[(Title)] Driverless, autonomous cars present ethical challenges — so how do we write the laws?

Driverless cars could make our roads safer and reduce congestion. But the algorithms driving them will also have to make life-or-death decisions.

无人驾驶汽车将使我们的道路更安全，减少拥堵，但驱动这些汽车的算法也必须做出生命或死亡决策。

At some stage in the future, a fully autonomous car may determine who lives and who dies on our roads.

将来的某个阶段，一辆完全自主的汽车可能决定谁活着，谁死在我们的道路上。

These machines are being tested right now and Australian politicians are looking overseas for leadership, emboldened by the promise of fewer fatalities and less congestion.

这些机器目前正在测试中，澳大利亚政客正在寻找海外领导班子。

At the moment, there must be a human behind the wheel of these cars at all times, but government agencies are already working on a legal framework for when machines are totally in control.

目前，这些汽车车轮的背后一定有一个人，但政府机构已经在制定机器完全处于控制状态的法律框架。

The Germans — with an established car industry — have developed some simple rules: the machine must harm the fewest possible people and treat all life equally.

德国人，拥有成熟的汽车工业，制定了一些简单的规则：这台机器必须伤害最少的人和平等地对待所有生命。

So what would you do?

那你怎么办呢？

A car programmed to harm the fewest possible people would swerve into a wall, injuring you, rather than hit the three pedestrians.

一辆计划伤害最少的人的车会转向隔离墙。

If you ask Australia's chief scientist, Alan Finkel, German lawmakers are trying to reduce a tough moral argument about the value of human life into a simple formula.

如果你问澳大利亚的首席科学家艾伦·芬克尔，德国立法者正试图把关于人类生命价值的强硬的道德争论减少为一种简单的公式。

He says scenarios like this one trigger difficult but necessary discussions about ethics, the value of human life and how we regulate technology.

他说，这样的情景引发了关于伦理、人类生活的价值以及我们如何规范技术而必要的讨论。

While Australia is a few years away from seeing fully autonomous cars hit the roads, Dr Finkel says it's time for a serious debate about whether a legal framework like the German one would work here.

虽然澳大利亚距离看到完全自主的车辆撞上道路还有几年时间，芬克尔博士说，现在是时候认真讨论像德国这样的法律框架是否在这里发挥作用了。

In crude terms, the German rules specify that if a crash is unavoidable, a car would be programmed to hurt the fewest people possible.

从粗略意义上讲，德国的规则规定，如果坠机不可避免，汽车将被设计成伤害可能最少的人。

The machine's algorithms wouldn't consider a person's family ties, profession, fame, criminal record, gender, age or any other factors.

机器的算法不会考虑一个人的家庭关系、职业、名誉、犯罪记录、性别、年龄或任何其他因素。

"It's a sensible rule but is it the right rule?" Dr Finkel asks.

“这是一条合理的规则，但这是正确的规则？”芬克尔博士问道。

"Well, that's for ethicists and politicians to debate."

“嗯，这是给伦理学家和政治家辩论的。”

It's a debate that gets more complex and delicate when real humans are involved.

当真正的人类参与其中，这场争论变得更加复杂和微妙。

With no time to brake, a car programmed to harm the fewest possible people would hit the road works. That would injure you and your child, but save the pedestrians.

没有时间刹车，一辆计划伤害最少的人的汽车会撞上道路工程，那样会伤害你和你的孩子，但拯救行人。

Germany is home to some of the world's biggest car companies and these rules are an attempt to give manufacturers certainty before they develop fully autonomous vehicles.

德国是世界上一些最大的汽车公司的所在地，这些规则试图在制造商开发完全自主的车辆之前就给制造商带来确定性。

"They must be able to rely on absolutely clear ethical principles being observed in the development and design of technology," the German guidelines say.

德国的指导方针说：“他们必须能够依靠在技术开发和设计中所遵循的绝对明确的伦理原则。

Whether we agree with these rules or not, they raise a question about what role government should play in regulating an industry and technology that is still developing.

不管我们是否同意这些规则，他们提出一个问题，即政府在监管仍在发展的行业和技术方面应该发挥什么作用。

The Federal Government has been accused of lagging on driverless cars, but it's set aside $30 million to improve machine learning and develop a new "artificial intelligence ethics framework".

联邦政府被控落后于无人驾驶，但已拨出3 000万美元用于改进机器学习和发展新的"人工智能道德框架"。

That will guide the "responsible development" of technology and could eventually serve a similar function to the German rules.

这将引导技术的"负责任的发展"，并最终发挥与德国规则类似的功能。

The National Transport Commission (NTC), which advises federal and state governments on this issue, is now working on new laws for driverless cars. It's already developed rules for trials across Australia.

国家交通委员会（NTC）就这一问题向联邦政府和州政府提供咨询意见，该委员会目前正在制定新的无人车辆检查法，它已经制定了在澳大利亚全国范围内进行审判的规则。

Some car manufacturers think it's too early to develop these laws, given we're a long way away from stage-five autonomous cars and we don't know what the technology will look like in a decade.

一些汽车制造商认为，制定这些法律还为时过早，因为我们远离了五级自主汽车，而且我们不知道在十年中，这项技术会是什么样子。

But others, like the Transport Workers Union, want the Government to act now to ensure difficult decisions are not influenced by commercial interests.

但是，其他一些组织，如运输工人工会一样，希望政府现在就采取行动，确保困难的决定不会受到商业利益的影响。

"Leaving these decisions to technology and its programmers is unacceptable," the union told a Senate hearing.

工会告诉参议院听证会：“将这些决定留给技术及其程序员是不可接受的。”

That would leave the Government to regulate tough decisions like these.

这将使政府能够管理诸如此类的艰难决定。

Your car could swerve to avoid the child, but on either side it would hit an obstruction, injuring you. Alternatively, it could hit the child but save you. The German ethical guidelines are unclear.

你的车可以转向避开孩子，但是任何一方都会受到阻碍。

It's an uncomfortable reality, but a car programmed to harm the fewest possible people might be compelled, in some circumstances, to sacrifice passengers to save others.

这是一个令人不快的现实，但是计划伤害最少人的汽车可能在某些情况下被迫牺牲乘客来拯救他人。

This presents a challenge for companies trying to sell those cars.

这对试图出售这些汽车的公司来说是一个挑战。

Research from MIT shows while people overwhelmingly support driverless cars being programmed to hurt the fewest people possible in an unavoidable crash, they don't want to be in them.

麻省理工学院的研究显示，当人们压倒性支持无人车辆的计划是为了在不可避免的车祸中伤害最少的人，他们不想加入他们。

Mercedes Benz boss Christoph von Hugo was widely misquoted in 2016 as saying his cars would prioritise passengers over pedestrians.

梅赛德斯奔驰的老板克里斯托夫.冯.雨果(Christoph von Hugo)在2016年被广泛引用，称他的汽车将优先考虑行人的乘客。

The company went on the front foot, saying it was simply illegal for a machine to weigh up the value of life and this could only be solved through a lengthy legal and ethical debate.

该公司一直坚持下去，说机器权衡生命的价值简直不合法，这只能通过长期的法律和道德辩论来解决。

Hussein Dia, a civil engineer who researches driverless cars for Swinburne University, says this proves why some form of the German rules is necessary.

Swinburnne大学研究无车辆的民事工程师Hussein Dia说，这证明了为什么德国某些形式的规则是必要的。

"We need to have that discussion quickly or it's going to be dictated to us," he told the ABC.

他告诉ABC说：“我们需要迅速讨论这个问题，不然就要听从我们的指示。"

The German rules redefine our understanding of who is liable for accidents and highlight a change that's likely coming to Australia.

德国的规则重新定义了我们对谁应对事故负责的理解，并强调了澳大利亚可能产生的变化。

When humans make split-second decisions behind the wheel of a car, those decisions have consequences. If we're negligent we may face an insurance claim and, in serious cases, criminal prosecution.

当人类在汽车车轮后做第二次决定时，这些决定会产生后果。如果我们疏忽，我们可能面临保险索赔，并在严重情况下受到刑事起诉。

So when an accident does occur, will it be the passenger or the manufacturer who is held responsible?

所以，事故发生时，应由乘客或制造商负责吗？

"Today, a lot of our liability regimes are premised on liability sitting with the driver, but in a world where the vehicle is completely in control, it doesn't make sense to attach liability to the passengers," Victoria's Urban Infrastructure Minister, Paul Fletcher, says.

"今天，我们的许多赔偿责任制度都以司机承担的赔偿责任为前提，但在车辆完全控制下的世界中，对乘客负有责任是没有道理的，"维多利亚州城市基础设施部部长保罗·弗莱彻说。

The Federal Opposition takes a similar approach, saying we need to have these discussions now before fully autonomous cars become available.

联邦反对派采取了类似的做法，表示现在需要进行这些讨论，才能获得完全自主的汽车。

These aren't hypothetical arguments, because driverless cars — even at this early stage, with a passenger behind the wheel — have killed people.

这些并非假设论据，因为无人驾驶的汽车甚至在早期阶段，有一名乘客在车轮后驾驶，都杀死了人。

In March, Elaine Herzberg was killed while pushing her bike across the road. Her death was tipped as a legal test case, but the company settled with the family for an undisclosed fee.

3月，Elaine Herzberg在推着自行车横穿马路时被撞死。

As Dr Finkel points out, Australian courts may judge car companies more harshly than humans.

正如芬克尔医生所指出的，澳大利亚法院可能比人类对汽车公司的评判更为严厉。

"The court understands that if you've only been given one second to make a decision, you might make a decision that another reasonable person might not have made," Dr Finkel says.

芬克尔医生说：“法院的理解是，如果你只获得了一秒钟的裁判，你可以做出另一个理智的人可能没有做出的决定。“

"We understand for human beings that it's complex. We allow a lot of different decisions to be made.

"我们理解人类是复杂的，我们允许作出许多不同的决定。”

"Will we be as generous to a computerised algorithm that can run at much faster speeds than we can? I don't know."

“我们会对计算机的算法如此慷慨，它能够以比我们速度快得多的速度运行吗？我不知道。”

These questions are even more problematic when the rules don't give a clear answer on what a car should do.

当规则没有明确回答汽车应该怎么做时，这些问题就更成问题。

When it comes to a court, how would a judge determine guilt?

当提到法庭时，法官如何判定有罪？

A car programmed to harm the fewest possible people would save the jaywalkers. With traffic in the other lane, it would have to swerve onto the footpath and injure you and a bystander.

一辆计划伤害最少的人的汽车可以救掉那些越野的人，因为另一条道路上的交通，它就不得不转上小路，伤害你和旁观者。

Many car manufacturers are coy when asked when fully autonomous cars will be on our roads.

当被问及什么时候完全自主的汽车出现在我们的道路上时,许多汽车制造商都显得焦躁。

In an incredibly competitive market, some are reluctant to put a date on a roll-out or give away well-guarded company plans.

在一个令人难以置信的竞争性市场中，有些人不愿预约展期或放弃有戒备森严的公司计划。

But the consensus is, we're still some way away.

但共识是，我们仍然任重道远。

The majority of 300 industry figures informally polled by Bloomberg New Energy Finance say we won't see stage-five cars until at least 2030, but stage-four vehicles could roll out within the next five years.

彭博新能源金融公司(Bloomberg New Energy Finance)非正式调查的300个行业多数数字表示，至少在2030年之前，我们不会看到五级汽车，但四级汽车可以在未来五年内推出。

But both sides of federal politics know they need to ensure regulation keeps pace with technological developments.

但联邦政界双方都知道他们需要确保监管跟上技术发展。

The argument is really whether they're acting fast enough.

争论的真正原因是他们是否行动够快。