引言:5月27日,《纽约时报》在「人工智能技术比拼,中国超越美国?」这篇报导中预言“未来,中国或许会成为AI领域的最大玩家”引发各方热议。同日下午,中国的人工智能公司iPIN在GMIS(全球机器智能峰会)上向美国人工智能巨头IBM发起挑战,宣称“打赌一个亿,IBM搞不定万达智能招商”。现场外媒纷纷瞩目,并聚焦采访。以下为 TopBuzz 刊载的稿件译文。
[原文及译文]
We all know that China was doing good at Artificial Intelligence, but except those show-off BAT Internet Giants, there is no other evidence to prove this. But there is an increasing number of news reports about Chinese AI market. Last week, one report from NewYork Times revealed the reason why China is ruling the AI world where West and East would fight the Third World War in Is China Outsmarting America in A.I.?.
众所周知,中国在人工智能方面做得很好,但除了出彩的BAT(百度、阿里、腾讯)等互联网巨头之外,似乎没有其他的证据可以证明这一点。然而近期,关于中国人工智能市场的新闻报道越来越多。上周,纽约时报的一篇报道揭露了“为什么在第三次世界大战的中西对抗中,中国将会统治着人工智能世界——因为中国在人工智能领域比美国更聪明。”
After his postdoctorate, A young man named Soren Schwertfeger chose China to do research in Artificial Intelligence instead of Europe or America where used to be regarded as the birthplace of A.I. But in China, Soren got a huge sponsorship to build his own AI Lab, that won't happen in another country, even in his hometown German.
在取得博士学位后,一位名叫Soren Schwertfeger的年轻人选择在中国进行人工智能的研究,而不是在过去被认为是人工智能发源地的欧洲或美国。究其原因,在中国,Soren能得到巨额的赞助建造自己的人工智能实验室,这样的优惠甚至在他的家乡德国都难以获得。
According John Markoff, the writer of this report, told us the technology power balance is shifting from West to East. AI experts believed China is only one step behind America. And I had seen it by my eyes last week.
《纽约时代》稿件的作者John Markoff告诉我们,“技术力量的天枰正在从西方转移到东方。人工智能专家认为,中国只是落后于美国的一步。”上周我亲眼目睹了这一切。
I was in Beijing last weekend, and was invited to an A.I. summit named GMIS -- Chinese just love all kinds of summits-- to talk with some local expert. And yes, NYT is right about this, China is leading the A.I. and one startup even wanted to set up a gamble with IBM Watson.
上周末我去了北京,应邀参加了一个名为“GMIS”的人工智能峰会——中国人喜欢各种各样的峰会——为了促进与行业专家交流。我感觉到,纽约时报是对的,中国确实在引流人工智能的风潮,一家创业公司甚至想与IBM沃森进行一场豪赌。
You might think China is still the old-fashion Eastern country where people are still living under the standard. Actually, Beijing is investing vast sums of money into Artificial Intelligence to build a fancy high-tech and sci-fi world in the country with the help of machine learning. A lot of startups shown in the GMIS have presented their new technology and new algorithms are helping the government to tackle the censorship problem, public crime, and improving the efficiency of lending money, tracking personal credit. And they are hoping to replace many work position by machines which make fewer mistakes and cost less.
你可能会认为中国仍然只是一个古老的东方国家,那里的人们仍然生活在标准之下。事实上,北京正在人工智能领域投入大量资金。在机器学习的帮助下,中国正在打造一个高科技和科幻世界。在GMIS上,许多创业公司都展示了他们的新技术和新的算法,他们利用这些正在帮助政府解决审查问题,公共犯罪,以及提高贷款效率,追踪个人信用。他们希望通过机器来取代许多工作岗位,减少错误和降低成本。
With money, new technology and application scenarios, AI becomes the must-have stuff to every company and everyone's daily life. When the US are adopting Apple Pay, Chinese people just forget their wallets at home. Most of them can enjoy a convenient life with only a smartphone, no matter Android or iPhone, cheap or flagship.
随着资金、新技术和应用场景的出现,人工智能成为了每个公司和每个人日常生活的必需品。当美国人正在日渐接受Apple Pay时,中国人早就已经把钱包忘在家里了。中国的大多数人都可以只用智能手机享受便捷的生活,不管是Android还是iPhone,便宜还是高端。
In GMIS, the middle-aged businessman who gambled 100 million RMB with IBM Watson told me that he was 100% sure to win this gamble.
在GMIS中,一位与IBM沃森赌1亿元人民币的青年企业家告诉我,他100%肯定会赢这场赌博。
Yang Yang, CEO of iPIN, a Cognition Intelligence analysis startup in China. He told me his company could be the Chinese Watson, but iPIN could do better than IBM Watson in some aspects.
认知智能分析创业公司iPIN的CEO杨洋告诉我,他的公司被称为中国的IBM Watson,但在某些方面,iPIN可能比IBM沃森做得更好。
(iPIN 创始人杨洋在GMIS现场挑战IBM)
"I believe that IBM has no idea about the Chinese market. As the largest real estate enterprise in China, Wanda Group cooperated with IBM to solve its problems, like cloud computing and Smart Rent system. Watson is perfect to build the Smart Rent system," Yang told me, " but the thing is, Watson, knows more than Artificial Intelligence but the Chinese culture, environment, and economy."
“我认为,IBM对中国市场并不了解。作为中国最大的房地产企业,万达集团希望与IBM合作解决了云计算和智能租赁系统等问题——沃森很好地建立了智能租赁系统,”杨洋告诉我,“但是比起中国的文化、环境和经济,Watson只了解人工智能。”
As an Expert System, all the data and rules in Watson's database were written by experts from different industry. And thanks to its expertise knowledge, like finance and health, Watson got a lot of orders from ABB, Citi Bank, GE and other big brands.
作为专家系统,沃森数据库中的所有数据和规则都是由来自不同行业的专家编写的。由于IBM在金融和健康领域的专业性,沃森得到了ABB、花旗银行、通用电气和其他大品牌的大量订单。
But Yang Yang thought that Watson Artificial Intelligence will lose the gamble of building a Smart Rent System for Wanda, "to cognitive intelligence, Watson has scored impressive achievement in America, but now it comes to China. I am sorry to say that Watson will fail to complete this task because it doesn't understand China. "
但杨洋认为,沃森的人工智能不足以为万达打造一个智能租赁系统。“在认知智能方面,沃森在美国取得了令人瞩目的成就,但现在它来到了中国。我很遗憾地说,沃森将无法完成这项任务,因为它不了解中国。”
And Yang was confident to his cognitive intelligence, as he said iPIN built the first Social Economy Graph in China and it used the machine to learn that knowledge from the beginning, so that this cognitive intelligence could be applied to almost every industries, such as human resource and career planning.
杨洋对iPIN的认知智能非常有信心——iPIN已经在中国建立了第一个社会经济图谱。基于社会经济图谱,iPIN在一开始就让机器学习整个社会所有领域的常识,所以iPIN的认知智能几乎可以应用于所有的行业,比如人力资源和生涯规划。
He showed me the iPIN article from Wall Street Journal to make me trust him he can win the gamble, "If I lose the gamble and Watson did it, I would send our 100 million RMB value AI system as a gift to Wanda." However, since last weekend, Wanda has responded to this gamble.
他向我展示了华尔街日报报导iPIN的文章,这让我增加了他能赢得这场赌博的信心,“如果我输了这场赌博,而Watson也确实做到了,我会把我们价值1亿元的人工智能系统作为礼物送给万达。”然而,自上周末以来,万达还未回应这场赌博。
(华尔街日报2月份对 iPIN 的报道原文)
This seems straightforward on the surface, AI is changing our life. China is a country with 1.4 billion population and 800 million smartphone users, that makes China the best place to test new ideas. Every tiny need from the market could worth billion and every smart change in the workplace or in the apps could lead an enormous development to the society. And to my surprise, people are willing to accept those changes. The rate is even higher than the United States.
表面上看,人工智能正在直观地改变我们的生活。中国是一个拥有14亿人口和8亿智能手机用户的国家,这使得中国成为检验新想法的最佳场所。市场上的每一个微小需求都可能价值10亿美元,而工作场所或应用程序中的每一个智能变化都可能给这个社会带来巨大的发展。令我惊讶的是,中国人愿意接受这些改变,他们的接受比率甚至比美国还要高。
Compared with other countries, China provided more capital and policy to support their A.I. startups. Startups from China got more investment from the capital market. For all the support, the government may use the technology on Internet censorship or other restriction places. But to AI customers, AI is the cutting-edge solution to their business in fierce competition with transnational corporations.
与其他国家相比,中国提供了更多的资金和政策来支持他们的人工智能创业公司。此外,来自中国的创业公司也从资本市场上获得了更多的投资。在所有的支持之下,政府可能会在互联网审查、或其他领域中扶植这些技术;而对于人工智能的采购者来说,人工智能是他们在与跨国公司激烈竞争中最尖端的解决方案。
编者按:
或许,因为AI技术的革命,人类第一次发现可以如此有力、准确地把握自己的命运。
未来已来,我们有理由对类似iPIN这样的年轻团队报以期望;有理由相信AI时代将成为国内互联网行业超车的拐点;有理由相信,人类生活将进入更智慧、更高效的时代。