文章介绍：人工智能是科技话题中很火的话题，雅思阅读真题中考到过。而且雅思写作科技话题也会涉及到。本文篇幅不大，既可用以背景知识补充，亦可作为雅思写作论据积累。

The battle in AI——Giant advantage

Artificial intelligence looks tailor-made for incumbent tech giants. How to judge if that is a worry

TWO letters can add up to a lot of money. No area of technology is hotter than AI, or artificial intelligence. Venture-capital investment in AI in the first nine months of 2017 totalled $7.6bn, according to PitchBook, a data provider; that compares with full-year figures of $5.4bn in 2016. In the year to date there have been $21.3bn in AI-related M&A deals, around 26 times more than in 2015. In earnings calls public companies now mention AI far more often than “big data”.

At the heart of the frenzy are some familiar names: the likes of Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. A similar, though less transparent, battle is under way in China among firms like Alibaba and Baidu. Several have put AI at the centre of their strategies. All are enthusiastic acquirers of AI firms, often in order to snap up the people they employ. They see AI as a way to improve their existing services, from cloud computing to logistics, and to push into new areas, from autonomous cars to augmented reality (see page 55). Many observers fear that, by cementing and extending the power of a handful of giants, AI will hurt competition. That will depend on three open questions, involving one magic ingredient.

AlphaGone

The tech giants certainly have big advantages in the battle to develop AI. They have tonnes of data, oodles of computing power and boffins aplenty—especially in China, which expects to charge ahead. Imagine a future, some warn, in which you are transported everywhere in a Waymo autonomous car (owner: Alphabet, parent of Google), pay for everything with an Android phone (developer: Google), watch YouTube (owner: Google) to relax, and search the web using—you can guess. Markets with just a handful of firms can be fiercely competitive. A world in which the same few names duke it out in several industries could still be a good one for consumers. But if people rely on one firm’s services like this, and if AI enables that firm to predict their needs and customise its offering ever more precisely, it will be burdensome to switch to a rival.

That future is still a long way off. AI programs remain narrowly focused. Moreover, the ability of the incumbents to perpetuate their advantages is made uncertain by three questions.

The most important is whether AI will always depend on vast amounts of data. Machines today are usually trained on huge datasets, from which they can recognise useful patterns such as fraudulent financial transactions. If real-world data remain essential to AI, the tech superstars are in clover. They have vast amounts of the stuff, and are gaining more as they push into fresh areas such as health care.

A competing vision of AI stresses simulations, in which machines teach themselves using synthetic data or in virtual environments. Early versions of a program developed to play Go, an Asian board game, by DeepMind, a unit of Alphabet, were trained using data from actual games; the latest was simply given the rules and started playing Go against itself. Within three days it had surpassed its predecessor, which had itself beaten the best player humanity could muster. If this approach is widely applicable, or if future AI systems can be trained using sparser amounts of data, the tech giants’ edge is blunted.

But some applications will always require data. How much of the world’s stock of it the tech giants will end up controlling is the second question. They have clout in the consumer realm, and they keep pushing into new areas, from Amazon’s interest in medicine to Microsoft’s purchase of LinkedIn, a profession- al-networking site. But data in the corporate realm are harder to get at, and their value is increasingly well understood. Autonomous cars will be a good test. Alphabet’s Waymo has done more real-world testing of self-driving cars than any other firm: over 4m miles (6.5m kilometres) on public roads. But established carmakers, and startups like Tesla, can generate more data from their existing fleets; other firms, like Mobileye, a driverless-tech firm owned by Intel, are also in the race.

The third question is how openly knowledge will be shared. The tech giants’ ability to recruit AI expertise from universities is helped by their willingness to publish research; Google and Facebook have opened software libraries to out side developers. But their incentives to share valuable data and algorithms are weak. Much will depend on whether regulations prise open their grip. Europe’s impending data-protection rules, for example, require firms to get explicit consent for how they use data and to make it easier for customers to transfer their information to other providers. China may try to help its firms by having negligible regulation.

The battle in AI is fiercest among the tech giants. It is too early to know how good that will be for competition, but not to anticipate the magic ingredient that will determine the outcome: the importance, accessibility and openness of data.

文章精读：

The battle in AI ---Giant advantage

Artificial intelligence looks tailor-made for incumbent tech giants. How to judge if that is a worry.

黄色部分为实用单词或短语

红色部分为句子精选

TWO letters can add up to a lot of money. No area of technology is hotter than AI, or artificial intelligence. Venture-capital investment in AI in the first nine months of 2017 totalled $7.6bn, according to PitchBook, a data provider; that compares with full-year figures of $5.4bn in 2016. In the year to date there have been $21.3bn in AI-related M&A deals, around 26 times more than in 2015. In earnings calls public companies now mention AI far more often than “big data”.

· tailor-made量身定制的;完全恰当的

tailor 裁缝

e.g. My background and work experience are tailor-made for this position.

我的工作背景及经历都是为这个职位做准备的。

· incumbent tech giants 现在的科技巨头们

incumbent adj.现任的 n. 在职者

· venture-capital investment 风险资本投资(风投)

venture/adventure 风险

capital n.资本，资金;首都;首字母

· in the year to date 今年迄今为止

in the year to come 在新的一年

to date 迄今为止

原文句子：

In the year to date there have been $21.3bn in AI-related M&A deals, around 26 times more than in 2015.

今年迄今为止，AI相关的M&A(Mergers and Acquisitions 企业并购)交易已达到213亿美元，大约是2015年26倍多。

· In earnings calls public companies now mention AI far more often than “big data”.

翻译：在公司收益的电话会议上,大家提到人工智能(AI)的次数远远多过‘大数据’。

At the heart of the frenzy are some familiar names: the likes of Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. A similar, though less transparent, battle is under way in China among firms like Alibaba and Baidu. Several have put AI at the centre of their strategies. All are enthusiastic acquirers of AI firms, often in order to snap up the people they employ. They see AI as a way to improve their existing services, from cloud computing to logistics, and to push into new areas, from autonomous cars to augmented reality. Many observers fear that, by cementing and extending the power of a handful of giants, AI will hurt competition. That will depend on three open questions, involving one magic ingredient.

· frenzy 疯狂，狂热

a frenzy of religious feeling

狂热的宗教情感

· transparent adj. 清楚易懂的; 透明的

原文例句:

A similar, though less transparent, battle is under way in China among firms like Alibaba and Baidu.

在中国，一场类似不那么容易看明白的战役正在如阿里巴巴以及百度这样的公司之间发生。

be under way 进行中，正在开展

· put … at the center of 将…摆在最重要的位置

e.g. The W.H.O. says it aims to put public health at the center of U.N. efforts on climate change.

世界卫生组织表示它的目的在于把公共卫生置于联合国气候变化问题议程的核心。

· snap up 抢购

原文例句：

All are enthusiastic acquirers of AI firms, often in order to snap up the people they employ.

所有(公司)都是AI公司的狂热收购者，通常是为了抢购这些(人工智能)公司的员工。

· logistics 后勤，物流

· augmented reality (AR) 增强现实(技术)

(注：将真实世界信息和虚拟世界信息“无缝”集成的新技术)

· cement v.巩固，黏牢 n.水泥，胶合剂

原文例句：

Many observers fear that, by cementing and extending the power of a handful of giants, AI will hurt competition.

很多观察家们担心人工智能增强及扩大少数几个巨头公司的实力，从而会损害竞争。

· ingredient n.要素，因素

the essential ingredients for success 成功的基本要素

AlphaGone

The tech giants certainly have big advantages in the battle to develop AI.They have tonnes of data, oodles of computing power and boffins aplenty—especially in China, which expects to charge ahead. Imagine a future, some warn,in which you are transported everywhere in a Waymo autonomous car (owner: Alphabet,parent of Google), pay for everything with an Android phone (developer: Google),watch YouTube (owner: Google) to relax, and search the web using—you can guess.Markets with just a handful of firms can be fiercely competitive.A world in which the same few names duke it out in several industries could still be a good one for consumers. But if people rely on one firm’s services like this,and if AI enables that firm to predict their needs and customise its offering ever more precisely,it will be burdensome to switch to a rival.

· tonnes of; oodles of; aplenty 大量

· charge ahead勇往向前

原文例句

They have tonnes of data, oodles of computing power and boffins aplenty—especially in China, which expects to charge ahead.

它们(科技巨头们)有海量数据，庞大的计算能力以及大量的技术，尤其是在中国正大步往前冲。

· duke it out大打出手,分个输赢

· customise (customize) v.定制

That future is still a long way off. AI programs remain narrowly focused. Moreover, the ability of the incumbents to perpetuate their advantages is made uncertain by three questions.

· perpetuate their advantages 保持优势(使优势得以持续)

perpetual adj.的

perpetuate v.使…化/持续下去

The most important is whether AI will always depend on vast amounts of data. Machines today are usually trained on huge datasets, from which they can recognise useful patterns such asfraudulent financial transactions. If real-world data remain essential to AI, the tech superstars are in clover. They have vast amounts of the stuff, and are gaining more as they push into fresh areas such as health care.

· fraudulent financial transactions 诈骗性质的金融交易行为

fraud n.欺诈

transact v.做交易

· in clover养尊处优，生活优裕

A competing vision of AI stresses simulations, in which machines teach themselves usingsynthetic data or in virtual environments. Early versions of a program developed to play Go, an Asian board game, by DeepMind, a unit of Alphabet, were trained using data from actual games; the latest was simply given the rules and started playing Go against itself. Within three days it had surpassed its predecessor, which had itself beaten the best player humanity couldmuster. If this approach is widely applicable, or if future AI systems can be trained usingsparser amounts of data, the tech giants’ edge is blunted.

· simulations 模拟

simulate v.

· synthetic adj.合成的

· virtual adj.虚拟的

VR 虚拟现实(virtual reality)

· predecessor n.前任，前身

· muster 召集;搜集

原文例句：

Within three days it had surpassed its predecessor, which had itself beaten the best player humanity could muster.

三天之内它(一个类似阿尔法狗的程序)就超越了它的前身，而其前身已经击败了人类能搜集到的最厉害的棋手。

· sparse adj.稀少的

原文例句：

If future AI systems can be trained using sparser amounts of data, the tech giants’ edge is blunted.

如果将来AI系统用少量的数据就可以训练，那么科技巨头们的优势就下降了。

edge n.边缘;优势

e.g. have an early edge 有早期优势

cutting edge technology 科技

· Early versions of a program developed to play Go, an Asian board game, by DeepMind, a unit of Alphabet, were trained using data from actual games; the latest was simply given the rules and started playing Go against itself.

翻译：由DeepMind—Alphabet公司的一个部门—所研发下围棋(一种亚洲的棋盘游戏)的程序早期版本是用真实游戏中的数据来来训练;版本只是给一些下棋规则，程序自己进行自我对战。

But some applications will always require data. How much of the world’s stock of it the tech giants will end up controlling is the second question. They have clout in the consumer realm, and they keep pushing into new areas, from Amazon’s interest in medicine to Microsoft’s purchase of LinkedIn, a professional networking site. But data in the corporate realm are harder to get at, and their value is increasingly well understood. Autonomous cars will be a good test. Alphabet’s Waymo has done more real-world testing of self-driving cars than any other firm: over 4m miles (6.5m kilometres) on public roads. But established carmakers, and startups like Tesla, can generate more data from their existing fleets; other firms, like Mobileye, a driverless-tech firm owned by Intel, are also in the race.

· clout n.影响力

· realm 领域

原文例句：

They have clout in the consumer realm, and they keep pushing into new areas.

它们(科技巨头)在消费者领域已有影响力，并且正在不停地进军新的领域。

· But data in the corporate realm are harder to get at, and their value is increasingly well understood.

翻译：但公司领域的数据更难获取，而他们的价值越来越明确。

The third question is how openly knowledge will be shared. The tech giants’ ability to recruit AI expertise from universities is helped by their willingness to publish research; Google and Facebook have opened software libraries to outside developers. But their incentives to share valuable data and algorithms are weak. Much will depend on whether regulations prise open their grip. Europe’s impending data-protection rules, for example, require firms to get explicit consent for how they use data and to make it easier for customers to transfer their informationto other providers. China may try to help its firms by having negligible regulation.

· The tech giants’ ability to recruit AI expertise from universities is helped by their willingness to publish research; Google and Facebook have opened software libraries to outside developers.

翻译：科技巨头们乐意发表研究成果的做法有助于他们从大学获取人工智能方面的专业知识。谷歌及脸书已将软件库对外部开发者公开。

· incentive n.激励,动力

=motivation

· algorithm 算法

· impending adj.即将来临的

e.g. Agitated activity by certain animals may be a sign of an impending earthquake.

某些动物烦躁不安可能是地震临震前的预兆。

· explicit consent 明确同意

implicit 不明确的，含蓄的

dissent 不同意

· transfer v.转移

e.g. He wants to transfer some money to the account of his daughter

他想把一些钱转到女儿的账户上。

· negligible adj.无足轻重的;可忽略不计的

neglect v.忽视; negligent adj.玩忽职守的

The battle in AI is fiercest among the tech giants. It is too early to know how good that will be for competition, but not to anticipate the magic ingredient that will determine the outcome: the importance, accessibility and openness of data.

(译文：科技巨头们在人工智能领域方面的竞争最为激烈。这是否对竞争有益现在来说还为时尚早，但是可以确定决定结果的要素是：数据的重要性，可获取性以及公开性。)

本文作者简介：

王少娟

上海新航道雅思主讲，上海外国语大学教育技术学硕士。对综合英语的阅读教学有深入的研究，教授了数百名学生均取得了优异的英语成绩。讲解细致、逻辑清晰、课堂活跃，丰富的教学经验能帮助学生在学习中和练习中能够更有效的提高英语能力。