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 Passage Seven (Forecasting of Statistics)

Nearly two thousand years have passed since a census decreed by Caesar Augustus become part of the greatest story ever told. Many things have changed in the intervening years. The hotel industry worries more about overbuilding than overcrowding, and if they had to meet an unexpected influx, few inns would have a manager to accommodate the weary guests. Now it is the census taker that does the traveling in the fond hope that a highly mobile population will stay long enough to get a good sampling. Methods of gathering, recording, and evaluating information have presumably been improved a great deal. And where then it was the modest purpose of Rome to obtain a simple head count as an adequate basis for levying taxes, now batteries of complicated statistical series furnished by governmental agencies and private organizations are eagerly scanned and interpreted by sages and seers to get a clue to future events. The Bible does not tell us how the Roman census takers made out, and as regards our more immediate concern, the reliability of present day economic forecasting, there are considerable differences of opinion. They were aired at the celebration of the 125th anniversary of the American Statistical Association. There was the thought that business forecasting might well be on its way from an art to a science, and some speakers talked about newfangled computers and high-falutin mathematical system in terms of excitement and endearment which we, at least in our younger years when these things mattered, would have associated more readily with the description of a fair maiden. But others pointed to the deplorable record of highly esteemed forecasts and forecasters with a batting average below that of the Mets, and the President-elect of the Association cautioned that “high powered statistical methods are usually in order where the facts are crude and inadequate, the exact contrary of what crude and inadequate statisticians assume.” We left his birthday party somewhere between hope and despair and with the conviction, not really newly acquired, that proper statistical methods applied to ascertainable facts have their merits in economic forecasting as long as neither forecaster nor public is deluded into mistaking the delineation of probabilities and trends for a prediction of certainties of mathematical exactitude.

1. Taxation in Roman days apparently was based on

[A]. wealth. [B]. mobility. [C]. population. [D]. census takers.

2. The American Statistical Association

[A]. is converting statistical study from an art to a science.

[B]. has an excellent record in business forecasting.

[C]. is neither hopeful nor pessimistic.

[D]. speaks with mathematical exactitude.

3. The message the author wishes the reader to get is

[A]. statisticians have not advanced since the days of the Roman.

[B]. statistics is not as yet a science.

[C]. statisticians love their machine.

[D].computer is hopeful.

4. The “greatest story ever told” referred to in the passage is the story of

[A]. Christmas. [B]. The Mets.

[C]. Moses. [D]. Roman Census Takers.

Vocabulary

1. census 人口調查

2. decreed 分布法令

3. influx 匯集，流入（人口或物）

4. census taker 人口調查員

5. in the intervening years 在這期間

6. sampling 取樣（調查）

7. presumable 可能的，可推測的

8. batteries 一連串，一系列

9. sage 圣人；聰明的（人-）

10. seer 先知

11. newfangled 新型的（貶義）

12. high-falutin 夸大的，夸張的

13. deplorable 悲慘的，雜亂的

14. batting average 平均成功率（原指擊球平均得分數）

15. ascertainable 可以確定的/確切的

16. delineation 描述

17. exactitude 精確

難句譯注

1. The hotel industry worries more about overbuilding than overcrowding, and if they had to meet an unexpected influx, few inns would have a manager to accommodate the weary guests.

[結構簡析] 復合句。And后為虛擬條件句。

[參考譯文] 旅館業就憂慮旅館建的太多，不愁人太多。但是如果他們不得不碰到意想不到大批旅客，沒有什么旅館會有一位經理去安排疲憊不堪的客人的食宿。

寫作方法與文章大意

文章論及“統計數字預測經濟”。采用對比論證手法，還帶點諷刺口吻，但氣勢宏偉。從兩千年前愷撒·奧古斯都下令進行的人口調查說起，講到現在的統計數字預測經濟情況。得出應當正確對待預測數字的結論。

答案祥解

1. C. 人口。答案在第六句，“那時羅馬計算人頭作為征稅的適當基礎，目的很簡單。”

A. 財富。 B. 流動性。 C. 人口調查員。

2. A. 正把統計研究從文科轉變成理科。這是從第六句開始講的一種觀點。“現在，政府機構和私人組織的一系列復雜的統計數字，由智者和先知人物殷切地瀏覽和解釋以取得預先外未來事件的線索。圣經并沒有告訴我們羅馬的人口調查員是怎么調查統計的。至于我們當前更加關心的問題：目前經濟預測的可靠性，意見分歧很大。美國統計協會125周年慶祝活動上，人們在大肆宣揚這些不同觀點。有一種說法是經濟預測可能正從文科轉向科學（理科）發展。有些人興高采烈大談新型計算機和非常高級數學系統。”作者雖然沒有明說，明眼人一看便知，藝術向科學轉變正是美國統計協會在把統計學從文科轉向理科。所以A. 對。

B. 在商業預測方面具有杰出的記錄。不對。實際上“平均成功率還低于the Mets”

C. 既沒有希望也不樂觀。文內沒有提及。只提作者他們半喜半憂離開協會。

D. 以數學的精確性來說話。見下道題解釋。協會部分人卻有此看法“數學精確性。”

3. B. 統計學（到現在為止）還不是一門科學（理科）。文章最后幾句話。“連統計協會的主席也告戒說高能統計法在實際材料原始和不允許的地方一般發揮正常。這跟低級的，不合適的統計員所假定的正好相反。我們懷著憂“希”摻半的心情離開周年慶祝宴會，懷著確實不是新近才有的信念，相信應用于確切材料上恰當的統計法在經濟預測中有它的貢獻，只要預測人員和公眾不受蒙蔽，誤呆板所述概率和趨勢當作數學精確無比的預測就行。”

A. 統計員從羅馬時代起就沒向前進步過。 C. 統計員愛計算機。這兩項文內沒有提到。 D. 計算機前程遠大。文內只講了有些人懷著興高采烈的心情大講新型計算機和非常高級數學“系統”，暗示了計算機大有希望。但不是所有人都這樣認為的。最重要的計算機的應用并不能改變這個事實：統計學不是立刻，而是文科。所以B. 對。

4. A. 基督，圣誕節，指基督的誕生。圣經中的一個故事。

B. the Mets. 圣經中率領希伯萊人出埃及的領袖，也作放債的猶太人講。 C. 摩西。 D. 羅馬人口調查員。

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