经济学人:技术也是一种威胁(1)

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Researchers at Stanford University have demonstrated that, when shown pictures of one gay man, and one straight man,  斯坦福大学的研究表明，在被出示给一张同性恋之人的照片和一张异性恋之人的照片时，

the algorithm could attribute their sexuality correctly 81% of the time. 算法在81%的时间中可以正确地确定他们的性取向。

Humans managed only 61%. 人类经过努力才才能达到61%。

In countries where homosexuality is a crime, software which promises to infer sexuality from a face is an alarming prospect¹. 在同性恋是一种犯罪的国家中，能从脸部断定性取向的软件是一种令人担忧的前景。

Less violent forms of discrimination could also become common. 不那么暴力的歧视形式也可能变得很常见。

Employers can already act on their prejudices to deny people a job. 雇主早就能够根据自己的偏见拒绝给人们一份工作。

But facial recognition could make such bias² routine, enabling firms to filter all job applications for ethnicity and signs of intelligence and sexuality. 但是，脸部识别可能让这类偏见司空见惯，它能让公司为了种族特点以及智力和性别信号而去过滤所有的求职申请。

Nightclubs and sports grounds may face pressure to protect people by scanning entrants' faces for the threat of violence—even though, owing to the nature of machine-learning,  夜总会和运动场可能面对为了暴力威胁而通过扫描入场者脸部的方式来保护人们的压力——鉴于机器学习的性质，

all facial-recognition systems inevitably³ deal in probabilities. 所有的脸部识别系统都不可避免地是在各种可能性中转来转去。

Moreover, such systems may be biased⁴ against those who do not have white skin, since algorithms trained on data sets of mostly white faces do not work well with different ethnicities. 再者，由于接受的大多是白人脸部的数据集培训的算法不能很好地处理不同的种族特点，这类系统可能沾染上对没有白色皮肤的人的偏见。

Such biases⁵ have cropped up in automated⁶ assessments⁷ used to inform courts' decisions about bail⁸ and sentencing. 这类偏见已经在用来公示法庭有关假释和判决的决定的自动评估中露出了苗头。

Eventually, continuous facial recording⁹ and gadgets¹⁰ that paint computerised data onto the real world might change the texture¹¹ of social interactions. 最后，持续不断的脸部记录行为以及能把经过计算机处理的数据投射到现实世界的各种小工具可能改变社会交往的结构。

Dissembling helps grease the wheels of daily life. 掩饰有助于日常生活的润滑。

If your partner can spot every suppressed yawn, and your boss every grimace¹² of irritation¹³, marriages and working relationships will be more truthful¹⁴, but less harmonious¹⁵. 如果伴侣能够发现每一个被强压下去的哈欠，如果老板能够发现每一个带着不满的苦相，婚姻和工作关系将会更加诚实，但是，却少了一些和谐。

 

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