文/伯納德·馬爾 譯/曹莉

By Bernard Marr

Ten years ago, if you mentioned the term “artificial intelligence” in a boardroom there’s a good chance you would have been laughed at. For most people it would bring to mind sentient,sci-fimachines such as 2001: A Space Odyssey’s HAL1電影《2001：太空漫游》中掌控“發(fā)現(xiàn)者”號(hào)的人工智能，有超強(qiáng)的計(jì)算能力，能模擬出大部分人腦的活動(dòng)。or Star Trek’s Data2《星際迷航》系列中的一個(gè)生化人，可不斷進(jìn)化。.

[2] Today it is one of the hottest buzzwords in business and industry. AI technology is a crucial lynchpin3lynchpin關(guān)鍵；關(guān)鍵性人物或事物。of much of the digital transformation taking place today as organizations position themselves to capitalize on the ever-growing amount of data being generated and collected.

[3] So how has this change come about? Well partly it is due to the Big Data revolution itself. The glut of data has led to intensified research into ways it can be processed, analyzed and acted upon. Machines being far better suited than humans to this work, the focus was on training machines to do this in as“smart” a way as is possible.

十年前，如果有人在董事會(huì)議上提到“人工智能”一詞，很有可能會(huì)受到大家的嘲笑。當(dāng)時(shí)，對(duì)于大部分人來(lái)說(shuō) ，人工智能就是像電影《2001：太空漫游》中的哈爾和《星際迷航》中的百科少校一樣有感知力的科幻機(jī)器。

[2]如今，人工智能卻成了商界和產(chǎn)業(yè)界最熱門(mén)的字眼之一。各組織都在利用源源不斷地生成和收集的數(shù)據(jù)，人工智能技術(shù)因此在數(shù)字化轉(zhuǎn)型中至關(guān)重要。

[3]那么，這種轉(zhuǎn)變是如何發(fā)生的？部分原因在于大數(shù)據(jù)革命。大量數(shù)據(jù)催生了對(duì)數(shù)據(jù)處理、分析以及作用方式的深化研究，而機(jī)器遠(yuǎn)比人類(lèi)更能勝任這項(xiàng)研究工作，重點(diǎn)是如何讓機(jī)器盡可能“智能”地工作。

[4]隨著學(xué)術(shù)界、產(chǎn)業(yè)界以及開(kāi)源社區(qū)（介于學(xué)術(shù)界及產(chǎn)業(yè)界之間）對(duì)該領(lǐng)域研究興趣的增長(zhǎng)，人工智能不斷取得突破和進(jìn)展。而這些突破和進(jìn)展將會(huì)帶來(lái)巨大的變化。從醫(yī)療保健到無(wú)人駕駛汽車(chē)，再到預(yù)測(cè)法律案件判決結(jié)果，如今再無(wú)人嘲笑人工智能！

[4] This increased interest in research in the field—in academia, industry and among the open source community4又稱(chēng)開(kāi)放源代碼社區(qū)，根據(jù)相應(yīng)的開(kāi)源軟件許可證協(xié)議公布軟件源代碼的網(wǎng)絡(luò)平臺(tái)，是編程者自由溝通交流的空間。which sits in the middle—has led to breakthroughs and advances that are showing their potential to generate tremendous change. From healthcare to self-driving cars5self-driving car無(wú)人駕駛汽車(chē)。to predicting the outcome of legal cases,no one is laughing now!

What is Artificial Intelligence?

[5] The concept of what defines AI has changed over time, but at the core there has always been the idea of building machines which are capable of thinking like humans.

[6] After all, human beings have proven uniquely capable of interpreting the world around us and using the information we pick up to effect change.If we want to build machines to help us do this more efficiently, then it makes sense to use ourselves as a blueprint.

[7] AI, then, can be thought of as simulating the capacity for abstract,creative, deductive thought—and particularly the ability to learn which this gives rise to—using the digital,binary logic of computers.

[8] Research and development work in AI is split between two branches.One is labelled “applied AI” which uses these principles of simulating human thought to carry out one specific task.The other is known as “generalized AI”—which seeks to develop machine intelligences that can turn their hands to any task, much like a person.

人工智能是什么？

[5]關(guān)于人工智能的定義，不同時(shí)間有不同的理解，但其核心概念始終是關(guān)于如何建造能像人一樣思考的機(jī)器的。

[6]畢竟，人類(lèi)已證明是唯一可解釋周?chē)澜?、可利用所掌握的信息改變世界的生物。如果我們想建造機(jī)器幫助我們更有效地工作，那么以我們自己為藍(lán)圖來(lái)進(jìn)行建造無(wú)疑是合理的。

[7]因此，人工智能可以被認(rèn)為是利用計(jì)算機(jī)二進(jìn)制數(shù)字邏輯模擬人類(lèi)抽象、創(chuàng)造及推理思維的能力——特別是由此產(chǎn)生的學(xué)習(xí)能力。

[8]人工智能的研究和發(fā)展有兩個(gè)分支：一為被冠以“應(yīng)用型人工智能”的分支，即通過(guò)應(yīng)用模擬人類(lèi)思維的原理實(shí)施某項(xiàng)特定的任務(wù)；二則為“通用型人工智能”，旨在開(kāi)發(fā)能夠像人一樣從事任何任務(wù)的機(jī)器智能。

[9]有關(guān)應(yīng)用型、專(zhuān)業(yè)化的人工智能的研究正在給許多研究領(lǐng)域帶來(lái)突破：在量子物理領(lǐng)域，人工智能可模仿和預(yù)測(cè)由數(shù)十億亞原子粒子組成的各系統(tǒng)的表現(xiàn)；在醫(yī)學(xué)領(lǐng)域，人工智能可基于基因組數(shù)據(jù)診斷病人。

[10]在產(chǎn)業(yè)界，人工智能可用在金融領(lǐng)域中，可提供的服務(wù)包括偵測(cè)欺詐行為、預(yù)測(cè)客戶(hù)需求以提高服務(wù)質(zhì)量等。在制造業(yè)中，人工智能可用來(lái)管理勞動(dòng)力及生產(chǎn)流程，還可提前提示故障，從而進(jìn)行預(yù)測(cè)性維護(hù)。

[11]在消費(fèi)領(lǐng)域，我們?nèi)粘Ｉ钪惺褂玫募夹g(shù)越來(lái)越多是由人工智能所支持的：從智能手機(jī)助手例如蘋(píng)果手機(jī)的語(yǔ)音助手Siri、谷歌的谷歌助手，到自動(dòng)駕駛汽車(chē)和無(wú)人駕駛汽車(chē)——這兩種汽車(chē)預(yù)計(jì)在我們有生之年會(huì)在數(shù)量上超過(guò)人工駕駛汽車(chē)。

[9] Research into applied, specialized AI is already providing breakthroughs in fields of study from quantum physics where it is used to model and predict the behavior of systems comprised of billions of subatomic particles, to medicine where it being used to diagnose patients based on genomic data.

[10] In industry, it is employed in the financial world for uses ranging from fraud detection to improving customer service by predicting what services customers will need.In manufacturing it is used to manage workforces and production processes as well as for predicting faults before they occur, therefore enabling predictive maintenance.

[11] In the consumer world more and more of the technology we are adopting into our everyday lives is becoming powered by AI—from smartphone assistants like Apple’s Siri and Google’s Google Assistant, to self-driving and autonomous cars6autonomous car自動(dòng)駕駛汽車(chē)。which many are predicting will outnumber manually driven cars within our lifetimes.

[12] Generalized AI is a bit futher off—to carry out a complete simulation of the human brain would require both a more complete understanding of the organ than we currently have, and more computing power than is commonly available to researchers. But that may not be the case for long, given the speed with which computer technology is evolving. A new generation of computer chip technology known as neuromorphic processors are being designed to more efficiently run brain-simulator code.And systems such as IBM’s Watson cognitive computing platform use highlevel simulations of human neurological processes to carry out an ever-growing range of tasks without being specifically taught how to do them.

[12]通用型人工智能則要更復(fù)雜一些——完全模擬人腦需要我們比現(xiàn)在更為徹底地了解人腦，需要研究者掌握更強(qiáng)的計(jì)算能力。 但考慮到計(jì)算機(jī)技術(shù)發(fā)展的速度，不久這些都將不成其為問(wèn)題。新一代的計(jì)算機(jī)芯片技術(shù)神經(jīng)形態(tài)處理器正在設(shè)計(jì)當(dāng)中，可更高效地運(yùn)行人腦模擬器代碼。一些類(lèi)似IBM沃森認(rèn)知計(jì)算平臺(tái)的系統(tǒng)可高度模擬人類(lèi)神經(jīng)過(guò)程，無(wú)須人類(lèi)具體指揮就可執(zhí)行海量任務(wù)。

人工智能有哪些主要進(jìn)展？

[13]人工智能在致力于模仿人腦思維過(guò)程中不斷取得進(jìn)步。我們所熟知的“機(jī)器學(xué)習(xí)”領(lǐng)域近幾年已取得豐碩的研究成果。事實(shí)上，該領(lǐng)域?qū)τ诋?dāng)代人工智能來(lái)說(shuō)不可或缺，因此，“人工智能”與“機(jī)器學(xué)習(xí)”這兩個(gè)術(shù)語(yǔ)有時(shí)可以互換使用。

[14]但這種表達(dá)是不精確的，最恰當(dāng)?shù)恼f(shuō)法應(yīng)該是：機(jī)器學(xué)習(xí)代表著更廣范圍內(nèi)人工智能現(xiàn)階段的最高水準(zhǔn)。機(jī)器學(xué)習(xí)的根本并非一步一步來(lái)教授機(jī)器知識(shí)，而是通過(guò)編寫(xiě)程序讓機(jī)器能夠像人一樣思考，通過(guò)觀察、分類(lèi)、從錯(cuò)誤中吸取教訓(xùn)來(lái)學(xué)習(xí)如何工作，恰如我們?nèi)祟?lèi)一樣。

What are the key developments in AI?

[13] All of these advances have been made possible due to the focus on imitating human thought processes.The field of research which has been most fruitful in recent years is what has become known as “machine learning”.In fact, it’s become so integral to contemporary AI that the terms “artificial intelligence” and “machine learning” are sometimes used interchangeably.

[14] However, this is an imprecise use of language, and the best way to think of it is that machine learning represents the current state-of-the-art in the wider field of AI. The foundation of machine learning is that rather than have to be taught to do everything step by step,machines, if they can be programmed to think like us, can learn to work by observing, classifying and learning from its mistakes, just like we do.

[15] The application of neuroscience to IT system architecture7architecture構(gòu)建；架構(gòu)。has led to the development of artificial neural networks—and although work in this field has evolved over the last half century it is only recently that computers with adequate power have been available to make the task a dayto-day reality for anyone except those with access to the most expensive,specialized tools.

[16] Perhaps the single biggest enabling factor has been the explosion of data which has been unleashed since mainstream society merged itself with the digital world. This availability of data—from things we share on social media to machine data generated by connected industrial machinery—means computers now have a universe of information available to them, to help them learn more efficiently and make better decisions.

[15]神經(jīng)科學(xué)應(yīng)用于信息技術(shù)系統(tǒng)構(gòu)建，促進(jìn)了人工神經(jīng)網(wǎng)絡(luò)的發(fā)展。盡管該領(lǐng)域的研究工作在過(guò)去的半個(gè)世紀(jì)中不斷取得進(jìn)展，但直到最近才研制出具有充足電源的計(jì)算機(jī)。這種計(jì)算機(jī)使得普通人——那些本身就擁有最昂貴的專(zhuān)業(yè)工具的人除外——運(yùn)用計(jì)算機(jī)工作成為日?，F(xiàn)實(shí)。

[16]也許促成上述一切的唯一最大因素就是數(shù)據(jù)爆炸。主流社會(huì)與數(shù)字世界的融合帶來(lái)了數(shù)據(jù)大爆炸，而數(shù)據(jù)的可獲取性——從我們?cè)谏缃幻襟w上分享的各種信息到由聯(lián)合工業(yè)機(jī)械產(chǎn)生的機(jī)器數(shù)據(jù)——意味著計(jì)算機(jī)現(xiàn)在擁有可幫助它們更有效學(xué)習(xí)及更好決策的信息來(lái)源。

人工智能的未來(lái)是什么？

[17]關(guān)于這個(gè)問(wèn)題的答案，取決于你問(wèn)的是誰(shuí)。仁者見(jiàn)仁，智者見(jiàn)智！

What is the future of AI?

[17] That depends on who you ask,and the answer will vary wildly!

[18] Real fears that development of intelligence which equals or exceeds our own, but has the capacity to work at far higher speeds, could have negative implications for the future of humanity have been voiced, and not just by apocalyptic sci-f i such as The Matrix or The Terminator, but respected scientists like Stephen Hawking.

[19] Even if robots don’t eradicate us or turn us into living batteries, a less dramatic but still nightmarish scenario is that automation of labour (mental as well as physical) will lead to profound societal change—perhaps for the better,or perhaps for the worse.

[20] This understandable concern has led to the foundation last year,by a number of tech giants including Google, IBM, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon, of the Partnership in AI. This group will research and advocate for ethical implementations of AI, and to set guidelines for future research and deployment of robots and AI. ■

[18]人們擔(dān)心，人工智能發(fā)展到一定地步，其智能可與人類(lèi)相當(dāng)甚至超過(guò)人類(lèi)，且其工作速度遠(yuǎn)超人類(lèi)，由此可能會(huì)對(duì)人類(lèi)的未來(lái)產(chǎn)生負(fù)面影響。這種擔(dān)憂在末日科幻電影例如《黑客帝國(guó)》和《終結(jié)者》中都有所體現(xiàn)，而一些受人敬重的科學(xué)家如史蒂芬·霍金也表達(dá)了相同的擔(dān)憂。

[19]即使機(jī)器人不會(huì)消滅人類(lèi)或者僅將人類(lèi)當(dāng)成活電池，勞動(dòng)自動(dòng)化（無(wú)論是體力還是腦力）也將會(huì)帶來(lái)深刻的社會(huì)變化——可能朝著好的方面，也可能朝著壞的方面變化。這種情況雖不像人類(lèi)消亡那樣夸張，但卻一樣夢(mèng)魘般可怕。

[20]正是因?yàn)檫@種擔(dān)憂，去年，谷歌、IBM、微軟、臉書(shū)以及亞馬遜等五家科技巨頭成立了人工智能聯(lián)盟。該組織將研究并倡導(dǎo)人工智能應(yīng)用中的倫理問(wèn)題，為未來(lái)機(jī)器人和人工智能的研究和利用制定指導(dǎo)方針。 □