中国技术热潮：不能上餐的机器人服务员也受追捧
SHANGHAI — The mind-reading headsets won’t read minds. The fire-detecting machine has been declared a safety hazard. The robot waiter can’t be trusted with the soup.
上海——能读人想法的耳机什么都没读出来。检测火灾的机器人已被宣布为安全隐患。机器人服务员端汤让人不放心。
China is ready for the future, even if the future hasn’t quite arrived.
中国已为未来做好了准备，尽管未来尚未到来。
China has become a global technological force in just a few years. It is shaping the future of the internet. Its technology ambitions helped prompt the Trump administration to start a trade war. Hundreds of millions of people in China now use smartphones to shop online, pay their bills and invest their money, sometimes in ways more advanced than in the United States.
短短几年里，中国已成为全球技术主力，正在塑造着互联网的未来。中国的技术野心是促使特朗普政府发动贸易战的其中一个原因。中国目前有数亿人使用智能手机在网上购物、支付账单、做投资，其中一些方式要比美国更先进。
That has led many people in China to embrace technology full tilt, no matter how questionable. Robots wait on restaurant diners. Artificial intelligence marks up schoolwork. Facial recognition technology helps dole out everything from Kentucky Fried Chicken orders to toilet paper. China is in a competition with itself for the world record for dancing robots
这促使许多中国人全面拥抱了技术，不管某些技术还多么不成熟。机器人在餐厅为就餐者服务。人工智能给学生的作业打分。人脸识别技术在帮助分发从肯德基餐到卫生纸的各种东西。中国正在一次又一次地打破自己创下的跳舞机器人世界纪录。
That embrace of tech for tech’s sake — and the sometimes dubious results it leads to — were on display at the Global Intelligence and World Business Summit, held last month in Shanghai, which several luminaries in Chinese tech and academia were supposed to kick off with their minds.
这种为技术而接受技术——有时还包括接受它们带来的可疑结果——上个月在上海举行的“2018全球智能+新商业峰会”上有所展现，峰会邀请了中国技术界和学术界的几位名人，按照计划，他们将用意识来为峰会揭幕。
Donning black headbands that looked like implements of electroshock therapy, the seven men and two women onstage were told to envision themselves pressing a button. The headbands would transmit their brain activity to the robotic hand sharing the stage, which would then push a button to officially start the conference.
台上七男两女九个人戴着黑色头带，看上去像是要做电击治疗，他们被告知用脑子想象按按钮的动作。他们戴的头带会把他们的大脑活动传递给同在台上的机械手，然后，这个机械手会按一个标志着会议正式开始的按钮。
A countdown began. A camera put the robotic hand onto a huge screen above the stage. The people onstage seemed to concentrate. And then, nothing happened. The hand remained motionless. The camera panned away.
倒计时开始了。摄像机将拍摄的机械手投影到舞台上方一个巨大的屏幕上。台上的人似乎在聚精会神地想。接下来，什么都没发生。机械手毫无动静。摄像机转向了别的画面。
A spokesman for Yiou, the tech consultant that hosted the event, declined to comment except for: .
主办此次活动的技术咨询公司亿欧的发言人拒绝发表评论，只表示：（两个笑哭表情）。
机器人还会坏。在那里用午餐的一小时时间里，一名服务员有三次不得不把一个机器人放倒，用喷灯把卡在机器人身上各种轴承上的食物和垃圾烧掉。当记者问这名服务员，他是否担心机器人会抢走他的工作时，服务员笑了。 YUYANG LIU FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES.
All of this embarrasses some people in the Chinese tech scene. They warn that the excess exuberance is one sign of a venture capital bubble, which may be about to burst. Rather than show China’s newfound tech might, they argue, spectacles like dancing robots and ineffective mind readers cover up the country’s lack of progress in other areas.
这一切让中国技术界的一些人感到尴尬。他们警告说，技术市场的过度繁荣是风险投资泡沫的一个迹象，这个泡沫可能将要破灭。他们认为，机器人跳舞和不管用的读心技术之类的表演，并不是中国新取得的技术威力的展示，而是掩盖了中国在其他领域缺乏进展的事实。
Those deficiencies were made clear in April when the United States forbade American companies to sell chips, software and other technology to ZTE, a Chinese telecom company. ZTE was found to have violated American sanctions by selling products to Iran and North Korea. The ban brought the company to a virtual standstill.
中国的短处在今年4月显露无疑，当时，由于发现中国电信公司中兴通讯(ZTE)违反了美国的制裁，向伊朗和朝鲜出售产品，美国政府下令禁止美国公司向其出售芯片、软件和其他技术。该禁令让中兴实际上进入了停顿状态。
Chinese people shouldn’t lose touch with reality, warned Liu Yadong, chief editor of the state-run Science and Technology Daily. In a recent speech, he said that China still lagged the United States in tech, and that those who argued otherwise ran the risk of “tricking leaders, fooling the public and even fooling themselves.”
官方媒体《科技日报》总编辑刘亚东警告说，中国人不应该无视现实。刘亚东在最近的一篇演讲中说，中国在科学技术上仍落后于美国，那些不承认差距的人“忽悠了领导，忽悠了公众，甚至忽悠了自己”。
China isn’t the first country to get ahead of itself in tech. Japan at the height of its economic powers had robots that prepared sushi. More recently, Silicon Valley has gone gaga over more than a few pointless products, like Yo — the app that said only “yo” — and Juicero, the $700 juicer. Ultimately the exuberance could be a good thing for China, as useful products find their place and bad ones disappear when the boom matures.
中国并不是第一个夸大本国技术能力的国家。日本在其经济鼎盛时代曾推出过制作寿司的机器人。近年的硅谷也对一些毫无意义的产品着迷不已，比如只会说“Yo”的应用Yo，还有售价700美元的榨汁机Juicero。不过，这种繁荣对中国来说，可能最终是一件好事，因为在从快速增长到成熟的过程中，有用的产品会脱颖而出，坏的产品则会消失。
And China has come a long way. What was an agrarian backwater 40 years ago is home to the world’s single largest group of internet users and some of its most valuable internet companies.
中国已取得了很大的进步。40年前，中国曾是一个以农业为主的落后国家，如今这里有全球独一无二的、最大的互联网用户群，以及一些全球最有价值的互联网公司。
Now it’s pushing ahead into emerging tech. In 2017, Chinese start-ups took up nearly half the dollars raised globally for artificial intelligence, according to CB Insights, a research firm that follows venture capital. By 2020, China is expected to account for more than 30 percent of worldwide spending on robotics, according to technology research firm IDC.
现在，中国正在向新兴技术产业推进。据追踪风险投资的研究公司CB Insights的数据，2017年，中国初创企业拿到了全球人工智能方面集资的近一半。据从事技术研究的国际数据公司(IDC)的数据，预计到2020年，中国在机器人研发上的支出将占全球的30%以上。
Many in China see the country’s supremacy over the United States in tech as inevitable, and they are eager to get to that day.
中国有不少人认为，该国在技术领域超过美国是不可避免的，他们迫不及待地期待着这个日子的到来。
“Chinese are much more willing to try something new just because it looks cool,” said Andy Tian, chief executive of Beijing-based Asia Innovations Group, which runs mobile apps. “It sounds superficial. It is superficial. But that’s the driver of progress in a lot of cases.”
“中国人更愿意尝试新东西，只是因为这些东西看起来很酷，”总部设在北京的亚洲创新集团首席执行官田行智说，该公司从事移动应用业务。“这听起来浅薄，是表面的东西。但在许多情况下，这也在推动进步。”
The E-Patrol Robotic Sheriff could fill that bill. It is among several security robots that have shown up at train stations and airports around China in recent months. The E-Patrol Robotic Sheriff — which looks like the camera lens from the HAL 9000 computer in “2001: A Space Odyssey” mounted on a white trash tub — patrols the high-speed rail station in the central Chinese city Zhengzhou, tasked with using facial recognition to find and follow suspicious characters, as well as to measure air quality and detect fires.
电子巡逻机器人警察(E-Patrol Robotic Sheriff)可能就是这样的例子。它是近几个月来出现在中国各地火车站和机场的保安机器人之一。电子巡逻机器人警察的样子看起来像是把影片《2001太空漫遊》(2001: A Space Odyssey)中的计算机HAL 9000的摄像镜头安装在了一个白色垃圾箱上。中国中部城市郑州的高铁火车站用过电子巡逻机器人警察巡逻，其任务包括通过人脸识别寻找和跟踪可疑人员，以及测量空气质量和探测火灾。
During a winter visit to the station, the robot was nowhere to be found. First, it had missed a fire, officials said. It also had a tendency to collect so many selfie-seeking fans that it became a safety hazard. A spokesman for the train station said it was getting an upgrade and would eventually return.
记者冬天去这个火车站访问时没有找到这种机器人。官员说，第一个原因是，这个机器人未能检测到一次火灾。第二，机器人警察吸引了太多想与之自拍的人，以至于它本身已成为安全隐患。火车站的一位发言人说，正在对机器人警察进行升级改造，它最终会回来。
Robots in particular have captured the Chinese imagination. A Beijing television station this year made a robot-dominated version of the country’s annual Lunar New Year television special. Robots and humans performed tai chi and comedy routines, and sang and danced.
机器人尤其让中国人心生向往。北京一家电视台今年制作了一个以机器人为主的春节联欢晚会。晚会上，机器人与人一起表演太极和喜剧小品，一起唱歌跳舞。
Companies and local officials often have good reason to show off their splashiest and silliest wares. China frequently takes a top-down approach to technology, with local governments rushing to follow plans that come down from on high. Gizmos with a bit of futuristic verve are often the best symbols of progress.
企业和地方官员经常有很好的理由来炫耀他们最招摇、最荒唐的产品。中国经常靠自上而下的手段来推动技术发展，结果是地方政府急于完成上面布置下来的计划。有点儿未来主义感的小玩意通常是进步的最好象征。
Dancing robots, for example, became something of a fixture of company and government presentations last year. “They were everywhere,” said David Li, a co-founder of Shenzhen Open Innovation Lab, a government-supported platform that supports small hardware start-ups in Shenzhen. He estimated that he had seen 10 dancing robot shows in a single week.
以跳舞机器人为例，去年，跳舞机器人成了公司和政府成果展上的一个固定项目。“到处都可以看到它们，”深圳开放创新实验室的联合创始人李大维说，该实验室有来自政府的资金，专门支持深圳的小型硬件初创企业。李大维估计他在一周里看到了10场机器人舞蹈表演。
Alibaba, the Chinese online shopping giant, has also gotten into the act, though in a more sophisticated way. At one of its new Hema grocery stores in Shanghai, rolling robots take cooked food out onto a sort of runway that connects the kitchen to seating. A team of waiters standing nearby said a human hand was required for soup and steamed dishes, lest the robots inadvertently splash someone with hot liquid.
中国在线购物巨头阿里巴巴也加入到这个行动中来，不过是以更先进的方式。机器人在阿里巴巴在上海新开的盒马鲜生实体店里跑来跑去，把做熟的食品放在一条将厨房与餐桌连接起来的传送带上。站在传送带边上的一队服务员说，汤和蒸的东西仍需要人来端，以免机器人不小心把热液体洒到人的身上。
An Alibaba spokeswoman said in an email that the store was a prototype that sought to combine digitization with a unique consumer experience. “The system has driven significant traffic to the Hema store,” she added.
阿里巴巴的一位发言人在一封电子邮件中说，该店是一个寻求将数字化与独特的消费体验结合起来的雏形。“这个系统已给盒马店带来了巨大的客流量，”该发言人补充说。
Robot restaurants have been popping up across China. One in Shanghai’s Xujiahui district, Robot Magic Restaurant, cultivates a space-age, mini-golf ambience. Diners enter through a door on which animated fairies flap their wings. Inside, a robot with hearts for eyes charged its batteries in an ersatz cave rimmed by silver stalagmites tipped with glowing white lights. On the ceiling, fake stars twinkled.
使用机器人的餐厅已在中国遍地开花。上海徐家汇的机器人魔力餐厅(Robot Magic Restaurant)给人以一种太空时代迷你高尔夫的氛围。用餐者从显示扇着翅膀的仙女的动画门进来。餐厅里，一个长着心形眼睛的机器人在一个人造山洞里给自己的电池充电，洞里镶嵌着银色的石笋，上面点缀着发白光的小灯。天花板上闪烁着假的星星。
Waiters said their automated counterparts caused more work than they saved. The robots take trays of food out to customers, but are unable to lower them to the table. Real waiters stand back so photos and videos can be taken before shuffling in and serving food the old-fashioned way.
服务员说，机器人服务员给他们带来了更多、而不是更少的工作。机器人能把放食品的托盘送到顾客面前，但无法将其降低放到餐桌上。真人服务员先得躲得远远的，让就餐者给机器人拍照片、拍视频，然后再走上前来，用老方式上菜。
The robots also break down. Three times during an hour lunch, a waiter had to lean a robot on its side and take a blowtorch to the undercarriage to burn out food and trash caught in its axles. When asked whether he was worried that the robots would take his job, the waiter laughed.
机器人还会坏。在那里用午餐的一小时时间里，一名服务员有三次不得不把一个机器人放倒，用喷灯把卡在机器人身上各种轴承上的食物和垃圾烧掉。当记者问这名服务员，他是否担心机器人会抢走他的工作时，服务员笑了。
Still, patrons were impressed.
不过，机器人很让顾客佩服。
“I’ve just been to America, and I didn’t see many new things at all,” said Xie Aijuan, a retiree in her 50s. “I don’t think they have anything like robotic restaurants there.”
“我刚从美国回来，在那里没看到太多新的东西，”50多岁的退休人员谢爱娟（音）说。“我想他们那里是没有机器人餐厅的。”
“China is surpassing America,” agreed her dining companion, Zhuang Jiazheng. “Robots are coming. Tech is advancing. It’s all a matter of time.”
“中国正在超越美国，”与她一起用餐的庄家生（音）同意她的说法。“机器人时代正在到来。技术正在前进。这只是时间的问题。”
本文作者孟宝勒(Paul Mozur)是《纽约时报》驻上海记者。他报道的领域包括亚洲最大的科技公司、网络安全、新兴互联网文化、审查以及亚洲地缘政治与科技的交叉点。他此前在《华尔街日报》供职。
翻译：Cindy Hao
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