1.
Noise pollution
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Noise pollution or noise disturbance is the disturbing or excessive noise that may harm the activity or balance of human or animal life. The source of most outdoor noise worldwide is caused by machines and transportation systems, motor vehicles, aircraft. Outdoor noise is summarized by the environmental noise. Poor urban planning may give rise to noise pollution, since side-by-side industrial and residential buildings can result in noise pollution in the residential areas, documented problems associated with urban noise go back as far as Ancient Rome. Outdoor noise can be caused by machines, construction activities, and music performances, noise-induced hearing loss can be caused by outside or inside noise. High noise levels can contribute to cardiovascular effects in humans and an incidence of coronary artery disease. In animals, noise can increase the risk of death by altering predator or prey detection and avoidance, interfere with reproduction and navigation, Noise pollution affects both health and behavior. Unwanted sound can damage psychological health, Noise pollution can cause hypertension, high stress levels, tinnitus, hearing loss, sleep disturbances, and other harmful effects. Sound becomes unwanted when it interferes with normal activities such as sleeping, conversation. Chronic exposure to noise may cause noise-induced hearing loss, less addressed is how humans adapt to noise subjectively. Indeed, tolerance for noise is frequently independent of decibel levels, however, Murray Schafers soundscape research was groundbreaking in this regard. In his eponymous work, he makes compelling arguments about how humans relate to noise on a subjective level, other key research in this area can be seen in Fongs comparative analysis of soundscape differences between Bangkok, Thailand and Los Angeles, California, US. Acoustic overexposure can lead to temporary or permanent loss of hearing, an impact of noise on wild animal life is the reduction of usable habitat that noisy areas may cause, which in the case of endangered species may be part of the path to extinction. Noise pollution may have caused the death of species of whales that beached themselves after being exposed to the loud sound of military sonar. Noise also makes species communicate more loudly, which is called Lombard vocal response, scientists and researchers have conducted experiments that show whales song length is longer when submarine-detectors are on. If creatures do not speak loudly enough, their voice will be masked by anthropogenic sounds and these unheard voices might be warnings, finding of prey, or preparations of net-bubbling. When one species begins speaking more loudly, it will mask other species voice, marine invertebrates, such as crabs, have also been shown to be negatively affected by ship noise. Larger crabs were noted to be affected more by the sounds than smaller crabs
2.
Environment of Japan
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Environmental pollution in Japan has accompanied industrialization since the Meiji period. One of the earliest cases was the poisoning caused by drainage from the Ashio Copper Mine in Tochigi prefecture. The local farmers led by Shozo Tanaka, a member of the Lower House from Tochigi appealed to the prefecture, although the mining company paid compensatory money and the government engaged in the embankment works of the Watarase river, no fundamental solution of the problem was achieved. Japan is the leading importer of both exhaustible and renewable natural resources and one of the largest consumers of fossil fuels. Current Japanese environmental policy and regulations were the consequence of a number of disasters in 1950s and 1960s. Cadmium poisoning from industrial waste in Toyama Prefecture was discovered to be the cause of the extremely painful itai-itai disease, people in Minamata City in Kumamoto Prefecture were poisoned by methylmercury drained from the chemical factory, known as the Minamata disease. The number of casualties in Minamata is 6,500 as of November 2006, in Yokkaichi, a port in Mie Prefecture, air pollution caused by sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide emissions led to a rapid increase in the number of people suffering from asthma and bronchitis. In urban areas photochemical smog from automotive and industrial exhaust fumes also contributed to a rise in respiratory problems, in the early 1970s, chronic arsenic poisoning attributed to dust from arsenic mines occurred in Shimane and Miyazaki prefectures. In the 1970s, Consumers Union of Japan led the opposition to nuclear power, in the 1990s, Japans environmental legislation was further tightened. In 1993 the government reorganized the environment law system and legislated the Basic Environment Law, the Environment Agency was promoted to full-fledged Ministry of the Environment in 2001, to deal with the deteriorating international environmental problems. In 1984 the Environmental Agency had issued its first white paper, most believed that Japan, alone or in cooperation with other industrialized countries, had the responsibility to solve environmental problems. However, it received poorer marks for quality, as its rivers, lakes. Another report in 2002 said that the mix of used to implement environmental policy is highly effective and regulations are strict. Japan burns close to two thirds of its waste in municipal and industrial incinerators, by some estimates,70 percent of the worlds waste incinerators are located in Japan. As a result, Japan has higher levels of dioxin in its air than any other G20 nation and this has called into question the Japanese government line that the thousands of incinerators in Japan are safe. In January 2017 the Japanese environment ministry said that 70% of the Sekisei lagoon in Okinawa, Japan maintains one third of its electric production from nuclear power plants. The treatment of radioactive wastes also became a subject of discussion in Japan, new spent-nuclear-fuel reprocessing plant was constructed in Rokkasho in 2008, the site of the underground nuclear-waste repository for the HLW and LLW has not yet been decided. Some local cities announced a plan to conduct a study at the disposal site
3.
Ministry of the Environment (Japan)
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The Ministry of the Environment is a Cabinet-level ministry of the government of Japan responsible for global environmental conservation, pollution control, and nature conservation. The ministry was formed in 2001 from the sub-cabinet level Environmental Agency established in 1971, the minister is a member of the Cabinet of Japan and is chosen by the Prime Minister, usually from the Diet. In March 2006, the Minister of the Environment, Yuriko Koike, in August 2011, the Cabinet of Japan approved a plan to establish a new energy watchdog under the Environment Ministry, and the Nuclear Regulation Authority was founded on September 19,2012. This idea was proposed by then-MOE minister Yuriko Koike under Prime Minister Koizumi, following the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami in March 2011, the shut down of many nuclear power plants for safety reasons lead to energy shortages. The government then launched a Super Cool Biz campaign to encourage workers to wear outfits appropriate for the office yet cool enough to endure the summer heat, polo shirts and trainers are allowed, while jeans and sandals are also acceptable under certain circumstances. The campaign was repeated in 2012 and 2013, Environmental issues in Japan Official website
4.
Soundscape
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The soundscape is the component of the acoustic environment that can be perceived by humans. There is a history of the use of soundscape depending on discipline - ranging from urban design to wildlife ecology. An important distinction is to separate soundscape from the term acoustic environment. The acoustic environment is the combination of all the resources within a given area - natural sounds. The International Organization for Standardization standardized these definitions in 2014, the term soundscape was first described by Canadian composer and environmentalist, R. Murray Schafer. According to this there are three main elements of the soundscape, A soundscape is a sound or combination of sounds that forms or arises from an immersive environment. The study of soundscape is the subject of acoustic ecology, the disruption of these acoustic environments results in noise pollution. Pauline Oliveros, composer of post-World War II electronic art music, defined the term soundscape as All of the waveforms faithfully transmitted to our audio cortex by the ear, keynote sounds This is a musical term that identifies the key of a piece, not always audible. The key might stray from the original, but it will return, the keynote sounds may not always be heard consciously, but they outline the character of the people living there. They are created by nature, wind, water, forests, plains, birds, insects, in many urban areas, traffic has become the keynote sound. Sound signals These are foreground sounds, which are listened to consciously, examples would be warning devices, bells, whistles, horns, sirens, soundmark This is derived from the term landmark. A soundmark is a sound which is unique to an area, biophony Consisting of the prefix, bio and the suffix for sound, this term refers to all of the non-human, non-domestic biological soundscape sources of sound. Anthropophony Consisting of the prefix, anthro, this refers to all of the sound signatures generated by humans. In music, soundscape compositions are often a form of electronic music, composers who use soundscapes include real-time granular synthesis pioneer Barry Truax, Hildegard Westerkamp, and Luc Ferrari, whose Presque rien, numéro 1 is an early soundscape composition. The work landed on the ground of Titan in 2005 after traveling inside the spacecraft Huygens over seven years, irv Teibels Environments series consisted of 30-minute, uninterrupted environmental soundscapes and synthesized or processed versions of natural sound. Music soundscapes can also be generated by automated software methods, such as the experimental TAPESTREA application, a framework for design and soundscape composition. The soundscape is often the subject of mimicry in Timbre-centered music such as Tuvan throat singing, the process of Timbral Listening is used to interpret the timbre of the soundscape. This timbre is mimicked and reproduced using the voice or rich harmonic producing instruments, the soundscape consists of three major sources or components
5.
Symbol
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A symbol is a mark, sign, or word that indicates, signifies, or is understood as representing an idea, object, or relationship. Symbols allow people to go beyond what is known or seen by creating linkages between otherwise very different concepts and experiences, all communication is achieved through the use of symbols. Symbols take the form of words, sounds, gestures, ideas or visual images and are used to other ideas. For example, a red octagon may be a symbol for STOP, on a map, a blue line might represent a river. Alphabetic letters may be symbols for sounds, personal names are symbols representing individuals. A red rose may symbolize love and compassion, the variable x, in a mathematical equation, may symbolize the position of a particle in space. In cartography, a collection of symbols forms a legend for a map The word derives from the Greek symbolon meaning token or watchword. It is an amalgam of syn- together + bole a throwing, a casting, the sense evolution in Greek is from throwing things together to contrasting to comparing to token used in comparisons to determine if something is genuine. The meaning something which stands for something else was first recorded in 1590, later, expanding on what he means by this definition Campbell says, a symbol, like everything else, shows a double aspect. We must distinguish, therefore between the sense and the meaning of the symbol. The term meaning can only to the first two but these, today, are in the charge of science – which is the province as we have said, not of symbols. The ineffable, the unknowable, can be only sensed. Heinrich Zimmer gives an overview of the nature, and perennial relevance. Concepts and words are symbols, just as visions, rituals, through all of these a transcendent reality is mirrored. They are so many metaphors reflecting and implying something which, though thus variously expressed, is ineffable, though thus rendered multiform, Symbols hold the mind to truth but are not themselves the truth, hence it is delusory to borrow them. Each civilisation, every age, must bring forth its own, in the book Signs and Symbols, it is stated that A symbol. Is a visual image or sign representing an idea -- a deeper indicator of a universal truth, Symbols are a means of complex communication that often can have multiple levels of meaning. This separates symbols from signs, as signs have only one meaning, human cultures use symbols to express specific ideologies and social structures and to represent aspects of their specific culture
6.
Matsuyama, Ehime
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Matsuyama is the capital city of Ehime Prefecture on the island of Shikoku in Japan and also Shikokus largest city, with a population of 516,459 as of December 1,2014. It is located on the portion of the Dōgo Plain. The city was founded on December 15,1889, the city is known for its hot springs, among the oldest in Japan, and is home to the Dōgo Onsen Honkan, a Meiji Period wooden public bathhouse dating from 1894. A second favorite tourist spot is Matsuyama Castle, eight of the eighty-eight temples in the Shikoku Pilgrimage are in Matsuyama. Matsuyama was in medieval times part of the Iyo-Matsuyama Domain, a fiefdom of Iyo Province consisting mainly of a castle town, supporting Matsuyama Castle. There was a village at Dōgo Onsen to the east. Dōgo Onsen was already famous in the Asuka period, as Shotoku Taishi visited the spa in the year 596 and it is also mentioned in passing in The Tale of Genji. The site of the former Yuzuki Castle is nearby, famous shrines of the city include Isaniwa Jinja, built in 1667. The haiku poet Masaoka Shiki lived in Matsuyama and his house, now known as the Shiki-do, and a museum, the Shiki Memorial Museum, are popular attractions, and the centerpieces of the citys claim as a center of the international haiku movement. Other famous haiku poets associated with Matsuyama include Kurita Chodō, whose Kōshin-an was visited by Kobayashi Issa, Shikis followers, Takahama Kyoshi and Kawahigashi Hekigoto, santokas house, known as Isso-an, is also a tourist attraction and is periodically open to the public. The Matsuyama Declaration of 1999 proposed the formation of International Haiku Research Center, recipients have included Yves Bonnefoy, Cor van den Heuvel and Gary Snyder. The famed novel Botchan by Natsume Sōseki is set in Matsuyama, as a result, there are numerous sites and locales named after the main character, including Botchan Stadium, the Botchan Ressha, and Botchan dango. Matsuyama also figures in works by Shiba Ryōtarō, notably his popular novel. In anticipation of the upcoming NHK Taiga drama adaptation of Saka no ue no kumo, Matsuyama was also the setting of a 1907 novel about the Russo-Japanese War, As the Hague Ordains, by American writer Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore. Matsuyama figures in the novel because the city housed a camp for Russian prisoners during the war, a Russian cemetery commemorates this important episode in Matsuyama history. As of the most recent merger, on January 1,2005, absorbing the city of Hōjō, and town of Nakajima, the city had an population of 512,982. The total area is 428.86 km², Matsuyama is home to several universities including Ehime University and several private colleges, including Matsuyama University and Matsuyama Shinonome College. The Museum of Art, Ehime is the main art museum
7.
Sea of Okhotsk
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The northeast corner is the Shelikhov Gulf. The sea is named after Okhotsk, the first Russian settlement in the Far East, the Sea of Okhotsk covers an area of 1,583,000 square kilometres, with a mean depth of 859 metres and a maximum depth of 3,372 metres. It is connected to the Sea of Japan on either side of Sakhalin, on the west through the Sakhalin Gulf, the distribution and thickness of ice floes depends on many factors, the location, the time of year, water currents, and the sea temperatures. With the exception of Hokkaido, one of the Japanese home islands, the International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the Sea of Okhotsk as follows, On the Southwest. The Northeastern and Northern limits on the Japan Sea, some of the Sea of Okhotsks islands are quite large, including Japans second largest island, Hokkaido, as well as Russias largest island, Sakhalin. Practically all of the islands are either in coastal waters or belong to the various islands making up the Kuril Islands chain. These fall either under undisputed Japanese or Russian ownership or disputed ownership between Japan and Russia, iony Island is the only island located in open waters and belongs to the Khabarovsk Krai of the Russian Federation. The majority of the islands are uninhabited making them ideal breeding grounds for seals, sea lions, seabirds. Large colonies, with over an individuals, of crested auklets use the Sea of Okhotsk as a nesting site. The Okhotsk culture is a coastal fishing and hunter-gatherer culture of the lands surrounding the Sea of Okhotsk. Some believe that Mishihase was living in the area, Russian explorers Ivan Moskvitin and Vassili Poyarkov were the first Europeans to visit the Sea of Okhotsk in the 1640s. The first and foremost Russian settlement on the shore was the port of Okhotsk, the Russian-American Company all but monopolized the commercial navigation of the sea in the first half of the 19th century. The Second Kamchatka Expedition under Vitus Bering systematically mapped the entire coast of the sea, jean-François de La Pérouse and William Robert Broughton were the first non-Russian European navigators known to have passed through these waters other than Maarten Gerritsz Vries. Ivan Krusenstern explored the eastern coast of Sakhalin in 1805, mamiya Rinzō and Gennady Nevelskoy determined that the Sakhalin was indeed an island separated from the mainland by a narrow strait. The first detailed summary of the hydrology of the Okhotsk sea was prepared and published by Stepan Makarov in 1894, American and French whaleships, as well as a few German, Russian, and British, hunted whales in the Sea of Okhotsk between 1845 and 1907. They primarily caught right whales and bowhead whales, the former in the half of the sea. Bowheads were first caught in 1847, and dominated the catch between 1849 and the late 1860s, beginning in the mid-1850s they caught the occasional gray whale, and made attempts to catch humpback, fin, blue and killer whales as well but were rarely successful. Beluga whales were also taken opportunistically, from 1854 to 1856, an average of nearly 150 vessels cruised in the sea each year
8.
Hokkaido
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Hokkaido, formerly known as Ezo, Yezo, Yeso, or Yesso, is the second largest island of Japan, and the largest and northernmost prefecture. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaido from Honshu, the two islands are connected by the underwater railway Seikan Tunnel. The largest city on Hokkaido is its capital, Sapporo, which is also its only ordinance-designated city, about 43 km north of Hokkaido lies Sakhalin island, Russia, whereas to its east and north-east are the disputed Kuril Islands. Hokkaido was settled by the Ainu, Nivkh, and Orok before recorded history, the Nihon Shoki, finished in 720 AD, is often said to be the first mention of Hokkaido in recorded history. According to the text, Abe no Hirafu led a navy and army to northern areas from 658 to 660 and came into contact with the Mishihase. One of the places Hirafu went to was called Watarishima, which is believed to be present-day Hokkaido. During the Nara and Heian periods, people in Hokkaido conducted trade with Dewa Province, from the Middle Ages, the people in Hokkaido began to be called Ezo. Hokkaido, formerly known as Ezochi Ezochi or Ezogashima, the Ezo mainly relied upon hunting and fishing and obtained rice and iron through trade with the Japanese. During the Muromachi period, the Japanese created a settlement at the south of the Oshima Peninsula, as more people moved to the settlement to avoid battles, disputes arose between the Japanese and the Ainu. The disputes eventually developed into a war, takeda Nobuhiro killed the Ainu leader, Koshamain, and defeated the opposition in 1457. Nobuhiros descendants became the rulers of the Matsumae-han, which was granted trading rights with the Ainu in the Azuchi-Momoyama. The Matsumae familys economy relied upon trade with the Ainu and they held authority over the south of Ezochi until the end of the Edo period in 1868. The Matsumae clan rule over the Ainu must be understood in the context of the expansion of the Japanese feudal state, medieval military leaders in northern Honshū maintained only tenuous political and cultural ties to the imperial court and its proxies, the Kamakura Shogunate and Ashikaga Shogunate. Feudal strongmen sometimes located themselves within medieval institutional order, taking shogunal titles, in fact many of the feudal strongmen were descended from Emishi military leaders who had been assimilated into Japanese society. The Matsumae clan were of Yamato descent like other ethnic Japanese people, the Emishi were conquered and integrated into the Japanese state dating back as far as the 8th century, and as result began to lose their distinctive culture and ethnicity as they became minorities. By the time the Matsumae clan ruled over the Ainu most of the Emishi were ethnically mixed, there were numerous revolts by the Ainu against feudal rule. The last large-scale resistance was Shakushains Revolt in 1669–1672, in 1789, a smaller movement, the Menashi-Kunashir Rebellion, was also crushed. After that rebellion the terms Japanese and Ainu referred to clearly distinguished groups, in 1799–1821 and 1855–1858 the Edo Shogunate took direct control over Hokkaido in response to a perceived threat from Russia
9.
Sapporo Clock Tower
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Sapporo Clock Tower is a wooden structure and well-known local tourist attraction, located at North 1 West 2, Chūō-ku, Sapporo, the largest city on the island of Hokkaidō, northern Japan. The building is of American design and is one of the few surviving Western-style buildings in Sapporo and it is known by many as the symbol of the city and is a main feature of almost all domestic and international tours of Sapporo. The clock after which it is named continues to run and keep time, the tower was built in 1878, and is all that remains of the drill hall of the former Sapporo Agricultural College. The building was one of the earliest to be built in this city, the city itself was chosen as the administrative centre of Hokkaidō in 1868, which is the date currently recognised as the official birth of the city. Currently, this is the oldest building standing in Sapporo, the clock was installed in July 1881 by E. Howard & Co. of Boston, Massachusetts, USA. In 1970, Sapporo Clock Tower was designated an Important Cultural Property, the clock tower now houses a museum introducing the history of the Agricultural College and the development of Sapporo. It is open to year round, but is closed on Sundays. Admission is 200 yen for adults and free for children, with discounts for groups, viewing and photographing the building is very popular among visitors to Sapporo, and visiting it forms a part of many tours of the city. It is possible for members of the public to rent the hall upstairs for private functions
10.
Sapporo
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Sapporo is the fourth largest city in Japan by population, and the largest city on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido. Located in Ishikari Subprefecture, it is the capital of Hokkaido Prefecture, the city is also home to Sapporo Brewery and the white chocolate biscuits called shiroi koibito. Before its establishment, the occupied by Sapporo was home to a number of indigenous Ainu settlements. In 1866, at the end of the Edo period, construction began on a canal through the area, the settlements name was taken from the Ainu language sat poro pet, and can be translated as dry, great river. As a result, it was determined that a new capital on the Ishikari Plain should be established, the plain itself provided an unusually large expanse of flat, well drained land which is relatively uncommon in the otherwise mountainous geography of Hokkaido. During 1870–1871, Kuroda Kiyotaka, vice-chairman of the Hokkaido Development Commission, as a result, Horace Capron, Secretary of Agriculture under President Ulysses S. Grant, became an oyatoi gaikokujin and was appointed as a special advisor to the commission. Construction began around Odori Park, which remains as a green ribbon of recreational land bisecting the central area of the city. The city closely followed a plan with streets at right-angles to form city blocks. Edwin Dun came to Sapporo to establish sheep and cattle ranches in 1876 and he also demonstrated pig raising and the making of butter, cheese, ham and sausage. He once went back to the US in 1883 but returned to Japan as a secretary of government. William S. Clark, who was the president of the Massachusetts Agricultural College and he taught academic subjects in science and lectured on the Bible as an ethics course, introducing Christian principles to the first entering class of the College. In 1880, the area of Sapporo was renamed as Sapporo-ku. That year the Hōheikan, a hotel and reception facility for visiting officials and it was later moved to Nakajima Park where it remains today. Two years later, with the abolition of the Kaitaku-shi, Hokkaidō was divided into three prefectures, Hakodate, Sapporo, and Nemuro, the name of the urban district in Sapporo remained Sapporo-ku, while the rest of the area in Sapporo-ku was changed to Sapporo-gun. The office building of Sapporo-ku was also located in the urban district, Sapporo, Hakodate, and Nemuro Prefectures were abolished in 1886, and Hokkaidō government office building, an American-neo-baroque-style structure with red bricks, constructed in 1888. The last squad of the Tondenhei, the soldiers pioneering Hokkaido, settled in the place where the area of Tonden in Kita-ku, Sapporo-ku administered surrounding Sapporo-gun until 1899, when the new district system was announced. After that year, Sapporo-ku was away from the control of Sapporo-gun, the ku enforced from 1899 was an autonomy which was a little bigger than towns, and smaller than cities. In Hokkaido at that time, Hakodate-ku and Otaru-ku also existed, in 1907, the Tohoku Imperial University was established in Sendai Miyagi Prefecture, and Sapporo Agricultural College was controlled by the University
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