I'm an artist and an engineer.?And lately, I've been thinking a lot about how technology mediates?the way we perceive reality.?And it's being done in a superinvisible and nuanced way.?Technology is designed to shape our sense of reality?by masking itself as the actual experience of the world.?As a result, we are becoming unconscious and unaware?that it is happening at all.

我是一位藝術家兼工程師。最近，我一直在思考科技在以怎樣的方式影響我們感知現(xiàn)實的能力。這種影響是潛移默化的?？萍纪ㄟ^偽裝對現(xiàn)實的真實體驗，來塑造我們對現(xiàn)實的感知。于是，我們對正在發(fā)生的一切變得毫無意識，也毫無察覺。

?Take the glasses I usually wear, for example.?These have become part of the way I ordinarily experience my surroundings.?I barely notice them,?even though they are constantly framing reality for me.?The technology I am talking about is designed to do the same thing:?change what we see and think?but go unnoticed.

就拿我平時戴的眼鏡舉例。眼鏡變成我平日里體驗周圍環(huán)境方式的一部分。盡管它們一直框住了我的現(xiàn)實世界，我也很少注意到它們的存在。我現(xiàn)在所說的科技也被設計成做同樣的事：不知不覺地改變著我們的所見所思。

?Now, the only time I do notice my glasses?is when something happens to draw my attention to it,?like when it gets dirty or my prescription changes.?So I asked myself, "As an artist, what can I create?to draw the same kind of attention?to the ways digital media -- like news organizations, social media platforms,?advertising and search engines --?are shaping our reality?"?So I created a series of perceptual machines?to help us defamiliarize and question?the ways we see the world.

如今，我很少意識到我?guī)е坨R，除非發(fā)生了一些事情，引起我的注意，比如，眼鏡臟了，或者度數(shù)不夠了。所以我自問：“作為一名藝術家，我能創(chuàng)造出什么作品，來吸引注意力，就如同數(shù)字媒體那樣——像新聞機構、社交媒體平臺、廣告，和搜索引擎——來塑造我們的現(xiàn)實？”所以我創(chuàng)造了一系列的感知機器來幫助我們陌生化并質(zhì)疑我們看世界的方式。

?For example, nowadays, many of us have this kind of allergic reaction?to ideas that are different from ours.?We may not even realize that we've developed this kind of mental allergy.?So I created a helmet that creates this artificial allergy to the color red.?It simulates this hypersensitivity by making red things look bigger?when you are wearing it.?It has two modes: nocebo and placebo.?

例如，現(xiàn)在我們很多人對持有不同觀點的人有著這樣一種過敏反應。我們可能甚至都沒意識到我們已經(jīng)產(chǎn)生了這樣一種“精神過敏”。所以我做了一個頭盔，對紅色產(chǎn)生人工過敏。當你佩戴頭盔時，它會通過放大紅色物體，來模擬這一超敏反應。它有兩種模式：非安慰劑效應和安慰劑效應。

?In nocebo mode, it creates this sensorial experience of hyperallergy.?Whenever I see red, the red expands.?It's similar to social media's amplification effect,?like when you look at something that bothers you,?you tend to stick with like-minded people?and exchange messages and memes, and you become even more angry.?Sometimes, a trivial discussion gets amplified?and blown way out of proportion.

?在非安慰劑模式下，頭盔可以創(chuàng)造超敏的感官體驗。只要我看到紅色，紅色就會膨脹開來。這和社交媒體的放大效應類似，就像你在看到某些不喜歡的言論，你會傾向于去找和自己想法一樣的人交換信息和表情包，然后你變得更加生氣。有時，無關緊要的小討論會被放大、夸張到不合時宜的程度。

?Maybe that's even why we are living in the politics of anger.?In placebo mode, it's an artificial cure for this allergy.?Whenever you see red, the red shrinks.?It's a palliative, like in digital media.?When you encounter people with different opinions,?we will unfollow them,?remove them completely out of our feeds.?It cures this allergy by avoiding it.?But this way of intentionally ignoring opposing ideas?makes human community hyperfragmented and separated.

可能這就是“憤怒政治”出現(xiàn)的原因。在安慰劑模式下，有種針對該過敏的人造療法。只要你看到紅色，紅色會縮小。這是一種緩和劑。好比在數(shù)字媒體中，當你遇到有著與你有不同想法的人時，你會取消關注他們，不接收他們的推送。通過避免接觸來治療過敏。但是，這種有意無視對立觀點的方法，使人類社區(qū)變得極其破碎且分離。?

The device inside the helmet reshapes reality?and projects into our eyes through a set of lenses?to create an augmented reality.?I picked the color red, because it's intense and emotional,?it has high visibility?and it's political.?So what if we take a look?at the last American presidential election map?through the helmet?

頭盔內(nèi)部的設備重塑現(xiàn)實，并通過一組鏡頭投射入我們的眼睛，從而實現(xiàn)增強現(xiàn)實。我選擇紅色，因為紅色緊張激烈且飽含情緒。它具有高度可見性，也同時具有政治性。所以，要是我們利用這頭盔看看上次美國總統(tǒng)大選的地圖，會是如何？?

You can see that it doesn't matter if you're a Democrat or a Republican,?because the mediation alters our perceptions.?The allergy exists on both sides.

可以看到，不論你是民主黨還是共和黨，都不重要了，因為這一調(diào)解改變了我們的感知。兩邊都存在過敏反應。?In digital media,?what we see every day is often mediated,?but it's also very nuanced.?If we are not aware of this,?we will keep being vulnerable to many kinds of mental allergies.在數(shù)字媒體中，我們每天看到的內(nèi)容通常都是經(jīng)過調(diào)整的，但這些調(diào)整也非常細微。如果我們無法意識到這一點，我們會變得脆弱，容易遭受到許多不同的“精神過敏”。

?Our perception is not only part of our identities,?but in digital media, it's also a part of the value chain.?Our visual field is packed with so much information?that our perception has become a commodity with real estate value.?Designs are used to exploit our unconscious biases,?algorithms favor content that reaffirms our opinions,?so that every little corner of our field of view is being colonized?to sell ads.?Like, when this little red dot comes out in your notifications,?it grows and expands, and to your mind, it's huge.

我們的感知不僅是我們身份認同的一部分，在數(shù)字媒體中也是價值鏈的一部分。我們的視野中充斥著如此多的信息，以至于我們的感知已經(jīng)變成了商品，跟房地產(chǎn)一樣明碼標價。設計被用來挖掘我們的無意識的偏愛，算法則偏愛那些能再次確認我們想法的內(nèi)容，我們視線所及的每個角落都被掌控，來銷售廣告。例如，當這一個小紅點出現(xiàn)在你的推送中，它會不斷放大，在你腦海中，它變得巨大。

?So I started to think of ways to put a little dirt,?or change the lenses of my glasses,?and came up with another project.?Now, keep in mind this is conceptual. It's not a real product.?It's a web browser plug-in?that could help us to notice the things that we would usually ignore.?Like the helmet, the plug-in reshapes reality,?but this time, directly into the digital media itself.?It shouts out the hidden filtered voices.?What you should be noticing now?will be bigger and vibrant,?like here, this story about gender bias emerging from the sea of cats.

我開始想辦法弄臟我的眼鏡，或是改變鏡片的度數(shù)。于是想出了另一個項目。請記住，目前還只是概念性的，并未投產(chǎn)。這是一個瀏覽器插件，能幫我們注意到那些經(jīng)常被忽略的內(nèi)容。像剛剛的頭盔一樣，這一插件能重塑現(xiàn)實，但這次，是直接從數(shù)字媒體本身入手。被埋沒、被過濾的聲音得以傳播。值得你關注的東西會變得更大、更明顯，比如這里，一篇關于性別偏見的文章，從一堆關于貓咪的文章中被篩選出來。?

The plug-in could dilute the things that are being amplified by an algorithm.?Like, here in this comment section,?there are lots of people shouting about the same opinions.?The plug-in makes their comments super small.

這個插件能夠稀釋被算法放大的東西。例如，在這個評論區(qū)，很多人都在發(fā)表著同樣的觀點。這個插件就能把他們的評論變得超級小。

So now the amount of pixel presence they have on the screen?is proportional to the actual value they are contributing to the conversation.

所以現(xiàn)在，這些相同觀點的占屏面積和他們?yōu)檫@場對話貢獻的實際價值成正比了。?The plug-in also shows the real estate value of our visual field?and how much of our perception is being commoditized.?Different from ad blockers,?for every ad you see on the web page,?it shows the amount of money you should be earning.

這個插件也能展現(xiàn)我們視野的房地產(chǎn)價值，以及我們的感知有多少正在被商品化。與廣告攔截器不同，它能告訴你，你每看一個廣告，你本應該掙到多少錢。

?We are living in a battlefield between reality?and commercial distributed reality,?so the next version of the plug-in could strike away that commercial reality?and show you things as they really are.

我們身處戰(zhàn)場之中，雙方是現(xiàn)實和商業(yè)分銷化的現(xiàn)實，所以下一個插件版本將可能打破商業(yè)化的現(xiàn)實還原一個真正的現(xiàn)實。

?Well, you can imagine how many directions this could really go.?Believe me, I know the risks are high if this were to become a real product.?And I created this with good intentions?to train our perception and eliminate biases.?But the same approach could be used with bad intentions,?like forcing citizens to install a plug-in like that?to control the public narrative.?It's challenging to make it fair and personal?without it just becoming another layer of mediation.

你們可以想象一下，這個插件能做多少事情。相信我，我知道把它做出來會有很大風險。我提出這個概念的出發(fā)點是好的，是為了訓練感知和消除偏見。但它也可能被用來做不好的事情，例如，強迫公民安裝這樣的插件來控制公眾敘事。挑戰(zhàn)之處在于把它變得公平且個人化，而非只是變成另一層調(diào)和工具。

?So what does all this mean for us??Even though technology is creating this isolation,?we could use it to make the world connected again?by breaking the existing model and going beyond it.?By exploring how we interface with these technologies,?we could step out of our habitual, almost machine-like behavior?and finally find common ground between each other.

所以，這一切對我們來說意味著什么？盡管科技正在讓我們分裂隔離，但通過打破并超越現(xiàn)有模型，我們依舊可以利用科技把世界再次連結起來。通過探索我們?nèi)绾闻c這些科技建立聯(lián)系，我們能夠擺脫習慣性的、甚至類似機器的行為，最終找到我們彼此間的共同點。?

Technology is never neutral.?It provides a context and frames reality.?It's part of the problem and part of the solution.?We could use it to uncover our blind spots and retrain our perception?and consequently, choose how we see each other.

科技永遠不會是中立的。它能提供情境，也能構建現(xiàn)實。它既是問題的一部分，也是解決方法的一部分。我們能夠利用它來發(fā)現(xiàn)我們的盲點，并重新訓練我們的感知能力，這么一來，我們就能選擇如何看待彼此。?Thank you.謝謝大家。