TOEFL iBT Writing for an Academic Discussion Government spending on improving the national image - revised -

Is it a good idea for governments to allocate financial resources to enhance the image of their own country in various ways on the international stage? 

 

 

☆Let’s Think

1         What exactly are governmental allocations of financial resources to enhance the national image, in other words, spending tax money on improving soft power?

(e.g. donations, financial and technological support of development of developing countries, dispatching rescue teams to disaster-stricken areas and supporting the reconstruction, renouncing war in the Constitution, exchange student programs, cultural exchange, etc.)

2         Will military spending or going to war enhance national images?

(Notes: (1) Japan invaded other Asian countries before, so its extra spending on military budget rightly raises concerns among them. (2) Right after starting the Iraq War, America’s soft power dropped, with less people around the world liking the country than before the war.)

 

 

☆Hints for Points

Agree

1.     Supports to other countries, especially their people, will increase goodwill and world peace.

2.     Trades and investment will increase. China supports development of African countries, which keep strong ties in collaborative projects with China.

3.     International students will increase, and the tourism industry will benefit from the advertisement, leading to true mutual understanding between countries.

 

Disagree

1.     “If you take care of your character, your reputation will take care of itself.” For instance, in the latter half of the last century, Japan had solid industry and was the second biggest economy in the world. Japanese brand names were well-known around the world. This organic national reputation was high enough to attract people from other countries to work and learn in Japan.

2.     Cool Japan Campaign by the Japanese government failed with a huge deficit. It started as a campaign to promote Japanese contents like anime and manga, which had already been popular around the world and needed no promotion. Then it expanded to promote other Japanese cultures like Japanese food and textiles. The marketing was done not by businessmen but by the government officials.  For reference: A Decade in “Cool Japan” – Over the Offing

(https://overtheoffing.wordpress.com/2021/06/10/a-decade-in-cool-japan/)

3.     The tax money must be returned to reduce the suffering of vulnerable people.

 

 

☆Sample Response

【Thesis】Image control is deceptive, but image is often everything. Thus, I think governmental attempt to make the national image among other countries better may make some gain. However, I tend to be skeptical about the true benefits and believe that it can lead to a fiasco in the end.

【Supporting Details】To control its image, the country manages the media and education, which is so sophisticated that people do not realize that they are brainwashed. The case in point was the Japanese Empire, which wreaked havoc of the times due to its desire to be seen a military power. We also have a recent example. While no experts can find ways to solve the problem of the crippled nuclear power plant in Fukushima, the Prime Minister Abe and his sycophants handled more than 10 million yen (then 100 thousand dollars) of bribes, saying, “It’s under control,” for the right to hold the Olympics 2020 in Japan. It created false images among the public both inside and outside of Japan that Japan was safe enough to have the huge sporting event. Abe also promoted in-bound tourism with Cool Japan Campaign. Both spending has now been proven to be futile.

【Counterargument-treatment】Some may say that efforts to improve national images has various benefits. However, such efforts are just a scam with falsely successful images. For example, although subsidizing tourism may attract tourists at first, it is not good images but good experiences and word of mouth that make tourists royal visitors. Three decades ago, people came to Japan because Japan had attractions such as Akihabara the anime town and the beautiful countryside that retain traditional landscapes and cultures. Now they come to Japan because it’s cheap. Neither boom has little to do with the government spending on tourism.

【Conclusion】Therefore, budget allocation to national image improvement won’t work for government. Striving for real advancement of our society is the only way to bring the country prosperity.  (323 words)

 

Write your draft on this topic. Give feedback to other people’s drafts, asking questions and making suggestions.

 

 

DRAFT

 

 

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

TOEFL iBT Writing for an Academic Discussion Are major discoveries more often the result of collaborative effors or individual genius? - revised -

Lesson 29   Are major discoveries more often the result of collaborative efforts or individual genius??

 

 

☆Let’s Think

1.  What is the difference between discovery and invention?

Note: While inventions are creations of something new,

discoveries are findings of something that had existed all the time.

 

2.  Name examples of major discoveries. Are they results of collaborative efforts or individual genius? Why?

 

 

☆Hints for Points

Collective efforts

1.      Two heads are better than one.

 

2.      These days, novel prizes of science are often shared by a group of scientists. Very often, major discoveries occur as a serendipity to a member of a group of researchers who are doing the same researches.

 

3.      Today’s important discoveries are products of strenuous efforts financed by those in power. Governments and big businesses support scientific projects for profits and power. Atomic energy, DNA, semi-conductors workable at room temperatures, iPS cells, Higgs boson, and gravitational waves are all crucial scientific discoveries that were made systematically with huge subsidies and through the collaboration of a large number of people in the related fields after some geniuses constructed the theories.

 

4.      No genius can discover anything without cumulative knowledge as an asset of humanity. Columbus’s discovery was based on the theory of Galileo Galilei, and Galileo’s theory was impossible without observations by unknown ancient thinkers.

 

Individual genius

1.      Historically, major breakthroughs have been attributed to individual researchers, who were often ridiculed by the neighbors who didn’t understand what they were doing.

 

2.      Chance discoveries would have been overlooked had it not been for a genius. Numerous people had seen the same phenomenon as Newton saw, but no one else discovered gravity. Only Flaming had the insight to find penicillin when he saw common molds in his laboratory. Few people still understand Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. He solely came up with the idea although helped by a mathematician in calculation.

 

 

☆Sample Response Structures

【Thesis】As long as a mind is a product of knowledge accumulated by a group of people or all humans, major discoveries are results of collaborative efforts rather than a genius in a broader sense of meaning.

【Supporting Details】First of all, thoughts are in sync with language, and the language the thinker uses has been made by the people of the individual’s ethnicity. Also, the pieces of knowledge the individual puts together to reach the “Eureka!” moment are the results of the efforts of other individuals. The finding that apes are social animals was made by a Japanese team, and the groundbreaking discovery is attributed to their Asian cultural background that, unlike the Western culture, sees humans as part of nature that share their lifestyles with other animals.

【Counterargument-treatment】Of course, it is genius that leaps to the insight that leads to the final stage of a discovery, but what makes the genius is not just the genius themselves.

【Conclusion】Thus, major discoveries are made by countless number of people. (169 words)

 

【Thesis】People intuitively regard major discoveries as products of prodigy, and I think they are right because key to breakthrough is in unconventional areas that most people other than geniuses aren’t interested in or stay away from.

【Supporting Details】Breakthroughs need unconventional ideas of extraordinary minds that see something remarkable in what ordinary people see nothing special. Historic major discoveries were made by such names as Galileo Galilei, Issac Newton, and Albert Einstein, who were then unknown and even treated as failures or touched when they were working on what was later going to be a discovery of the century. Other less extraordinary spotting like the discovery of the oil well in America was treated at first as a folly of the person who alone dug the ground.

【Counterargument-treatment & Conclusion】Putting aside the cumulative knowledge that the breakthroughs were based on, significant discoveries are made by the gifted that their contemporaries never took them seriously, and therefore a major breakthrough is achieved not by a group of people but by a solitary giant. (167 words)

 

Write your draft on this topic. Give feedback to other people’s drafts, asking questions and making suggestions.

 

 

DRAFT

 

 

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

                                                                                                                                      

TOEFL iBT Writing for an Academic Discussion Are major discoveries more often the result of collaborative effors or individual genius? - revised -

Are major discoveries more often the result of collaborative efforts or individual genius?? 

 

 

☆Let’s Think

1         What is the difference between discovery and invention?

Note: While inventions are creations of something new,

discoveries are findings of something that had existed all the time.

2         Name examples of major discoveries. Are they results of collaborative efforts or individual genius? Why?

 

 

☆Hints for Points

Collective efforts

1.     These days, novel prizes of science are shared by a group of scientists. Very often, major discoveries occur as a serendipity to a member of a group of researchers who are doing the same researches.

 

2.     Today’s important discoveries are products of strenuous efforts financed by those in power. Governments and big businesses support scientific projects for profits and power. Atomic energy, DNA, semi-conductors workable at room temperatures, iPS cells, Higgs boson, and gravitational waves are all crucial scientific discoveries that were made systematically with huge subsidies and through the collaboration of a large number of people in the related fields after some geniuses constructed the theories.

 

3.     No genius can discover anything without cumulative knowledge as an asset of humanity. Galileo’s discovery was based on the theory of Copernicus, and Copernicus’s theory was impossible without observations by unknown ancient thinkers.

 

Individual genius

1.     Historically, major breakthroughs have been attributed to individual researchers, who were often ridiculed by the neighbors who didn’t understand what they were doing.

 

2.     Chance discoveries would have been overlooked had it not been for a genius. Numerous people had seen the same phenomenon as Newton saw, but no one else discovered gravity. Only Flaming had the insight to find penicillin when he saw common molds in his laboratory. Few people still understand Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. He solely came up with the idea although helped by a mathematician in calculation.

 

 

☆Sample Response Structures

【Thesis】As long as a mind is a product of knowledge accumulated by a group of people or all humans, major discoveries are results of collaborative efforts rather than a genius in a broader sense of meaning.

【Supporting Details】First of all, thoughts are in sync with language, and the language the thinker uses has been made by the people of the individual’s ethnicity. Also, the pieces of knowledge the individual puts together to reach the “Eureka!” moment are the results of the efforts of other individuals.

【Counterargument-treatment】Of course, it is genius that leaps to the insight that leads to the final stage of a discovery, but what makes the genius is not just the genius themselves.

【Conclusion】Thus, major discoveries are made by countless number of people. (128 words)

 

【Thesis】People intuitively regard major discoveries as products of prodigy, and they are right.

【Supporting Details】Breakthroughs need unconventional ideas from extraordinary minds. Historic major discoveries are attributed to such names as Galileo Galilei, Issac Newton, and Albert Einstein, who were actually unknown and even treated as failures or touched when they were vigorously working on what was later going to be a discovery of the century.  

【Counterargument-treatment & Conclusion】Putting aside the cumulative knowledge that the breakthroughs were based on, significant discoveries are made by the gifted that their contemporaries never took them seriously, and therefore a major breakthrough is achieved not by a group of people but by a solitary giant. (106 words)

Write your draft on this topic. Give feedback to other people’s drafts, asking questions and making suggestions.

 

 

DRAFT