1

They are only tools, not a competing form of intelligence. But they will reshape what work means and how wealth is created, leading to unprecedented economic inequalities and even altering the global balance of power.它们只是工具，而非某种与人类竞争的智慧形式。但它们将重塑工作的含义和财富的创造方式，引发前所未有的经济不平等，甚至改变全球力量均势。

2

Roughly speaking, it’s technology that takes in huge amounts of information from a specific domain (say, loan repayment histories) and uses it to make a decision in a specific case (whether to give an individual a loan) in the service of a specified goal (maximizing profits for the lender). Think of a spreadsheet on steroids, trained on big data. These tools can outperform human beings at a given task.

今天的人工智能是什么？大致来说，它是一种从特定领域（例如贷款偿还记录）获取大量信息，并利用这些信息在特定情况下作出决定（是否贷款给某人），服务于特定目标（让贷方实现利润最大化）的技术。它就好比是打了鸡血——接受了大数据训练——的电子表格程序。执行特定任务时，这些工具的表现可以好于人类。

3

Instead, it is poised to bring about a wide-scale decimation of jobs — mostly lower-paying jobs, but some higher-paying ones, too.相反，它有可能造成工作岗位的大规模减少——其中大多是低薪岗位，但也会有一些高薪岗位。

4.

This transformation will result in enormous profits for the companies that develop A.I., as well as for the companies that adopt it.

这种转变将为开发人工智能以及运用人工智能的企业带来大量利润。

5.

The solution to the problem of mass unemployment, I suspect, will involve “service jobs of love.” These are jobs that A.I. cannot do, that society needs and that give people a sense of purpose.The volunteer service jobs of today, in other words, may turn into the real jobs of the future.

我猜想，大规模失业问题的解决方案会牵涉到“爱心服务工作”。这些工作人工智能做不了，社会需要，又能给人以使命感。换句话说，今天的志愿者服务工作或许可以在未来变成真正的工作。

6.

In all cases, people will be able to choose to work fewer hours than they do now.

管怎样，人们都将可以选择让自己的工作时间比现在短。

7.

It strikes me as unavoidable that large chunks of the money created by A.I. will have to be transferred to those whose jobs have been displaced. This seems feasible only through Keynesian policies of increased government spending, presumably raised through taxation on wealthy companies.

在我看来，由人工智能创造的财富有一大部分要不可避免地被转移给那些因之失去工作的人。看起来，这一点似乎只有通过实行增加政府开支的凯恩斯经济政策才能做到，而政府开支的增加或许可以通过对有钱的公司征税实现。

8.

To fund this, tax rates will have to be high. 要给这些福利提供资金，势必要提高税率The Keynesian approach I have sketched out may be feasible in the United States and China, which will have enough successful A.I. businesses to fund welfare initiatives via taxes.

我设想的凯恩斯政策方案在美国和中国或许是可行的，这两个国家会有足够多成功的人工智能企业来通过税收资助福利措施。

9

A.I. is an industry in which strength begets strength: The more data you have, the better your product; the better your product, the more data you can collect; the more data you can collect, the more talent you can attract; the more talent you can attract, the better your product. It’s a virtuous circle, and the United States and China have already amassed the talent, market share and data to set it in motion.

工智能是一个强者更强的行业：你获得的数据越多，产品就会越好；产品越好，收集的数据越多；数据越多，就能吸引更多人才；人才越多，产品也会越好。这是一个良性循环，美国和中国已经积聚了足够多的人才、市场份额和数据来启动这个循环。

10

.It seems American businesses will dominate in developed markets and some developing markets, while Chinese companies will win in most developing markets.

看起来，美国的公司将主导发达国家市场和一些发展中国家市场，而中国企业将在大多数发展中国家市场获胜。

11

.While a large, growing population can be an economic asset (as in China and India in recent decades), in the age of A.I. it will be an economic liability because it will comprise mostly displaced workers, not productive ones.

尽管不断增长的庞大人口也可以成为经济资本（就像中国和印度最近几十年的情况），但在人工智能时代，它会成为一个经济责任，因为这些人口会构成大多数的失业工人，而不是多产的员工。

12

.Unless they wish to plunge their people into poverty, they will be forced to negotiate with whichever country supplies most of their A.I. software — China or the United States — to essentially become that country’s economic dependent, taking in welfare subsidies in exchange for letting the “parent” nation’s A.I. companies continue to profit from the dependent country’s users. Such economic arrangements would reshape today’s geopolitical alliances.

除非它们愿意让民众陷入贫困，否则就必须与供应最多人工智能软件的国家——中国或美国——谈判，最终成为这个国家的经济依赖者，以允许“母”国的人工智能企业继续从依赖国的用户身上获利，来换取福利补贴。这样的经济安排将重塑现有的地缘政治联盟。

13

A.I. is presenting us with an opportunity to rethink economic inequality on a global scale. These challenges are too far-ranging in their effects for any nation to isolate itself from the rest of the world.

要么就得把这件事看得更乐观一些：人工智能给我们提供一个在全球范围内重新思考经济不平等的机会。这些挑战太过广泛，任何国家都无法将自己孤立起来，独自解决。