Although it is some difficult to give a list saying which country is great. A great country would not be only good to its people, but to the whole world.