full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Nicholas Amendolare: What is the tragedy of the commons?

Unscramble the Blue Letters


That's a simplified example, but the tragedy of the commons plays out in the more complex systems of real life, too. The overuse of antibiotics has led to short-term gains in livestock production and in treating common ieenslsls, but it's also resulted in the evolution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which threaten the entire population. A coal-fired power plant produces cheap electricity for its customers and profits for its owners. These local benefits are hpfulel in the short term, but plouiotln from mining and burning coal is spread across the entire aortshmpee and sticks around for thousands of years. There are other ealpmxes, too. leriitntg, water seahrtogs, deforestation, traffic jams, even the pcrhuase of bottled water.

Open Cloze


That's a simplified example, but the tragedy of the commons plays out in the more complex systems of real life, too. The overuse of antibiotics has led to short-term gains in livestock production and in treating common _________, but it's also resulted in the evolution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which threaten the entire population. A coal-fired power plant produces cheap electricity for its customers and profits for its owners. These local benefits are _______ in the short term, but _________ from mining and burning coal is spread across the entire __________ and sticks around for thousands of years. There are other ________, too. _________, water _________, deforestation, traffic jams, even the ________ of bottled water.

Solution


  1. shortages
  2. examples
  3. littering
  4. purchase
  5. atmosphere
  6. illnesses
  7. helpful
  8. pollution

Original Text


That's a simplified example, but the tragedy of the commons plays out in the more complex systems of real life, too. The overuse of antibiotics has led to short-term gains in livestock production and in treating common illnesses, but it's also resulted in the evolution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which threaten the entire population. A coal-fired power plant produces cheap electricity for its customers and profits for its owners. These local benefits are helpful in the short term, but pollution from mining and burning coal is spread across the entire atmosphere and sticks around for thousands of years. There are other examples, too. Littering, water shortages, deforestation, traffic jams, even the purchase of bottled water.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
fish pond 3


Important Words


  1. antibiotics
  2. atmosphere
  3. bacteria
  4. benefits
  5. bottled
  6. burning
  7. cheap
  8. coal
  9. common
  10. commons
  11. complex
  12. customers
  13. deforestation
  14. electricity
  15. entire
  16. evolution
  17. examples
  18. gains
  19. helpful
  20. illnesses
  21. jams
  22. led
  23. life
  24. littering
  25. livestock
  26. local
  27. mining
  28. overuse
  29. owners
  30. plant
  31. plays
  32. pollution
  33. population
  34. power
  35. produces
  36. production
  37. profits
  38. purchase
  39. real
  40. resulted
  41. short
  42. shortages
  43. simplified
  44. spread
  45. sticks
  46. systems
  47. term
  48. thousands
  49. threaten
  50. traffic
  51. tragedy
  52. treating
  53. water
  54. years