機器人烏托邦 不用勞動坐領工資

Let’s say computers come for most of our jobs. This may not seem likely at the moment; computer scientists and economists offer wildly varying ideas for how deeply automation will affect future employment.

讓我們假設，計算機會取代我們大多數的崗位。這看起來可能不像當下會發生的事；對於自動化會在多大程度上影響未來的職場，計算機科學家和經濟學家都提出了各種不同的大膽設想。

But for the sake of argument, imagine that within two or three decades we’ll have morphed into the Robotic States of America.

但爲了便於討論，這裏權且假設，在接下來的二三十年裏，我們將逐漸演變爲美利堅機器人國。

In Robot America, most manual laborers will have been replaced by herculean bots. Truck drivers, cabbies, delivery workers and airline pilots will have been superseded by vehicles that do it all. Doctors, lawyers, business executives and even technology columnists for The New York Times will have seen their ranks thinned by charming, attractive, all-knowing algorithms.

在機器人美國，大多數體力勞動者將被力大無比的機器人替代。卡車和出租車司機、快遞員及航空公司飛行員，都將被全能的自動駕駛運載工具取代。醫生、律師、企業管理人員，乃至《紐約時報》的科技專欄作者的地位，也會因無所不知、魅力無限的算法的出現而被削弱。

How will society function after humanity has been made redundant? Technologists and economists have been grappling with this fear for decades, but in the last few years, one idea has gained widespread interest — including from some of the very technologists who are now building the bot-ruled future.

當人類成爲一種多餘的存在，社會將會如何運轉？技術專家和經濟學家已經和這種擔憂鬥爭了幾十年，但在過去幾年，有一種觀念引起了人們普遍的興趣，包括一些正在建設由機器人主宰的未來的技術專家們。

Their plan is known as “universal basic income,” or U.B.I., and it goes like this: As the jobs dry up because of the spread of artificial intelligence, why not just give everyone a paycheck?

這項計劃稱爲“全民基本收入”（Universal Basic Income，簡稱UBI），其核心點如下：既然工作機會因人工智能的普及而日益減少，幹嘛不直接給每個人發一份薪酬？

Imagine the government sending each adult about $1,000 a month, about enough to cover housing, food, health care and other basic needs for many Americans. U.B.I. would be aimed at easing the dislocation caused by technological progress, but it would also be bigger than that.

想象一下，政府給每個成年人每月發放大約1000美元。這些錢基本足夠大多數美國人支付住房、食物、醫療和其他基本需求方面的開支。UBI的目標是緩解由技術進步引發的錯位，但它又不止於此。

While U.B.I. has been associated with left-leaning academics, feminists and other progressive activists, it has lately been adopted by a wider range of thinkers, including some libertarians and conservatives. It has also gained support among a cadre of venture capitalists in New York and Silicon Valley, the people most familiar with the potential for technology to alter modern work.

儘管UBI一直被認爲和左傾的學術界人士、女權主義者和其他進步派活動人士有關，但它最近被範圍更廣的思想人士所採納，包括一些自由意志論者和保守派。它還得到了紐約和硅谷一撥風險投資人的支持，而這些人最清楚技術改變未來工作狀況的潛力有多大。

Rather than a job-killing catastrophe, tech supporters of U.B.I. consider machine intelligence to be something like a natural bounty for society: The country has struck oil, and now it can hand out checks to each of its citizens.

認同UBI的科技業支持者覺得，與其把人工智能看作一場扼殺人類工作機會的災難，不如把它看作賜予這個社會的饋贈：這個國家行了大運，現在它可以給每個公民分發支票了。

These supporters argue machine intelligence will produce so much economic surplus that we could collectively afford to liberate much of humanity from both labor and suffering.

這些支持者認爲，機器智能將實現非常之多的經濟盈餘，乃至我們在整體上能讓大部分人類免於勞作和受苦。

The most idealistic thinkers see the plan as a way to foster the sort of quasi-utopian future we’ve only encountered in science fiction universes like that of “Star Trek.” As computers perform more of our work, we’d all be free to become artists, scholars, entrepreneurs or otherwise engage our passions in a society no longer centered on the drudgery of daily labor.

最爲理想主義的思考者將這個計劃看作一種手段，認爲它可以幫我們實現只在《星際迷航》(Star Trek)等科幻小說領域見識過的類似烏托邦的未來。當計算機包攬了更多工作，我們就都自由了，可以隨自己的意願做藝術家、學者和創業者，或以其他方式將我們的激情投入到這個不再圍繞繁重無聊的日常勞作運轉的社會。

“We’re talking about divorcing your basic needs from the need to work,” said Albert Wenger, a venture capitalist at Union Square Ventures, a proponent who is working on a book about U.B.I. “For a couple hundred years, we’ve constructed our entire world around the need to work. Now we’re talking about more than just a tweak to the economy — it’s as foundational a departure as when we went from an agrarian society to an industrial one.”

“我們說的是，讓工作的需要和人們的基本需求不再緊密相連，”合廣投資(Union Square Ventures)風投人艾伯特·文格爾(Albert Wenger)說。他是UBI的倡導者之一，正在撰寫一本有關的著作。“幾百年來，我們的整個世界都是圍繞着工作的需要建造起來的。現在我們要討論的不是經濟上的微調，而是像從農業社會進入工業社會那麼大的根本性轉變。”

Sam Altman, president of the tech incubator Y Combinator, recently proposed to fund research into U.B.I. The firm has received thousands of applications for research funding, Mr. Altman said; it plans to select winning recipients within a few weeks, and ultimately Y Combinator plans to spend “tens of millions” of dollars on research to answer some of the most basic questions about life under U.B.I.

孵化技術創業公司的Y Combinator公司總裁薩姆·奧爾特曼(Sam Altman)最近打算給針對UBI的研究提供一些資助。奧爾特曼表示，公司已經收到數千份研究資金申請；它計劃在幾周內篩選出最終獲得該項目資金的人選。Y Combinator計劃在這項研究上總共投入“數以千萬計”的美元，它們將爲在UBI之下生活的一些最基本的問題尋找答案。

Mr. Altman said these questions range from the most practical — how much U.B.I. would cost the country, and whether we could afford it — to deeper issues concerning people’s motivation and purpose in what you might call a “postwork” age.

奧爾特曼還表示，這些問題範圍很廣，從最爲實際的UBI需要國家花費多少資金，我們能否負擔得起，到更爲深刻的有關人們在“後工作”時代生活動力和目標的擔憂。

When you give everyone free money, what do people do with their time? Do they goof off, or do they try to pursue more meaningful pursuits? Do they become more entrepreneurial? How would U.B.I. affect economic inequality? How would it alter people’s psychology and mood? Do we, as a species, need to be employed to feel fulfilled, or is that merely a legacy of postindustrial capitalism?

當每個人都可以不用工作就獲得收入，他們會如何打發自己的時間？他們會虛度時光，還是努力追求更有意義的東西？他們會更有創業的慾望嗎？UBI會對經濟不平等產生什麼影響？它會如何改變人們的心理和情緒？作爲一個物種，我們是需要被受僱做事才能感覺充實，還是說那只是後工業化資本主義遺留的習慣？

There is an urgency to the techies’ interest in U.B.I. They argue that machine intelligence reached an inflection point in the last couple of years, and that technological progress now looks destined to change how most of the world works.

科技人士對於UBI的興趣包含着一種緊迫性。他們認爲，人工智能在過去幾十年達到了一個拐點，覺得現在看起來，技術進步註定會改變這個世界大多數領域的運轉方式。

“People have been predicting that jobs would go away for a long time, and usually what happens is they just change,” Mr. Altman said. But even so, “during those periods of change, things can be quite disruptive,” and at the very least, U.B.I. may be able to smooth out the transition period.

“人們預測工作會消失已經有很長時間了，現實往往是，它們只是發生了改變，”奧爾特曼說。但即便如此，“在改變發生的時期，情況可能會非常混亂，”而UBI至少能讓這個轉型階段更平穩地過去。

We may already be seeing the disruptions. Though the macroeconomic statistics suggest the United States has recovered from the last recession — job growth in 2015 reached levels not seen since the 1990s — surveys show that many Americans feel vulnerable and anxious about their jobs and finances.

我們可能已經看到了一些這樣的擾亂。儘管宏觀數據顯示，美國已經從最近的一次經濟衰退中恢復——2015年工作機會增長幅度達到自1990年代以來不曾有過的程度——但有調查問卷顯示，很多美國人覺得自己的工作和財務狀況並不穩固，併爲此感到焦慮。

A cynic might see the interest of venture capitalists in U.B.I. as a way for them to atone for their complicity in the tech that might lead to permanent changes in the global economy. After all, here are rich people who both actively fund and benefit from creating highly profitable companies that employ very few people.

多疑的人可能會認爲，風險投資者對於UBI的興趣，只是因爲他們在科技業中參與了一場可能永遠改變全球經濟的運動，如今他們想要做出一些彌補。畢竟，在創建利潤豐厚、僱員極少的企業方面，這些富人既進行了積極的投資，也從中大量獲利。

But my conversations with techies interested in U.B.I. revealed a sincerity and sophistication about the idea. They aren’t ashamed or afraid of automation, and they don’t see U.B.I. merely as a defense of the current social order. Instead they see automation and U.B.I. as the most optimistic path toward wider social progress.

但經過和一些對UBI感興趣的科技業人士的交談，我發現他們對這種理念的態度是真摯而成熟的。他們並不以自動化爲恥，也不懼怕它，他們不認爲UBI只是當下社會秩序的一種防禦。在他們看來，自動化和UBI是最有希望取得更廣泛社會進步的一條路。

“I think it’s a bad use of a human to spend 20 years of their life driving a truck back and forth across the United States,” Mr. Wenger said. “That’s not what we aspire to do as humans — it’s a bad use of a human brain — and automation and basic income is a development that will free us to do lots of incredible things that are more aligned with what it means to be human.”

“我認爲讓一個人花20年時間開卡車，在美國各地來回跑，是在耽誤一個生命，”文格爾說。“那不是我們作爲人類所追求的——它沒有恰當利用人的大腦——自動化和UBI是一種進步，可以讓我們解脫出來，去做很多不可思議的事，去做更符合人類這一身份的事。”