Computer scientists have hoped to give robots technical skills to help them recognize, process and react to humor. But these attempts have mostly failed. AI (人工智能) experts say that in many cases, attempts to make robots understand humor end up producing funny results, but not in the way they were supposed to.
Tristan Miller studied more than 10,000 puns (双关语) in one research project. The pun is a kind of joke that uses a word with two meanings. For example, you could say, “Balloons do not like pop music.” The word “pop” can be a way of saying popular music; or can mean the sound a balloon makes when it explodes. But a robot might not get the joke. Tristan Miller says that is because humor is a kind of creative language that is extremely difficult for computer intelligence to understand.
Allison Bishop is a computer scientist and she also performs stand-up comedy. She explained that machines are trained to look for patterns. Comedy, on the other hand, relies on things that stay dose to a pattern, kit not completely within it. To be funny, humor should also not be predictable, Bishop said. This sets a great obstacle for a machine to recognize and understand what is funny.
Bishop says since robots have great difficulty understanding humor, she feels like it gives her better job security as a comedy performer. It even made her parents happy when her brother decided to become a full-time comedy writer because it meant he wouldn’t be replaced by a machine, she added.
Despite the difficulties, Darmstadt University’s Miller says there are good reasons to keep trying to teach humor to robots. It could make machines more relatable, especially if they can learn to understand sarcasm (讽刺), he noted. Humans use sarcasm to say one thing but mean another. But Kiki Hempelmann thinks differently. “Teaching AI systems humor may make them find it where it isn’t, and they may use it where it’s inappropriate,” he said. “Maybe bad AI will start killing people because it thinks something is funny,” he added.
12．What does the author most probably want to show in Paragraph 1?
A. Robots’ influence on the scientific development.
B. Robots’ challenges of making sense of humor.
C. Computer scientists’ devotion to technical skills.
D. Computer scientists’ concern about AI’s development.
13．Examples mentioned in Paragraphs 2 and 3 are intended to ___________-.
A. prove robots do poorly in funny work
B. explain robots aren’t as intelligent as humans
C. describe language is complex and changeable
D. show language can’t be taught in a set pattern
14．What does the underlined word “obstacle” in Paragraph 3 mean?
A. Barrier. B. Record.
C. Message. D. Possibility.
15．What can we infer about teaching AI system humor from the last paragraph?
A. It will end up in vain.
B. It may be a double-edged sword.
C. It may help improve humans’ humor.
D. It will attract more computer scientists.
答案 12-15：BDAB
Tristan Miller studied more than 10,000 puns (双关语) in one research project. The pun is a kind of joke that uses a word with two meanings. For example, you could say, “Balloons do not like pop music.” The word “pop” can be a way of saying popular music; or can mean the sound a balloon makes when it explodes. But a robot might not get the joke. Tristan Miller says that is because humor is a kind of creative language that is extremely difficult for computer intelligence to understand.
Allison Bishop is a computer scientist and she also performs stand-up comedy. She explained that machines are trained to look for patterns. Comedy, on the other hand, relies on things that stay dose to a pattern, kit not completely within it. To be funny, humor should also not be predictable, Bishop said. This sets a great obstacle for a machine to recognize and understand what is funny.
Bishop says since robots have great difficulty understanding humor, she feels like it gives her better job security as a comedy performer. It even made her parents happy when her brother decided to become a full-time comedy writer because it meant he wouldn’t be replaced by a machine, she added.
Despite the difficulties, Darmstadt University’s Miller says there are good reasons to keep trying to teach humor to robots. It could make machines more relatable, especially if they can learn to understand sarcasm (讽刺), he noted. Humans use sarcasm to say one thing but mean another. But Kiki Hempelmann thinks differently. “Teaching AI systems humor may make them find it where it isn’t, and they may use it where it’s inappropriate,” he said. “Maybe bad AI will start killing people because it thinks something is funny,” he added.
12．What does the author most probably want to show in Paragraph 1?
A. Robots’ influence on the scientific development.
B. Robots’ challenges of making sense of humor.
C. Computer scientists’ devotion to technical skills.
D. Computer scientists’ concern about AI’s development.
13．Examples mentioned in Paragraphs 2 and 3 are intended to ___________-.
A. prove robots do poorly in funny work
B. explain robots aren’t as intelligent as humans
C. describe language is complex and changeable
D. show language can’t be taught in a set pattern
14．What does the underlined word “obstacle” in Paragraph 3 mean?
A. Barrier. B. Record.
C. Message. D. Possibility.
15．What can we infer about teaching AI system humor from the last paragraph?
A. It will end up in vain.
B. It may be a double-edged sword.
C. It may help improve humans’ humor.
D. It will attract more computer scientists.
答案 12-15：BDAB
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