BBC 6 Minute English 是 BBC Learning English 出品的英语学习节目。每周一期，每期约6分钟，两位主播围绕某个话题展开对话，非常适合英音爱好者模仿学习。来源：BBC，仅用于语言学习分享


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I'm Sam, and I'm Neil.

It's raining again. Sam. I've had enough.

It's been drizzling. That's raining lightly all week.

I know what you mean. Now, living in a white country like Britain, I sometimes wish I could push a magic basin and stop it raining.

And ironically, people living in hot, dry countries need rain, but don't get it.

If only we could control the weather?

Well, it's funny you should say that, neil, because you're not the 1st person to have that idea.

In this program, we'll be hearing about cloud seeding and geoengineering, two controversial methods scientists are using to manipulate or change the weather.

And as usual, we'll be learning some new vocabulary as well.

Anything that stops it drizzling. Sounds good to me, sam, I hate to disappoint you, neal, but these ideas involve making more, not less rain.

Will learn the detail soon. But 1st, I have a question for you about the wettest place in the world, village, which gets nearly 12 m of rain a year.

But where is it? Is the wetest village on Earth found in a Ireland, b New Zealand or c India?

Well, it rains a lot in Ireland, doesn't it?

So I'll say that's where the wetest place on Earth is.

OK? Now, we'll find out if that's the correct answer later in the program.

The 1st type of weather manipulation will hear about is a way of getting snow and rain out of clouds known as cloud seating.

Airplanes fly through the clouds and spray chemicals to make water particles freeze and stick together as snowflakes.

These then fall as snow, which builds up during winter before melting in spring to help water crops listen as charming cosier.

Presenter BBC World Service Program The Inquiry, speaks with Professor Catier Friedriick, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Colorado.

The 1st cloud seeding experiments took place in the 1940s.

In the year since scientists have often accused of meddling with nature, people are thinking, yeah, you putting some substances in the atmosphere that should not be there.

Usually, I respond and say, every time you get into your car, every time you get on an airplane, you put substances in the air that don't belong.

So you are also playing golf, because everyone needs water.

Cloud seeding is becoming more and more popular, with scientists from over 50 countries using the method to extract rain from clouds.

But some critics accused these scientists of meddling with nature, trying to change something which it's not their responsibility to change.

In other words, they're accused of playing God, acting as if they have unlimited power and can do whatever they want.

Unlike cloud seating, the next type of weather modification has never been tested and is still just a theory.

Solar geoengineering aims to reduce global warming by reflecting sunlight away from the Earth back into space.

This involves putting tiny particles called aerosols into the stratosphere, the band of sky 20 km above the surface of the Earth, about twice as high as airplanes fly.

Although it's never been tested. The method is controversial, as shaming Cozia discussed with Harvard University professor of engineering David Keith for BBC World Services.

The inquiry How controversial is this area?

There's lots of controversy around solar fuel ensuring, and for good reason.

People are, I think, sensibly scared that this could provide an excuse that allows countries or companies to avoid doing the work that has to be done to cut emissions.

But in fact, controversy is really waxed and waned over time.

So in the early work on climate change, in the 1960s and seventies and early eighties, these ideas were just part of the way we talked about what might happen about climate change.

And then, as climate change became more politically central, say in the's, and there was really a taboo, david Keith believes that geo engineering could provide an excuse for inaction on climate change, reason for countries to explain why they did not take action.

He says. Controversy over the method has waxed and waned an idiom connected with the cycle of the moon, which describes something that increases then decreases over time.

In the 1960s, e.g. geoengineering was uncontroversial.

In the 1990s, it had become taboo, a subject that is avoided for social or religious reasons.

While these ideas to change the weather have potential benefits, other suggestions, e.g. to position a giant floating mirror between the Earth and the Sun, are highly controversial, although personally, I think the idea of a giant floating umbrella above Britain would be good.

Well, just think there are even rainier places to live near As I asked in my question earlier in which country is the world's rainiest village?

I guess it was in Ireland, which was the wrong answer, I'm afraid.

In fact, morson Ram, the world's westest village, is in the Cassi Hills of northeastern India, with around 12 m of rain a year.

I guess it's not somewhere you'll be visiting now.

OK, three caps of vocabulary we've learned, starting with drizzling, which means raining lightly.

If you're meddling, you're trying to change something which is not your responsibility, or without being asked to someone who is plain God is acting as if they control everything and can do whatever they want.

An excuse is a reason you give to to explain why you did something wrong.

Is something waxed and waned. It grew stronger than weaker over time.

And finally, a taboo is a subject that's avoided for social or religious reasons.

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