New Al interprets ancient texts 追尋古老文字蹤跡，人工智能顯身手

王青

人工智能與人文共舞！由DeepMind推出的人工智能模型Ithaca可以幫助歷史學(xué)家修復(fù)受損的古老文字。

主題語境：人工智能篇幅：335詞建議用時(shí)：7分鐘

Named “Ithaca”after the Greek island home of Homer's King Odysseus， the modern Ithaca is a deep neural network architecture AI. It seeks to assist researchers in filling in crucial gaps in inscriptions（銘文）from Homer's time， restoring texts at the same time as well as accurately identifying the time and place they came from.

And， as New Atlas reports， the prospects look promising. So far Ithaca has shown a 62 percent success rate in restoring damaged texts， and a 71 percent success rate in identifying their original location along with the ability to accurately date the texts to within 30 years of their creation. The use of Ithaca alongside research by historians improved on the success rate of Ithaca alone in restoring damaged texts from 62 percent to 72 percent. Historians working unassisted by Ithaca had a success rate of 25 percent， so its astonishing possibilities have quickly become apparent.

“Just as microscopes and telescopes have extended the range of what scientists can do today， Ithaca aims to singularly strengthen and expand the capabilities to study one of the most significant periods of human history，”says Dr Yannis Assael， a co-author of the work.

The team believe that the model could be tuned to almost any ancient language，from Latin to Mayan to cuneiform. Further， it could possibly be capable of reading Greek literary texts written on papyrus（紙莎草紙）.

While scholars are excited at the possibilities the AI opens up， they warn about the need to proceed with extreme caution in using it to interpret the past. Prof. Peter Liddel， an expert in Greek history and epigraphy at the University of Manchester， acknowledged that the AI would certainly add to historians' toolbox. However， like scholars， the AI also has only the available ancient record to go by. “AI is powerful as a tool to help us ask questions about and make comparisons with the existing evidence，”he said.

Reading Check

1. What does the second paragraph focus on？

A. The market value of Ithaca.

B. The performance of Ithaca.

C. The historians' challenges.

D. The development of Ithaca.

2. How much does Ithaca alone raise the success rate in restoring damaged texts compared with historians？

A. By 10 percent.B. By 37 percent.

C. By 47 percent.D. By 62 percent.

3. How does Dr Yannis Assael feel about the use of Ithaca by historians？

A. Doubtful.B. Puzzled.C. Confident.D. Disapproving.

4. What does Prof. Peter Liddel mean with his words in the last paragraph？

A. AI will help answer most of historians' questions.

B. The nature of cultural activity will remain a mystery.

C. Historians can't rely much on Ithaca.

D. Historians today must not rush into any conclusions.

Language Study

I. Difficult sentence in the text

While scholars are excited at the possibilities the AI opens up， they warn about the need to proceed with extreme caution in using it to interpret the past.盡管學(xué)者們對(duì)人工智能帶來的前景激動(dòng)不已，但他們同時(shí)也提出警告：利用人工智能解讀過去時(shí)必須非常謹(jǐn)慎。

【點(diǎn)石成金】本句是一個(gè)主從復(fù)合句。while引導(dǎo)一個(gè)讓步狀語從句，to proceed為不定式短語作名詞need的后置定語。

II. Text-centered chunks

seek to do試圖做

fill in填充;填補(bǔ);填寫

as well as 也;和

look promising 看起來有希望

so far到目前為止

success rate 成功率

along with 與……一起

extend the range of 擴(kuò)大……的范圍

be capable of 能夠……

add to增加到

make comparisons with 與……做比較