2019年的几篇译文
《经济学人》：马丁·魏茨曼离世
来源 | 经济学人
Martin Weitzman died on August 27th
The environmental economist’s biggest strength was in knowing what we do not know
《经济学人》：马丁·魏茨曼逝于8月27日——这位环境经济学家最牛的一点在于他知道我们不知道什么
2019.9.5
Martin Weitzman, one of his colleagues observed last year, was not an economist you would expect to encounter on the 7am plane from Boston to Washington. That was not because the retired Harvard University professor, who died on August 27th, lacked influence. On the contrary, his research was cited by policymakers around the world. Nor was it because he objected to flying, although he might have done on the basis of his field, environmental economics. It was because he was a recluse who, according to many who knew him, preferred thinking in his study to being with his friends, let alone with politicians. Making intellectual advances was the most important thing.
马丁·魏茨曼可不是那种会在早晨7点从波士顿去往华盛顿的飞机上让你碰见的经济学家（据他的一位同事去年的说法）。这既不是因为他身为哈佛退休教授（逝于今年8月27日）缺乏影响力——相反，他的研究为遍布全球的政策制定者所征引——也不是因为他抗拒乘坐飞机，尽管他兴许会出于自己的研究领域——环境经济学——上的考虑而拒绝飞行。真正的原因是，他是一位隐士，许多认识他的人都说，他宁愿待在自己的书房里思考也不愿会友，更别提去会那些政客了。对他而言，推动智识上的进步才是最最要紧的事。
But what he made of his time at his desk. He was of a rare breed: a theorist capable of brilliant abstract reasoning whose work was nevertheless squarely relevant to essential—and increasingly pressing—policy choices. In 1974, early in his career, he wrote a paper that became a foundation stone of every course on public economics. It posed the question: how should regulators rein in pollution? Should they issue (tradable) pollution permits to firms, thereby picking a quantity? Or should they tax polluters, thereby picking a price?
不过，他究竟用书桌前的时间取得了什么成就？他这样的人真可谓凤毛麟角：作为一位理论家，他拥有着超凡的抽象推理能力，但与此同时，他的学术成果也与重要——且愈发紧迫——的政策选择紧密相关。他在学术生涯早期（1974年）写就的一篇论文成为了日后每一门公共经济学课程的基石。论文提出了这样一个问题：监管者究竟该以何种方式抑制排污？是向企业发放（可交易的）排污许可，从而为排污定一个“量”，还是对排污者收税，从而为排污定一个“价”？
Two sides of the same coin, went existing thinking, which assumed perfect knowledge on the part of bureaucrats. But Mr Weitzman assumed that predicting the reaction of prices to a regulated quantity, and vice versa, is partly guesswork (an assumption that would be borne out, decades later, when the prices of carbon permits in the European Union’s emissions-trading scheme collapsed unexpectedly after the financial crisis). Which you should regulate depends on the relative costs of mistakes. If getting the quantity of pollution slightly wrong would be costlier, then quantity should be pinned down, with prices allowed to work themselves out. If a slightly errant price can do more damage—say, because the need to buy expensive permits could put many firms out of business—then a tax, fixed at a safe level, is the way to go.
在既有的经济学思想里，这不过是一枚硬币的两面，因为它假定监管者是全知的。但在魏茨曼的设想里，无论是由规定的量来预测价的反应，还是反过来，由规定的价来预测量，都是个半猜半蒙的过程（这一设想在数十年后得到了印证，当欧盟的排污权交易体系出人意料地崩溃于金融危机后）。到底应该规定哪一个，其实取决于错误的相对成本。倘若排污量的细微偏差造成的损失更大，那量就应该被固定下来，而价则由市场自行决定。倘若价的细微偏差造成的损失更大——例如，昂贵的排污权价格可能会迫使众多企业面临关停的局面——那么将排污税率固定在一个稳妥的水平上才是正道。
Uncertainty was the theme that ran through Mr Weitzman’s career. It was also another reason to avoid that Washington shuttle: how could an economist ever make a precise recommendation in such a complex world? He would provide the intellectual machinery for thinking about a problem; others would have to choose the precise settings. For example, perhaps the biggest debate in environmental economics in recent years has concerned discount rates. By how much should you mark down the environmental damage of pollution to take account of the fact that it comes mostly in the future? Mr Weitzman assumed that the correct discount rate is itself uncertain. He demonstrated mathematically that whatever rate is chosen, uncertainty means it should decline over time. The further you peer into the future, the lower your discount rate should be. Many governments, including those of Britain, Denmark, France and Norway, now apply declining discount rates in their economic analyses, although the debate about the right starting-point is far from settled.
在魏茨曼的学术生涯里，不确定性这一主题贯穿始终。这也是他不愿飞往华盛顿的又一个原因：在这般复杂的世界里，经济学家如何能给出明确的政策建议呢？他可以提供理性思考一个问题的方法，而其他人则需要对具体的环境做出自己的判断。就拿折现率来说吧——这恐怕是近年来环境经济学领域引发最大争议的话题了——鉴于环境污染造成的损失主要发生在未来，这损失到底该如何折现呢？在魏茨曼的假设中，适当的折现率本身就是不确定的。他还用数学的方式论证了，无论选定哪个折现率，不确定性都意味着它应当随着时间的拉长而降低——越往未来看，折现率越低。如今包括英国、丹麦、法国、挪威在内的许多国家的政府都已采用递减的折现率进行经济分析，尽管关于适当的起始折现率的争论还远未平息。
The latter stages of Mr Weitzman’s career were defined by an assault on what he saw as false precision in predictions of the costs of climate change. In 2018 William Nordhaus, his longtime colleague—and rival, although there was no animosity between them—won the Nobel prize in economics for his work on the costs and benefits of acting to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. Mr Nordhaus carefully prices the potential damage from global warming using an economic model, discounts it appropriately (he favours a relatively high rate) and compares the result to the costs of reducing emissions today. His models suggest that policymakers should implement a carbon tax starting at around $30-40 per tonne of carbon dioxide and tolerate warming this century of over 3°C, compared with temperatures in pre-industrial times.
定义了魏茨曼学术生涯后期的，却是他的批判，在他看来，那些对气候变化的代价做出预估的尝试犯了“精确的错误”。在2018年，他的长期同事——亦是学术对手，不过并无私人恩怨——威廉·诺德豪斯凭借其对温室气体减排行动的成本效益分析，赢得了诺贝尔经济学奖的殊荣。在经济学模型的加持下，诺德豪斯为全球变暖可能造成的损失做了小心细致的计价，再经过适当的折现（他倾向于采用相对较高的折现率），并拿得出的结果同今时今日采取减排行动的成本进行了比较。他的模型建议政策制定者征收碳排放税——税率起始点定在每吨二氧化碳30-40美元上下，还建议他们默许本世纪的温度较前工业时代的水平上升3℃以上。
Mr Weitzman thought this approach problematic. Climate change, he argued, does not lend itself easily to cost-benefit analysis. Despite advances in climate science, the sensitivity of global surface temperature to atmospheric carbon dioxide remains uncertain. Even if the central case is that a given amount of pollution produces a manageable eventual rise in temperatures, a cataclysmic event, such as global warming of over 6°C, remains worryingly possible. Cost-benefit analysis, he showed, can break down in these conditions. His “dismal theorem” proved that with fat-tailed distributions, and under certain mathematical assumptions about people’s preferences, society should be willing to pay unlimited amounts today to avoid catastrophic risk.
魏茨曼认为这种方法是有问题的。他争辩说，对气候变化做成本效益分析可没那么简单。尽管气候科学取得了一些进步，但全球表面温度对大气中二氧化碳含量的敏感度仍旧是个未知数。就算在一般情况下，给定的排污量所导致的气温上升终究会落在可应付的范围内，极端的灾难性事件——譬如全球温度飙升6℃以上——那令人忧心的可能性也依然存在。魏茨曼阐明了成本效益分析会在这些情况下失效的问题。他的“悲观定理”论证了，当事件呈肥尾分布且人们的偏好满足一定的数学假设时，社会应该愿意为避免灾难性风险而在今时今日支付无穷高的成本。
The dismal profession
悲观的职业
Mr Weitzman acknowledged that this result was detached from reality: “obviously it cannot be taken literally,” he said. Nobody believes in giving up everything today in the name of future safety. Atheists are rarely persuaded by Pascal’s wager—the argument that you should believe in God to avoid the infinite downside risk of eternal hellfire. But Mr Weitzman thought he had made a deeper point about the fragility of cost-benefit analysis in the face of extreme risks. “We desperately need more information about what’s going on in these tails,” he said. “It’s not the median values that are gonna kill us.”
魏茨曼承认这一结论是脱离现实的：“这显然不能从字面上理解”。谁也不会相信为了保全明日而在今日舍弃一切的主张，也没有多少无神论者会被“帕斯卡的赌注”说动——帕斯卡（译者注：17世纪法国数学家、物理学家、思想家）声称，理性的人应当选择信仰上帝，以规避那无穷大的负面风险，那永世的地狱之火。尽管如此，当魏茨曼指出成本效益分析在极端风险面前的脆弱性时，他认为自己在指向一个更深层的问题。“我们迫切地需要更多的信息，以探明在这些‘尾部’究竟发生了什么，”他说，“会杀死我们的可不是那些中位数啊。”
Mr Weitzman is thought to have taken his own life, the second celebrated economist to do so this year. His ideas on tail risks might yet prevail in the profession, despite his apparent passing-over for the Nobel prize. Certainly campaign groups, such as Britain’s Extinction Rebellion, increasingly emphasise catastrophic risk above all else. He died a political moderate and, according to one colleague’s recollection, was no fan of the Green New Deal, the plan for fighting climate change proposed by America’s left, which downplays the role of carbon pricing.
据称，魏茨曼死于自杀，而这也是今年以来的第二位自杀的知名经济学家了。他的尾部风险理论也许迟早会在经济学领域占据主流，尽管他显然已经无缘诺奖了。固然有些政治运动组织——如英国的“反抗灭绝”——对“灾难性风险”理论推崇备至，且这推崇与日俱增，但魏茨曼至死都是个持温和政见者，而且据他的一位同事回忆，他对美国左派提出的那套对抗气候变化的计划——绿色新政——也没什么好感，该计划低估了碳定价的作用。
Still, Mr Weitzman was not one to say precisely what should be done. His domain was that which is not known.
但话说回来，魏茨曼可不会精确地指导我们应该做什么。研究我们不知道什么才是他的专长。
原文链接 https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2019/09/05/martin-weitzman-died-on-august-27th
狂热分子发话了
来源 | 纽约时报
And Now, a Word From a Fanatic
Inside the mind of an internet extremist.
狂热分子发话了
一位网络极端主义者的内心独白
David Brooks
2019.9.5
I am a sick man. I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased.
我是个病态的人，仇恨的人，不招人喜欢的人。我相信我的肝不好。
I am one of those fanatics on the alt-right and the alt-left, the ones who make online forums so vicious, the ones who cancel and call out, the minority of online posters who fill the air with hate. I’m one of those radicals whose rage is intertwined with psychological fragility, whose anger at real wrongs is corrupted by my existential panic about myself.
我是人称“另类右派”、“另类左派”的那帮狂热分子中的一员，是我们让那些网络论坛变得如此恶意满满，我们时而“抵制”时而“批斗”，在网络发言者的群体中，我们属于那令空气里充斥着仇恨的少数派。我是那帮激进者中的一个，我的怒火与内心的脆弱交缠着，我的义愤被对于自我的存在性恐慌腐蚀着。
To know anything about me you have to understand the chaos at the core of my innermost being. I was raised without coherent moral frameworks. I was raised amid social fragmentation and division, the permanent flux of liquid modernity.
要想了解我，你就得先理解我内心至深处的混乱。我的成长环境里并没有连贯一致的道德框架，围绕着我的只有社会的分裂和分化，只有流动的现代性那永无止境的涨涨落落。
Adults in my life have not been trustworthy. Friends have not been trustworthy. Women reject me. I passed through school unseen. You have no idea how ill equipped I am to deal with my pain. I was raised in that coddling way that protects you from every risk except real life.
出现在我人生中的成年人们并不可靠，朋友们也并不可靠。我被女人们拒绝，并如隐身人一般地度过了校园生涯。你都不晓得我在我的痛苦面前是多么地束手无策。我是在溺爱中长大的，这溺爱替我隔绝开了每一种风险，却独独未隔绝开现实生活的险恶。
When I was younger my eyes pleaded: Tell me what adulthood and manhood are supposed to look like! All you said was, “You can be anything you want to be!” How does that help? You told me I was special, but the world goes on as if I don’t exist.
儿时，我的双眼恳求着：告诉我吧，长大成人、成为男人该是什么样的！而你们只会说，“你想成为什么，就能成为什么！”这种答案对我有什么好处？你们告诉我我是与众不同的，但这世界却当我不存在似的。
I yearn for order. Blunt simplicities. Politics provides the Manichaean binaries I can’t find anywhere else, and so I make everything political. Own the libs! Smash the racist right! A war of pure good and pure evil.
我向往秩序。简单粗暴。政治提供了一个二元对立的世界，那是我在别处找不到的，于是我将一切都政治化了。“支配自由派！”【译者注：“Own the libs（liberals）”乃时下一句流行语并风靡于社交媒体，常在右派嘲讽挑衅自由派、进步主义人士时使用，或用以指称这一类嘲讽挑衅之举】“打倒种族主义的右派！”“纯善与纯恶之战。”
I crave the single narrative that will make everything clear: Everything is race. Everything is class. Everything is moral rot caused by godlessness. They say that fundamentalism is rigid and authoritarian. I say to them: Yes! I want fundamentalism. Please wrap me in that rigidity. Otherwise, I have no coherent self.
我渴盼着能阐明一切的单一叙事：一切都归结为种族，归结为阶级，归结为无神论带来的道德腐坏。他们说原教旨主义是僵化和独裁的。我倒要告诉他们：没错！我就想要原教旨主义。请将我包裹在那样的僵化中吧。否则，我就无法逻辑自洽了。
Catastrophizing is my mind-set. Catastrophizing is pure: Society is totally corrupt. The “system” is totally rotten. I am terrified by ambiguity and ambivalence, the idea that the glass might be only half full. I seize on the extreme example of anything and take it to be the typical case. In this way I create my truth. An immigrant committed murders, so immigrants are murderers.
灾难化是我的思维模式。灾难化不容一点杂质：社会堕落到底了；“体制”已经烂透了。我害怕模棱两可和摇摆不定，我害怕去思考或许只有“半杯满”的情形。我会抓住任何事的极端案例作为典型。如此一来，我就制造了属于我自己的真相。有个移民杀了人，所以移民都是杀人犯。
People are not defined by individual traits but by group ones. Individual persons are too complicated, but groups are abstract and easy to stereotype. Every human being gets reduced to some category, preferably the cunning ones I despise: the libs, white males.
定义人们的并非个体特质，而是群体特质。个体太过驳杂，而群体则是抽象的，容易用模子来套的。每个人都会被我简化入某一类别，而我优先考虑的类别就是诸如自由派、白人男性这些被我所鄙视的狡诈人群。
I need leaders and spokesmen who will never show uncertainty. I want leaders who tell simple blame stories. It’s the bankers! It’s the immigrants! I want intellectual put-down artists who will crush the other side and let me vicariously enjoy their triumphs on YouTube again and again.
我需要的那种领袖和代言人绝不会流露出一丝半点的动摇。我拥戴的领袖，说的是一套简单粗暴的指责归罪的语言。“都是银行家害的！”“都是移民害的！”我呼唤的是能用“有脑”的方式骂人的行家，有他们来将敌方击溃，我便能在“油管”上一遍又一遍地间接品享他们的战果了。
My moral system is simple, too. Up is evil and down is good. People above me on the status hierarchy are venal, while those of us in my group are victims of their corruption. The existence of any hierarchy itself is prima facie proof of injustice.
我的道德体系也很简单粗暴。上层是恶的，下层是善的。社会地位在我之上的人无不唯利是图，而与我落在同一阶层的人们则通通是受害者，深受上层人士腐败的侵害。再说了，任何阶层分化的存在本身就能构成社会不公的初步证据。
From the abstract vantage point of my computer screen, I see a world in which my opponents are elite oppressors and my kind are oppressed. They have their exclusive cliques and I am disdained. And here we get to the ultimate injustice: Why are they recognized while I am not? This is the molten core from which my indignation flows. The status quo does not respect me, and therefore I despise it.
从我那电脑屏幕的抽象视角，我看见了一个敌对的世界，我的敌人是那些精英压迫者，而我的同类正受着他们的压迫。精英有自己排外的小圈子，而我却遭人白眼。这就说到最根本的不公了：为什么他们得到了认可，而我却没有？我的义愤就是从这个炽热的核心里奔涌而出的。既然现状不尊重我，我就鄙视它。
So my politics is not really about issues, it’s epic wars for recognition. I don’t deal with the complexities of economics or foreign affairs. I seize upon the minor missteps made by my opponents in order to discredit their kind. You stumbled? I delight in crushing you! Owning the libs spares me the terrifying ambiguity of actually getting to know one.
因此，我的政治主张其实并不关乎具体的议题，这是一场争夺认可的史诗级大战。我才不去思考经济或外交上的复杂情况呢。我会揪住敌人的小小差错不放，好叫他们那帮人名誉扫地。你栽跟头了吧？击溃你令我快乐！一句“支配自由派”就让我免去了真正去了解一位自由派人士会造成的那令人恐惧的“黑白不明”。
I’ve lost faith in reason. Communication is for condemnation and arousal. Forgiveness has become foreign to me. Sometimes you have to be vicious for justice. If I afflict the comfortable I have served justice. I don’t have to worry about comforting the afflicted. If I attack faraway wrongdoers I don’t have to worry about tutoring a child.
我早就对讲道理失去了信心。交流是为了谴责和煽动。宽恕对我来说已然变得陌生。有时候为了正义你必须狠下心来。倘若我使生活安逸的人痛苦了，我也就伸张了正义，而不用费心去安慰那些真正受苦的人群。倘若我抨击了千里之外的作恶者，我就不用操心给孩子辅导功课的事了。
Online war is a force that gives life meaning. Hatred gives me that delicious simulacrum of power. Did you really think you could raise me on gourmet coffee and yoga pants and I wouldn’t find a way to rebel against your relativism and materialism? Didn’t you observe the eternal pattern — that if you try to flatten a man to the bourgeois he will rebel by becoming a fanatic?
网络大战是赋予人生以意义的一股力量。仇恨给了我拥有权力的美妙幻象。你真的以为用精制咖啡和瑜伽裤把我养大，就能让我找不到反抗你那相对主义和物质主义的办法吗？你难道没有发现那个永恒的规律吗？如果你打趴一个人的方式是将他送入中产阶级，那么他反抗你的方式就是变成一个狂热分子。
And yet … somehow it’s not working. Somehow politics doesn’t fill my soul, bring me peace or end my existential anxiety. I have helped create a harsh world in which vulnerability is impossible and without vulnerability there can be no relationship. Relationship is the thing that I long for the most and that I make impossible. I have cut myself off from the only thing that can save me.
然而……也不知怎地，这一切并不起作用。也不知怎地，政治并没有丰满我的灵魂，没有给我带来平静，也没有终结我的存在性焦虑。我为一个容不得弱点的严酷世界添了砖、加了瓦，但没有了弱点，也就不可能有人际交往。人际关系是我最最渴望的东西，而我却扼杀了它的可能性。我竟将自己隔绝在了唯一能拯救我的东西之外。
I am indignant. I am superior. I read Dostoyevsky’s “Notes From the Underground.” I am alone.
我是愤怒的。我是不凡的。我读陀思妥耶夫斯基的《地下室手记》。我是孤独的。
原文链接：
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/05/opinion/internet-extremism.html
犯罪用无人机，在法眼的盲点翱翔
来源 | 纽约时报
Drones Used in Crime Fly Under the Law’s Radar
Drones are increasingly being used by criminals across the country, and local law enforcement agencies are often powerless to stop them.
犯罪用无人机，在法眼的盲点翱翔
在全美各地，无人机已愈来愈多地被用于犯罪，而地方执法机构却往往对此无能为力。
Vanessa Swales
2019.11.3
An otherwise peaceful suburban neighborhood in Washington Township, Pa., began experiencing a series of explosions this past spring and summer. Homemade bombs were blowing up in front yards. Nails were raining down from the sky. Windows were left riddled with marks, as if they had been shot at.
从刚刚过去的春夏季节开始，宾州华盛顿镇郊一个原本平静的社区便经历了一系列的爆炸事件：一会儿是自制炸弹在人们的前院爆炸；一会儿是天降钉子雨；一会儿又见窗上伤痕累累，仿佛吃了枪弹。
For a while, the police were mystified. They could find no clues to the identity of the bomber, and they were confused about how the perpetrator could leave no footprints, tire tracks or DNA behind.
一时间，警方如坠云雾。他们压根找不到能确认投弹者身份的线索，同时也想不明白，作案人怎能连足迹、车胎印和DNA都没有留下。
Only after a resident’s security camera caught a glimpse of what was going on did they crack the case. The perpetrator, it turns out, was a drone, one that the authorities say was controlled by a man who is now behind bars, accused of serious felonies.
直到一位居民的监控摄像捕捉得事情的真相，案件才获侦破。“作案人”原来是一架无人机，据当局介绍，操控该无人机的是一名男子，如今已受若干重罪指控而锒铛入狱。
Drones pose novel and difficult problems for law enforcement. They are widely available, lightly regulated and can be flown remotely by an operator far away from the crime scene. They have already been put to a host of nefarious uses, from smuggling contraband into prisons to swarming F.B.I. agents who were preparing for a raid. And local and state authorities are restricted by federal law from intercepting drones in flight, potentially even when a crime is in progress, though experts say that has yet to be tested in court.
无人机向执法者提出了新的难题。它们有广泛的获取渠道又鲜有法规约束，而且还允许操控者远离犯罪现场进行远程驾驶。它们已有大量的不法用途，从向监狱偷运违禁品，到将预备进行突击搜查的联邦调查局特工团团围住。不仅如此，根据联邦法律，州和地方当局还无权拦截飞行中的无人机——恐怕就连犯罪正在进行也不可破例——尽管一些专家称这条规定还未经过法庭的检验。
“The use of drones by criminal groups is appealing in part because drones are harder to catch,” said Arthur Holland Michel, co-director of the Center for the Study of the Drone at Bard College. “They create all kinds of headaches for law enforcement.”
“利用无人机作案对犯罪团伙很有吸引力，部分是因为无人机更不易‘落网’，”巴德学院无人机研究中心副主任亚瑟·霍兰德·米歇尔说，“无人机为执法者制造了各式各样令人头疼的难题。”
In the Pennsylvania case, the authorities arrested Jason Muzzicato, 43, who is accused of dropping homemade bombs onto his ex-girlfriend’s property. He has been indicted on charges related to making explosives and possessing firearms, but the only charge concerning his delivery method has been unlawful operation of an unregistered drone. He is scheduled to appear in court Dec. 9.
在宾州的那起案件中，当局逮捕了43岁的杰森·穆奇卡托，他因将自制炸弹投入前女友家中而受到指控。对于他的控告集中在了制造爆炸物和拥有枪械的罪名上，而针对炸弹投递方式的罪名则仅有一条：违规操作未登记的无人机。按计划，他将于12月9日出庭。
“At state level, regulation has been very piecemeal or reactive to specific cases, whether criminal or otherwise,” said Hillary Farber, a law professor at the University of Massachusetts School of Law who studies the legal issues surrounding drones. “The charges seemed to miss the heart of the issue of how he was using the drone and how it was posing a threat to another person.”
“在州那一级，监管要么相当零碎，要么只能被动地对特定案件做出反应，无论涉及到的是否为刑事案件，”麻省大学法学院一位研究无人机相关法律问题的法学教授希拉里·法布尔说，“那些罪名似乎偏离了问题的核心，即他是如何使用无人机的，以及这如何构成了对他人的威胁。”
Drones have been widely available to the general public for about five years, and they are already everywhere. The Federal Aviation Administration counts almost 1.5 million registered commercial and recreational drones in the United States, which does not account for the many unregistered or homemade drones.
无人机进入广泛民用约有五年的时间，如今它们已是无处不在。据联邦航空管理局统计，全美登记在册的商用和娱乐用无人机总数将近150万，而这还不包括为数众多的未登记无人机和自制无人机。
There have long been concerns about the use of drones for smuggling. The Border Patrol caught two people flying 28 pounds of heroin over the border near Calexico, Calif., in 2015. In July, a man pleaded guilty to attempting to use an unregistered drone to smuggle a bag of marijuana into Autry State Prison in Pelham, Ga.
对将无人机用于走私的担忧由来已久。2015年，边境巡逻队曾抓获两名现行犯，当时他们正将28磅海洛因“空运”过加州加利西哥附近的边境线。而今年七月份，又有一名男子就其试图使用未登记无人机往位于乔治亚州佩勒姆的奥特里州立监狱偷运一袋大麻的行为认了罪。
What drones see can be as worrisome as what they carry. In 2017, a Utah couple was charged with voyeurism for using a drone to spy on people in their bedrooms and bathrooms. One victim chased the drone to a parking lot, found a memory card full of illicit images and turned it over to the police.
无人机见到的画面可能同它们携带的物品一样令人担忧。2017年时，犹他州的一对夫妇就曾因使用无人机暗中监视他人在卧室和浴室中的活动而被指控犯了窥视罪。一位受害人追逐该无人机到了一处停车场后，在机身内找到了一张满是出格图像的存储卡，并将它交给了警方。
When a drone is flown in a crime, it leaves the authorities little to go on — unless they are able to get hold of the machine.
利用无人机犯罪会令执法当局无从下手——除非他们能够捕获那台机器。
“Drones have a wealth of very valuable forensic evidence to analyze the classic ‘who, what, when, where, why and how,’” said David Kovar, one of asmall number of specialists in the new field of drone forensics.
“无人机上带有大量极具价值的司法鉴定证据，可用以分析‘人、事、时、地、原因、经过’的经典六要素，”大卫·柯伐如是说，他是无人机司法鉴定这个新领域中的少数专家之一。
Mr. Kovar and the company he founded, URSA, provide technology to law enforcement officers and train them how to capture data from drones that can establish where and when it was flown and by whom.
柯伐先生和他所创建的URSA公司不仅会为执法人员提供相应的科技服务，还会训练他们从无人机中抓取数据，从而确定它飞行的时间地点，以及操控它的人是谁。
But investigators may not be able to tap such expertise in every case. “Unless it is a very high-stakes investigation, it’s unlikely they will call in an expert,” Mr. Holland Michel said.
但调查人员恐怕无法在每个案件中都寻求这样的专业协助。“除非是极其重要的调查，否则他们不大可能找专家，”霍兰德·米歇尔先生说。
And even if a drone is recovered and dissected by experts, if it is homemade, it may prove impossible to trace to an owner.
而倘若无人机是自制的，那么即便专家找到它并将它大卸八块，也仍有可能追踪不到它的主人。
Drones are not easy to detect in flight, as the Secret Service found when one flew unnoticed over the White House grounds and crash-landed on the lawn in 2015.
侦测飞行中的无人机可不是件容易的事，美国特勤局对此就有亲身的体会，2015年时一架无人机曾在未被察觉的情况下飞入白宫上空，而后急坠在了白宫的草坪上。
Audio sensors can listen for the distinctive sound of a drone, but that method does not work well in urban areas, and a drone’s sound signature can be altered by changing its propellers. Cameras have limited reach and may not be able to tell a drone from a bird. Commercially manufactured drones are typically made largely of plastic and run on battery power, so they do not give off much heat or show up strongly on radar. Picking up a drone’s radio signal is considered the most reliable way to detect one — but that does not mean the drone is easy to catch.
虽然音频传感器能够听出无人机特有的声音，但这个方法在城区不太管用，而且无人机的声音特征还能随螺旋桨的更换而改变。摄像头所能拍到的范围有限，并且可能分辨不出无人机和鸟类的差别。商业生产的无人机通常都以塑料为主要材料并以电池供能，因此它们释放的热量不多，也不会很清晰地显示在雷达上。识别无人机的无线电信号被认为是侦测无人机最可靠的手段——但能被侦测到也并不意味着能被轻轻松松地捕获。
Then there is the question of who has the authority to do something about a drone that may be up to no good.
接下来的问题则是：面对也许在干坏事的无人机，到底谁才有出手的权力？
The F.A.A. has primary authority over what happens in the air, and it sets the rules for drone use across the country. A flight is generally legal as long as the drone is registered and displays its registration number, weighs less than 55 pounds, stays within 400 feet of the ground and avoids crowded places like stadiums or restricted areas like airports.
在空中发生的事主要受联邦航空管理局管辖，而在全国范围内针对无人机使用的规章也都由它制定。一般情况下，无人机飞行都是合规的，只要它做过登记、展示出了牌照号码、重量低于55磅、离地高度不超过400英尺，并且避开诸如体育场那样的人流密集的场所，以及诸如机场那样的禁飞区。
All reported sightings of drones flying in restricted airspace are recorded by the F.A.A., and the agency can impose civil penalties on those who break the rules, according to a spokeswoman. But the F.A.A. does not have criminal enforcement authority, and though it requires drones to be registered, it depends on the honor system.
根据一位女性发言人的说法，目击无人机在禁飞区飞行的事件一经上报，均会被联邦航空管理局记录在案，而且该管理局还可对违规者处以民事惩罚。但联邦航空管理局并没有刑事执法权，即便它规定无人机应当登记，它也仍要靠大家的自觉。
“It’s not like a car — it’s not necessary to register at sale,” Mr.Holland Michel said, adding, “A criminal will not register a drone.”
“这可不像汽车——无人机在销售时的登记并不是必须的，”霍兰德·米歇尔先生说着又补充道，“犯罪分子可不会拿无人机去做登记。”
Local and state authorities are often the ones dealing with crimes committed using drones, but their authority is limited. They have no power to charge suspects specifically for drone-use violations.
州和地方当局往往是直接面对无人机犯罪事件的主体，可他们的管辖权却很有限。他们并没有权力针对违规使用无人机的行为向嫌疑人提起控告。
According to F.A.A. sightings data, when the police in Huntsville, Ala., were notified by a pilot in June that a drone had been spotted in restricted airspace, the police “did not know whether or not that was their jurisdiction, nor what to do about it if it was.”
根据联邦航空管理局的目击记录，今年六月份时当一位飞行员向阿拉巴马州亨茨维尔的警方报案，称在禁飞区发现一架无人机时，警方“既不知那是否在自己的管辖范围内，也不知若确在管辖范围内，又该如何处理。”
All the police can usually do, experts said, is use the drone as evidence — if they can get hold of it — and charge suspects for the crimes that the drone was used to commit.
专家们表示，通常警方所能做的仅仅是将无人机用作证据——如果能捕获它的话——然后再就嫌疑人利用无人机犯下的罪行对其提起控告。
“The legal landscape is chaotic when it specifically comes to drones,” said Mr. Kovar, the forensics expert. “Using existing laws such as voyeurism or harassment sidesteps this issue.”
“针对无人机的法律环境真是混乱不堪，”先前的那位司法鉴定专家柯伐先生说，“适用窥视或骚扰之类的既有法律都是在回避问题。”
What about using jamming systems or other technology to interfere with drones in flight or keep them from flying where they do not belong? The only agencies allowed to do that are the federal departments of Defense, Justice, Energy and Homeland Security. For everyone else, it is illegal in all but the most exceptional circumstances — and so is taking down a drone in flight.
如果使用干扰系统等技术手段去干涉无人机的飞行或用技术手段防止其飞入不该飞入的区域呢？目前只有国防部、司法部、能源部、国土安全部这些联邦部门拥有此等权力。对于其他人来说，除非在最最特殊的情况下，这么做都是违法的——而以外力使飞行中的无人机下落当然也不例外。
“The consensus is, no one has cracked the code on countering drones,” Mr. Holland Michel said. “It’s an unresolved challenge.”
“公认的事实是，还未有人真正找到应对无人机的办法，”霍兰德·米歇尔先生说，“这是个尚待解决的挑战。”
原文链接：
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/03/us/drones-crime.html
（翻译学习者：狄佳吟）
