Name: スタディイングリッシュ - シリーズ2、第12話「サトウキビガエル (Study English - Series 2, Episode 12: Cane Toads)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T04:46:51.000Z
Duration: 10 min 5 s
Description: VoiceTubeの動画で発音を聞きながら英語表現を覚えよう！学べる英語：

Margot Politis. Welcome to Study English, IELTS preparation.

Today, we're going to talk about expressing attitude, and using the words so and such.

And we're going to find out about some nasty creatures called cane toads, and all the trouble

You can see these large glands he's got behind his eyes, which contain a lot of toxin. It's

got various compounds in there but basically what it does is give you a heart attack. The

toxin's actually all throughout the skin but the main concentration is in these glands.

So basically, something bites it, if it gets into its bloodstream, there's a good chance

We found a dead freshwater crocodile, which was apparently killed. Certainly a one death

adder, which is a venomous snake, quite an important Australian snake, we found one of

those freshly dead with a small toad in its mouth. And even to small children, if a child

was to put them in their mouth, the toxin is quite severe.

The flip side of that is that there are a whole lot of animals which will be out-competed

by cane toads. So they're other animals, which eat insects for instance, 'cause cane toads

are so numerous that they suck up all the insects from the biota, like big vacuum cleaners

and so they can actually cause other animals to starve.

Why are we literally sitting back and watching the cane toad invasion move further and further

up through Kakadu and through the Northern Territory?

Well there has actually been quite a lot done, in fact, over a period of perhaps 10 years

prior to this, a huge amount of effort and money has already been spent on looking at

some way and means of controlling cane toads. All that work has come to nothing, and most

What we have to do is wait on the big guns in Canberra with their genetic engineering

and biological control work. That's the only hope there is.

Cane toads are such prolific breeders, each female would produce 50 thousand eggs. There

will be millions of cane toads out there.

Unfortunately, cane toads are a big environmental problem in Australia. They're a species that

was introduced from another country. We'll use their story to talk about attitude or,

Attitude markers can indicate the attitude of someone to what they are saying or what

I just used one. I said: Unfortunately', cane toads are a big environmental problem.

The word unfortunately indicates my attitude to cane toads.

Other words that are attitude markers include:

Let's listen to a Wildlife Ranger, Greg Miles, answering a reporter's question. Listen for

some way and means of controlling cane toads.

Greg Miles says: There has actually been quite a lot done in fact.

He uses the attitude markers, actually and in fact to show that he disagrees with the

It's a polite way of expressing an opposing opinion.

Other examples of words and phrases that are used to do this include:

Cane toads look harmless, but as a matter of fact, they're dangerous.

I thought you liked cane toads? Well, I don't.

Can you hear the attitude expressed in these phrases?

You can see these large glands he's got behind his eyes, which contain a lot of toxin. The

James uses actually here to introduce details. Because the details of the toxins are surprising

in nature, and perhaps unexpected, 'actually' provides this subtlety of meaning.

Now here's Greg Miles again. He uses two other attitude markers.

We found a dead freshwater crocodile, which was apparently killed. Certainly, one death

those freshly dead with a small toad in its mouth.

He says: the crocodile was apparently killed.

He uses apparently because he got his information from someone else, and he's not certain that

it's true. Based on appearances, it looks like the crocodile was killed by the cane

Greg says: certainly one death adder was found dead.

Here, Greg is emphasising that there's no doubt that this is true, that the death adder

was killed by the toxins in the cane toad.

From the use of these attitude markers, we can tell that he's not completely sure the

crocodile was killed by a cane toad, but he's definitely sure the death adder was killed

Okay. Let's turn our attention to another way you can express subtleties of meaning

They're corelative subordinating conjunctions.

The words themselves are short and simple:

Listen to Greg Miles talking about the number of cane toads eating insects.

The flip side of that is that there's a whole lot of animals which will be out-competed

are so numerous that they suck up all the insects from the biota, like big vacuum cleaners.

Greg says: Cane toads are so numerous that they suck up all the insects from the biota.

This means that cane toads are numerous enough to suck up all the insects from the biota.

So that is called an amount construction. It expresses a meaning similar to enough,

which means an adequate number or amount.

But this construction also adds a meaning of result, using the 'that-clause'.

Let's study a sentence to see how this construction works.