The Pentagon’s ‘Terminator Conundrum’: Robots That Could Kill on Their Own
五角大廈的「終結者難題」：自主殺人武器
By Matthew Rosenberg and John Markoff

The small drone, with its six whirring rotors, swept past the replica of a Middle Eastern village and closed in on a mosque-like structure, its camera scanning for targets.
有6個旋轉回轉軸的一架小型無人機，快速飛掠一個仿造的中東村莊，逼近一個看似清真寺的建築，機上的攝影機開始掃描搜尋目標。

No humans were remotely piloting the drone, which was nothing more than a machine that could be bought on Amazon. But armed with advanced artificial intelligence software, it had been transformed into a robot that could find and identify the half-dozen men carrying replicas of AK-47s around the village and pretending to be insurgents.並沒有人在遙控這架無人機，它不過是部在亞馬遜網站就能買到的機器。但為它配備上先進的人工智慧軟體後，它就變成了機器人，能夠找到並辨識在村莊周圍的6個人，這些人攜帶著AK-47自動步槍的複製品，扮演叛亂分子。

As the drone descended slightly, a purple rectangle flickered on a video feed that was being relayed to engineers monitoring the test. The drone had locked onto a man obscured in the shadows, a display of hunting prowess that offered an eerie preview of how the Pentagon plans to transform warfare.
無人機高度稍降，在傳給監測這項測試的工程師的一個視頻饋送中，有個紫色的矩形在閃動。無人機鎖定一名藏身暗影中的人，這展示了無人機非凡的搜尋能力，也提供一項奇特的預覽，說明五角大廈正計畫如何轉變戰爭型態。

Almost unnoticed outside defense circles, the Pentagon has put artificial intelligence at the center of its strategy to maintain the United States’ position as the world’s dominant military power. It is spending billions of dollars to develop what it calls autonomous and semiautonomous weapons and to build an arsenal stocked with the kind of weaponry that until now has existed only in Hollywood movies and science fiction, raising alarm among scientists and activists concerned by the implications of a robot arms race.
國防圈外幾乎沒人注意到，五角大廈已將人工智慧視為戰略中心，意圖藉此維繫美國全球軍力霸主的地位。五角大廈正投注數十億美元，開發它所謂的自主和半自主武器，並開發一批新武器，個個是迄今只見於好萊塢電影和科幻小說中的那類武器，這個行動已引起科學家和社運人士的警覺，憂心機器人武器競賽可能帶來的後果。

The Defense Department is designing robotic fighter jets that would fly into combat alongside manned aircraft. It has tested missiles that can decide what to attack, and it has built ships that can hunt for enemy submarines, stalking those it finds over thousands of miles, without any help from humans.
國防部正在設計機器人戰機，讓它與有人駕駛的戰機並肩作戰。國防部並已對能自行決定攻擊目標的飛彈做了測試，建造了可找出敵方潛艇的船艦，可跟蹤發現的潛艇數千哩，完全不需人類協助。

“If Stanley Kubrick directed ‘Dr. Strangelove’ again, it would be about the issue of autonomous weapons,” said Michael Schrage, a research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management.
麻省理工學院史隆管理學院研究員邁可．施拉格說：「若是（美國電影導演）史丹利．庫柏力克重新執導『奇愛博士』，一定會與自主武器問題有關。」

Defense officials say the weapons are needed for the United States to maintain its military edge over China, Russia and other rivals, who are also pouring money into similar research (as are allies, such as Britain and Israel). The Pentagon’s latest budget outlined $18 billion to be spent over three years on technologies that included those needed for autonomous weapons.
國防部官員說，美國需要這些武器來維持對中國大陸、俄羅斯和其他競爭對手的軍事優勢，對方也對類似研究投入大筆經費（美國盟國亦然，如英國、以色列）。五角大廈的最新預算粗估，未來三年將以180億美元研發新科技，包括自主武器所需者在內。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/26/us/pentagon-artificial-intelligence-terminator.html

2016-11-13．聯合報．D4．紐約時報賞析．王麗娟譯

說文解字看新聞 張佑生

本文的導言寫作方式屬於descriptive lead，不是開門見山，而是先寫景再帶出主題。標題conundrum的其中一個意思是「謎語」，特別是利用詞語的雙重含義，用雙關語解答的謎語。人頭獅身的Sphinx問伊底帕斯（Oedipus）的謎語就是一個conundrum，答錯會被她吃掉！

標題的conundrum意指「難題」，尤其是「兩難」，往往無解。美國總統歐巴馬的民調支持率不差，為何同黨的希拉蕊仍不敵川普？《紐約客》（The New Yorker）雜誌評為當代一大費解之謎：How Trump’s strange rise and Obama’s high rating can have coincided in the same moment will remain one of the permanent conundrums of our history.

Eerie除了神秘古怪，更令人感覺毛毛的。康拉德（Joseph Conrad）的短篇小說《暗影邊界》（The Shadow Line）的敘事者形容一片死寂中傳來的怪聲讓他毛骨悚然：These were eerie, disturbing, alarming sounds in the dead stillness of the air around me.

Pizzas, Pony Rides and Dolphin Shows: Balms for North Korea’s Elite
娛樂年年增 北韓菁英的愜意生活
By Laya Maheshwari

Towering apartment blocks line the gleaming, six-lane avenue known as Future Scientists Street, their boldly colored facades leaping from the drab hues that dominate the rest of Pyongyang’s skyline.
閃閃發亮、名叫「未來科學家大街」的六線大道兩旁，矗立著高聳的公寓大樓群，它們外牆上的鮮豔色彩跟主宰平壤天際線其他部分的單調色彩相比，顯得十分突出。

At street level, there are electronics stores, a movie theater and a new pizzeria, where visitors are welcomed by young waitresses in bright red uniforms.
這條大街上有多家電子產品店、一間電影院及一家新開的披薩店，而披薩店內有身穿亮紅色制服的年輕女服務生在歡迎著客人。

A pizza costs about $8, and a pasta entree less than half that. There is a bright aquarium near the entrance, but it is devoid of life – much like the restaurant, which was eerily quiet the night I visited.
一個披薩要價約8美元，而義大利麵主菜則不到4美元。在入口附近有個明亮的水族箱，卻了無生氣，而那家餐廳也差不多，我去光顧的那晚靜得可怕。

The restaurant is Italy Pizza, hailed by local guides as the hottest new eatery in Pyongyang, the North Korean capital. It serves up a taste of cosmopolitan savvy for the city’s elite – and proof to foreign visitors that all is well in the nation despite punishing economic sanctions, international isolation, and intermittent reports of deprivation and famine.
餐廳名為「義大利披薩」，當地導遊譽為北韓首都平壤最熱門的新餐廳。它為這個城市的菁英提供了國際都市的品味，並向外國遊客證明，儘管這個國家受到懲罰性經濟制裁、國際孤立，而且偶爾傳出貧困與飢荒的報導，一切都還好。

There is no doubt North Korea is racked with poverty. Its economy barely functions, and per capita gross domestic product is estimated as low as $1,800 per year. But for the privileged few in this city of 3 million – state officials and members of a nascent merchant class – options for entertainment have expanded since Kim Jong Un took power five years ago.
無疑地，北韓極度貧困，經濟幾已失去作用，一年的人均國民所得估計低到只有1800美元。然而對平壤市內由國家官員和新興商人所組成的少數特權階級來說，自金正恩5年前掌權以來，娛樂選項已增加許多。平壤有300萬人口。

There are cafes and bars, tennis courts and gyms. There is a bowling alley and a fancy supermarket, a new dolphinarium and a water park. A half-hour’s drive from downtown Pyongyang, the Mirim Riding Club boasts 120 horses – including Orlov Trotters sent as a gift by Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin – and charges $8 to ride them for an hour outdoors, $10 indoors. (Foreign visitors are generally first taken to the Revolutionary Site Education Room, a gallery that includes a giant photograph of Kim at age 4, in a pink cap and red mittens, playing with a horse. “Our Grand Marshal Kim Jong Un always possessed a special gift with animals,” a guide told me.)
市內有些咖啡館和酒吧、網球場及健身房，同時還有一座保齡球館，一處高檔超市，一個新的海豚館，以及一座水上公園。距離平壤市中心車程半小時的美林馬術俱樂部擁有120匹馬，其中包括俄羅斯總統普亭饋贈的奧爾洛夫快步馬，在室外騎要價每小時8美元，室內則為10美元。（外國遊客一般都是先被帶到革命史蹟教育室，該處是個畫廊，內有幅金正恩4歲時頭戴粉紅色帽子、手戴紅色手套跟馬玩的巨幅照片。一位導遊告訴我說：「我們的大元帥金正恩一直都有跟動物相處的天賦異稟。」）

The North Korean government strictly controls what foreigners can see, so it is difficult to know to what extent Pyongyang’s new urban amenities are real or how many people can enjoy them. But during a recent weeklong visit to attend a biennial film festival staged by the government, I was allowed to visit a few of the new venues, in the company of two official minders.
北韓政府對於可讓外國人看到什麼東西有著嚴格的控制，因此很難知道平壤的新設施在多大程度上是真實的，或是有多少人可以使用這些設施，但最近我在參加北韓政府所辦電影雙年展的一周訪問期間，獲准在兩名官方人員陪同下參觀了幾處新場所。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/26/world/asia/north-korea-pyongyang.html

2016-11-13．聯合報．D4．紐約時報賞析．陳韋廷譯