每周一篇经济学人重点笔记。本周关注人工智能。

评论区置顶处有获取本文全文双语和音频的方式哦，要记得看到最后，还有很好听的歌~~

A GLIMPSE into the future of retailing is available in a smallish office in Hamburg. From there, Otto, a German e-commerce merchant, is using artificial intelligence (AI) to improve its activities. The firm is already deploying the technology to make decisions at a scale, speed and accuracy that surpass the capabilities of its human employees.

开头第一个词，a glimpse into the future of sth 瞥见…的未来，如果想要体现匆匆一瞥，前面可以加上定语，比如a brief/fleeting/quick glimpse。

smallish和small的区别在于，它比small更小，fairly small，非常小的。注意-ish这个词缀，表示rather，有点，颇，比如youngish还算年轻的，tallish略高的，reddish淡红色的。

merchant有个熟词僻义稍微提一下，可以表示爱好者，发烧友，但常见于英式英语，而且不太正式，带有贬义，比如a speed merchant好开快车的人。

Big data and “machine learning” have been used in retailing for years, notablyby Amazon, an e-commerce giant. The idea is to collect and analyse quantities of information to understand consumer tastes, recommend products to people and personalise websites for customers. Otto’s work stands out because it is already automating business decisions that go beyond customer management. The most important is trying to lower returns of products, which cost the firm millions of euros a year.

notably的写法是一定要掌握的，跟在主句后面，表示突出强调，将观点具体化，相当于especially, in particular。比如 The divorce would be granted when more important problems, notably the fate of the children, had been decided.更为重要的问题，尤其是孩子的问题得到解决后，离婚会获批准。

giant巨头，之前翻译群就总结过各种表示“巨头”的词，如下：

指公司的巨头：giant, behemoth

既可以指人也可以指公司的巨头：the big gun 

另外还有一些专指人的巨头有：titan, tycoon, magnate, big wig, grandee, top dog

stand out突出，也可以用这个词组表示最高级，比如，在东盟诸多对话伙伴关系中，中国—东盟关系最具活力、最富内涵，这是东盟国家的共识。All ASEAN members would agree that among ASEAN’s many dialogue partnerships, ASEAN plus China stands out as the most vibrant pair with the most substantial cooperation.要记住这个灵活的表达，下次可以用stand out as sth. 去替换最高级。

Its conventional data analysis showed that customers were less likely to return merchandise if it arrived within two days. Anything longer spelled trouble: a customer might spot the product in a shop for one euro less and buy it, forcing Otto to forgo the sale and eat the shipping costs.

spell一词跟invite, court一样，都表示招致不好的事情，所以在用这个词的时候要注意宾语得是trouble, disaster, danger, death等。来几个词典上的例句：

As a politician he has often courted controversy. 作为政治人物，他常常招致争议。

Any government that sells arms to dictators is inviting trouble.任何卖武器给独裁者的政府都是在自找麻烦。

前面出现了一个glimpse瞥见，这里的spot发现，这两个词都可以表示看见发现，但区别在于spot强调的是突然发现或注意到，而glimpse只是看一眼，通常还看不太清楚。

此处eat熟词僻义，因（商品滞销、倒账等）被迫承受生意亏损，承担费用（或损失等），比如to eat the damage承受损失。

But customers also dislike multiple shipments; they prefer to receive everything at once. Since Otto sells merchandise from other brands, and does not stock those goods itself, it is hard to avoid one of the two evils: shipping delays until all the orders are ready for fulfilment, or lots of boxes arriving at different times.

evil可以表示祸害，还有一个词组the lesser of two evils，也常见the lesser evil，表示两害之较轻者，两害相权取其轻，比如One suspects that hydro power is still the lesser evil.有人认为水力发电仍旧是两害相较取其轻。也是蛮好用的词组，记下来。

The typical solution would be slightly better forecasting by humans of what customers are going to buy so that a few goods could be ordered ahead of time. Otto went further and created a system using the technology of Blue Yonder, a startup in which it holds a stake. A deep-learning algorithm, which was originally designed for particle-physics experiments at the CERN laboratory in Geneva, does the heavy lifting. It analyses around 3bn past transactions and 200 variables (such as past sales, searches on Otto’s site and weather information) to predict what customers will buy a week before they order. 

前面两段提到过，notably可以表示突出强调一些具体案例，如果手上正好有一个案例比较突出，需要用一个句子来描写，那么可以用该案例主体做主语，搭配go further，后面跟and+另一个完整句或动词现在分词的状语，有点“更有甚者”的感觉。比如经济学人之前的一篇文：Some educationalists go further, arguing that facts get in the way of skills such as creativity and critical thinking. 这些教育学家更进一步，认为知识妨碍了创造力和批判性思维等能力的发展。

heavy lifting，从字面就能猜出词义，重活累活，挑大梁 assume the heavy lifting。

The initiative suggests that an important role of AI in business may be simply to make existing processes work better. Otto did not fire anyone as a result of its new algorithmic approach: it hired more, instead. In many cases AI will not affect a firm’s overall headcount, but will perform tasks at a level of productivity that people could not achieve. Otto’s experience also underlines that ordinary companies can use AI, not just giants such as Amazon and Google, notes Dave Selinger, a retailing-technology expert and former data scientist at Amazon. The degree to which the company has yielded control to an algorithm, he says, is extremely unusual. But it may not be long before others catch up.

headcount公司员工总数，跟我们中文里常说或的“人头数”有异曲同工之妙。“点人头”也是用这个词，比如The teachers did a headcount to check that none of the kids were missing.老师们清点学生人数以核实没有孩子丢失。

关于long before，做一个梳理，还蛮容易弄混的。long before很早以前，before long=soon很快，long after很久以后。

还有哪些词可以完美替换fire解雇呢？sack, dismiss, lay off都可以表示炒鱿鱼，后面宾语直接跟被解雇的人。如果只是想笼统地表达裁员，则可以是cut/reduce/slash/downsize the workforce, make workers redundant。

倒数第二句的语法结构稍微梳理一下，意群层次如下：

The degree（主语） to which the company has yielded control to an algorithm（定语从句）, he says,（插入语） is（谓语） extremely unusual（表语）.

定语从句如果改写成正常语序的话就是the company has yielded control to an algorithm to the degree。

跟这种结构很像的，还有经常出现在法律文本里的to the extent that...之前翻译群总结过to the extent that...的翻译套路，大概如下：

如果。这里是指按照“如果”的意思去理解，而不是单纯地译为如果。比如：

A party may not rely on a failure of the other party to perform, to the extent thatsuch failure was caused by the first party's act or omission.

这个句子中，我们可以先试着用 if 去替换一下 to the extent that，然后理解。这个句子就变成：

A party may not rely on a failure of the other party to perform if such failure was caused by the first party's act or omission.

字面上的大致意思是：如果一方的作为或疏忽使得另一方无法履行义务，那么该方不得声称另一方不履行义务。

润色一下，就是：

一方因其作为或不作为而使得另一方不履行义务时，不得声称该另一方不履行义务。

也可以直接译为“如果”。比如：

To the extent that performances of the parties can be rendered simultaneously, the parties are bound to render them simultaneously unless the circumstances indicate otherwise. 如果合同方可同时履行义务，则双方应同时履行，有情况表明不能同时履行的除外。

不译。比如：

Except to the extent that the Contractor would have been entitled to payment for the work, the Contractor shall...除非承包商有权获得该工作的付款，否则……

仅限于。一般与 if 连用的时候翻译成”仅限于“。比如：

If and to the extent that the Contractor encounters any condition unforseeable,... 如果且仅限于承包商遇到任何不可预知的情况，……

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