字神帝國英語天地

今日主題：Finally, an Algorithm to Sort Your Beatles Albums
終於，有一種算法，可以對披頭四的專輯進行分類排序

洪欣老師推薦：托福聽力最好的課外教材：60-Second Science
康康精選托福會考的主題，堅持每天精聽一定會進步的哦!!

建議方法：
1. 先聽兩三遍 (不看文稿)
2. 再一句一句聽寫 (每句都要聽寫數遍，直到寫出85%以上的字)
3. 最後check文稿，看哪聽不出來，單字沒背過，還是發音不熟。
4. 堅持天天聽，就能每天進步哦。

MP3音檔 (按右鍵可下載聽)：喜歡的同學，幫忙推或按讚哦~~
http://online1.tingclass.net/voaspe/…/20140901sa_science.mp3

只有音檔怎夠，聽不懂地方，不用怕，康康幫你準備好中英文稿了：

中英文稿：
If you're a fan of the Beatles, you no doubt know that ["She Loves You"] came before ["All You Need Is Love"]. But what about ["Help!"] or ["Yellow Submarine"] or ["I am the Walrus"]?
如果你是披頭四的粉絲，那麼你一定知道他們的歌曲《她愛你》的發布是先於《你需要的只是愛》的。但是你對《救命》、《黃色潛水艇》或者《我是海象》又瞭解多少呢?

You may not know which came first, but researchers from Lawrence Technological University in Michigan created an algorithm that does. By analyzing the evolving structure of the Beatles' music, the computer program was able to correctly place the Fab Four's albums in chronological order. The work is in the journal Pattern Recognition Letters. [Joe George, Lior Shamir: Computer analysis of similarities between albums in popular music]
你可能不知道哪首歌是最先創作的，但是美國密歇根勞倫斯理工大學的研究人員發明了一種算法來對其進行分類排序。該計算機程序通過分析披頭四所創作歌曲的發展結構，能夠準確的將其所創作的專輯按時間進行排序。該項研究被發表在《模式識別快報》上。

The researchers initially produced the algorithm to catalogue whale songs. [whale sound] And they figured what worked for killer whales should also work for the lads from Liverpool.
研究人員最初創造此算法是為了將鯨魚歌曲錄入目錄。當研究人員發現這方法行之有效時，他們認為該算法對披頭四的歌曲肯定也行得通。

The program converts audio data into a visual spectrogram, an image it then evaluates for texture, shape, and pattern. Based on this analysis, the algorithm could tell that ["Please Please Me"] was from the early days and ["She Came In through the Bathroom Window"] came near the end. It even correctly estimated that songs from Let It Be were recorded before those on Abbey Road, although Abbey Road was released first. You can find more 60-Second Science on chinavoa.com.
改程序可將音頻數據轉換成視覺光譜圖，然後對其紋理、形狀和模式進行評估。基於此分析結果，該算法可以分辨出《請讓我快樂》時披頭四的早期作品，而《她通 過浴室窗戶進來》是其後來之作。該算法甚至能夠辨認出歌曲《順其自然》的錄製要早於《艾比路》，儘管《艾比路》的發行要早於《順其自然》。

The algorithm also worked for the albums of Queen, U2, and ABBA. But the computer came up short on Taylor Swift, whose tunes thus far are too similar to sort. But her style could still change over time. ["Time Is on My Side," by Bonnie Raitt and Irma Thomas]
—Karen Hopkin
而且該算法也適用於皇后樂隊、U2樂隊和阿巴樂隊所創作的專輯。但是因為泰勒‧斯威夫特的曲調到目前為止都極為相似，所以此算法難將其分類排序。但是她的風格仍可能隨著時間的改變而變化。---凱倫‧霍普金