AI时代，控制权至关重要

How can we ensure that computers do what we want them to do when they are increasingly doing it for themselves?

在电脑自主性越来越强的时代，我们怎样确保它们按照人类的意志行事呢?

That may sound like an abstract philosophical question, but it is also an urgent practical challenge, according to Stuart Russell, professor of computer science at the University of California, Berkeley, and one of the world’s leading thinkers on artificial intelligence.

这听起来像是个抽象的哲学问题，但据加州大学伯克利分校(University of California, Berkeley)计算机科学教授、人工智能(AI)领域世界领先的思想家之一斯图尔特•罗素(Stuart Russell)表示，它也是一个紧迫的现实挑战。

It is all too easy to imagine scenarios in which increasingly powerful autonomous computer systems cause terrible real-world damage, either through thoughtless misuse or deliberate abuse, he says. Suppose, for example, in the not-too-distant future that a care robot is looking after your children. You are running late and ask the robot to prepare a meal. The robot opens the fridge, finds no food, calculates the nutritional value of your cat and serves up a feline fricassee.

他说，想象这样的场景太容易了：或是因为无意错用，抑或因为故意滥用，越来越强大的自主电脑系统给现实世界带来可怕的破坏。例如，假设在不远的将来，一个保育机器人负责照顾你的孩子。一天你快要迟到了，让机器人帮你做饭。机器人打开冰箱，没有找到食物，于是它计算了你的宠物猫的营养价值，最后做了一份炖猫肉。

Or take a more horrifying example of abuse that is technologically possible today. A terrorist group launches a swarm of bomb-carrying drones in a city and uses image recognition technology to kill everyone in a police uniform.

或者，再举一个更可怕的滥用案例——这在今天的技术上是完全可能的。一个恐怖组织向某城市派出了一组携带炸弹的无人机，利用图像识别技术杀死所有穿警察制服的人。

As Prof Russell argues in his latest book, Human Compatible, we need better ways of controlling what computers do to prevent them acting in anti-human ways, by default or by design. Although it may be many years, if not decades, away, we must also start thinking seriously about what happens if we ever achieve superhuman AI.

正如罗素教授在他的新书《人类兼容》(Human Compatible)中所写，我们需要用更好的方法控制电脑，防止它们做出无意或有意的反人类行为。虽然这可能需要数年时间，甚至数十年，但我们必须开始认真思考：如果我们制造出了超越人类的人工智能，会发生什么事情?

Getting that ultimate control problem right could usher in a golden age of abundance. Getting it wrong could result in humanity’s extinction. Prof Russell fears it may take a Chernobyl-scale tragedy in AI to alert us to the vital importance of ensuring control.

这个如何控制人工智能的终极问题如能应对得当，将会引领我们进入一个富足的黄金时代。应对不当有可能造成人类的灭绝。罗素教授担心，也许直到出现一个规模匹敌切尔诺贝利事件的人工智能悲剧，才能警示人们掌握控制权的至关重要性。

For the moment, the professor is something of an outlier in the AI community in sounding such alarms. Although he co-wrote a previous textbook on AI that is used by most universities around the world, Prof Russell is critical of what he calls the standard model of AI and the “denialism” of many in the industry.

目前，像罗素教授这样发出这类警告的人在人工智能界不是主流。虽然罗素教授是现在世界上大多数大学使用的人工智能教科书的合著者之一，但他对所谓的人工智能标准模型和许多业内人士拒不接受现实的心理持批判态度。