3
Unit
Internet
工程硕士研究生英语读写教程
全日制
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TextA
earning Objectives L
In this passage you will. learn about the Internet of Things, how it works, and how itwill benefit humans in the future.. learn to synthesize ideas to draw conclusions.. learn to evaluate sources.
etting Ready to ReadG
The Internet is increasingly becoming part of peoples lives.Discuss the questions below with your classmates before you read.
1. Can people now live without the Internet? Give yourreasons.
2. Could you name some important figures in the developmentof the computer and information technology? Why do youthink they are important?
3. Do you think that the Internet has negative effects onpeoples life? If yes, what are they?
4. Whats your imagination about your future life with theInternet? Share it with your classmates.
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Unit
45
eadR
The Internet Gets Physical
by Steve Lohr
The Internet likes you, really likes you. It offers youso much, just a mouse click or finger tap away. Go Christmasshopping, find restaurants, locate partying friends, and tell theworld what youre up to. Some of the finest minds in computerscience, working at start-ups and big companies, are obsessedwith tracking your online habits to offer targeted ads andcoupons, just for you.
But nownothing personal, mind youthe Internet isgrowing up and lifting its gaze to the wider world. To be sure, theeconomy of Internet self-gratification is thriving. Web start-upsfor the consumer market still sprout at a torrid pace. And youngcorporate stars seeking to cash in for billions by selling sharesto the public are consumer servicesthe online game companyZynga last week, and the social network giant Facebook, whosestock offering is scheduled for next year.
As this is happening, though, the protean Internettechnologies of computing and communications are rapidlyspreading beyond the lucrative consumer bailiwick. Low-costsensors, clever software and advancing computer firepowerare opening the door to new uses in energy conservation,transportation, health care, and food distribution. The consumerInternet can be seen as the warm-up act for these technologies.
The concept has been around for years, sometimes called theInternet of Things or the Industrial Internet. Yet it takes time forthe economics and engineering to catch up with the predictions.
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And that moment is upon us.
Were going to put the digital smarts into everything, saidEdward D. Lazowska, a computer scientist at the University ofWashington. These abundant smart devices, Dr. Lazowska added,will interact intelligently with people and with the physicalworld.
The role of sensorsonce costly and clunky, now inexpensiveand tinywas described this month in an essay in The New YorkTimes by Larry Smarr, founding director of the California Institutefor Telecommunications and Information Technology; he said theultimate goal was the sensor-aware planetary computer.
That may sound like blue-sky futurism, but evidence showsthat the vision is beginning to be realized on the ground, in recentinvestments, products and services, coming from large industrialand technology corporations and some ambitious start-ups.
One of the hot new ventures in Silicon Valley is Nest Labs,founded by Tony Fadell, a former Apple executive, which has hiredmore than 100 engineers from Apple, Google, Microsoft and otherhigh-tech companies.
Its product, introduced in late October, is a digitalthermostat, combining sensors, machine learning, and Webtechnology. It senses not just air temperature, but the movementsof people in a house, their comings and goings, and adjusts roomtemperatures accordingly to save energy.
At the Nest offices in Palo Alto, Calif., there is a lot of talk ofhelping the planet, as well as the thrill of creating cool technology.Yoky Matsuoka, a former Google computer scientist and winner ofa MacArthur genius grant, said, This is the next wave for me.
Matt Rogers, 28, a Nest co-founder, led a team of engineers atApple that wrote software for iPods. He loved his job and working
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for Apple, he said. But he added, In essence, we were buildingtoys. I wanted to build a product that could really make a hugeimpact on a big problem.
Across many industries, products and practices are beingtransformed by communicating sensors and computing intelligence.The smart industrial gear includes jet engines, bridges and oilrigs that alert their human minders when they need repairs, beforeequipment failures occur. Computers track sensor data on operatingperformance of a jet engine, or slight structural changes in an oilrig, looking for telltale patterns that signal coming trouble.
Sensors on fruit and vegetable cartons can track location andsniff the produce, warning in advance of spoilage, so shipments canbe rerouted or rescheduled. Computers pull GPS data from railwaylocomotives, taking into account the weight and length of trains,the terrain and turns, to reduce unnecessary braking and curb fuelconsumption by up to 10 percent.
Researchers at General Electric, the nations largest industrialcompany, are working on such applications and others. One is asmart hospital room, equipped with three small cameras, mountedinconspicuously on the ceiling. With software for analysis, theroom can monitor movements by doctors and nurses in and outof the room, alerting them if they have forgotten to wash theirhands before and after touching patients lapses that contributesignificantly to hospital-acquired infections. Computer visionsoftware can analyze facial expressions for signs of severe pain, theonset of delirium or other hints of distress, and send an electronicalert to a nearby nurse.
Last month, G.E. announced that it was opening a newglobal software center in Northern California and would hire400 engineers there to write code to accelerate the commercial
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development of intelligent machines. Our role is to build thesoftware that enables us to do this industrial Internet, said WilliamRuh, who will head the new center.
In 2008, I.B.M. declared that it was going to make a big pushinto the industrial Internet, using computing intelligence to createmore efficient systems for utility grids, traffic management, fooddistribution, water conservation, and health care. Smarter Planetwas the label the company tacked on to the initiative, and industryanalysts wondered if it was more than a sales campaign.
In a recent interview, Samuel J. Palmisano, chief executiveof I.B.M., emphasized that the programs origins were in thecompanys research labs rather than its marketing department. Thetiming was right because we had the technology, he said.
Today, I.B.M. says it is working on more than 2,000 projectsworldwide that fit in the Smarter Planet category.
In Dubuque, Iowa, for example, I.B.M. has embarked ona long-term program with the local government to use sensors,software and Internet computing to improve the citys use ofwater, electricity, and transportation. In a pilot project this year,digital water meters were installed in 151 homes, and softwaremonitored water use and patterns, informing residents about waysto consume less and alerting them to likely leaks. The savings inthe pilot, nearly 7 percent, would translate into curbing water useby 65 million gallons a year in Dubuque, a Midwestern city of60,000.
In Rio de Janeiro, I.B.M. is employing ground andairborne sensors, along with artificial intelligence software, forneighborhood-level disaster preparedness. The system, which isbeing developed by I.B.M. researchers, aims to predict heavy rainsand mudslides up to 48 hours in advance and conduct evacuations
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before they occur and avoid tragedies like the one last year,when a mudslide left more than 70 people dead and thousandshomeless.
The next wave of computing does not step away from theconsumer Internet so much as build on it for different uses posingsome of the same sorts of privacy and civil liberties concerns.Software techniques like pattern recognition and machine learningused in Internet searches, online advertising and smartphone appsare also ingredients in making smart devices to manage energyconsumption, health care, and traffic.
Take Googles robot car program, for example. The automatedcars, each with a human along for the ride, have deftly navigatedthousands of miles on California highways and city streets. Theprojecta research effort so faruses a bundle of artificialintelligence technologies, as does Googles search-and-ad business.
GLOBAL PULSE is a new initiative by the United Nations toleverage data from the consumer Internet for global development.So-called sentiment analysis of messages in social networksand phone text messagesusing natural-language decipheringsoftwarecan help predict job losses or lower spending in aregion, or disease outbreaks.
In parts of Africa and Asia, where cellphones serve asautomated bank tellers, with text messages initiating moneytransfers, they can also serve as an early warning system. Whensavings transfers drop to 50 cents or zero from $10 a month,something is happening that is evident in the digital smokesignals, said Robert Kirkpatrick, the director of Global Pulse.School feeding programs or government assistance might bestepped up to prevent a region from slipping back into poverty.
Global Pulse, begun in late 2009, is conducting research and
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trying to forge partnerships with private companies. To reallysucceed, the program needs the cooperation of Internet companiesand cellphone carriers to give it access to social network andtext-message communications, which would be stripped of anypersonally identifying information.
Mr. Kirkpatrick terms such contributions dataphilanthropy. His argument is that cooperating helps companiesby nurturing economic health in the markets where they dobusiness.
Global Pulse, Mr. Kirkpatrick said, is exploring new frontiersin knowledge with its real-time tracking of what is happeningto people, not to sell them something but to target developmentefforts. This is computational behavioral economics, he said.Were part of a whole new science here.
1,486 words
be up to 从事，忙于
start-up 新兴公司，新开张的企业
be obsessed with 痴迷于
track [trBk] v. 追踪
ads. abbr. 广告
coupon [''ku：p..n] n. 优惠券
nothing personal 与个人无关
mind you [用作插入语]请听清楚，请注意
gaze [geHz] n. 凝视，注视
self-gratification [''self grBtHfH''keHSRn] n. 自我满足
thriving [''FraHvHN] adj. 繁荣的；蒸蒸日上的
sprout [spraut] v. 发芽；长芽
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Glossary
torrid [''t..rid, ''tC：-] adj. 热情的
cash in [美国英语]把兑换成现金，兑现
stock offering 股票发行
protean [''prRGtHRn; prRG''ti#Rn] adj. 千变万化的
lucrative [''lu#krRtHv] adj. 有利可图的
bailiwick [XbeHlHZwHk] n. 职权范围；领域
firepower [''faHRpaGR] n. 火力
be upon 逼近；临近
clunky [''klVNkH] adj. 沉重的
planetary [''plBnHtRrH] adj. 地球上的；世界范围的
blue-sky [''blu：''skaH] adj. 不切实际的
futurism [''fju#tSRrHzRm] n. 未来主义
new ventures 新企业
thermostat [''F!#mRstBt] n. 恒温器
thrill [Fril] n. 一阵激动
jet engine [航]喷射发动机
oil rig 石油钻塔
minder [''maHndR] n. 照料人员，看管机器的人
telltale [''telteil] adj. 报警的 n. 指示器
carton [''kA#tRn] n. 纸板箱
sniff [snif] v. 嗅；闻
locomotive [ZlRGkR''mRGtHv] n. 机车；火车头
terrain [tRXreHn] n. [地理]地形，地势
braking [''breikiN] n. 刹车
curb [k!#b] v. 抑制
inconspicuously [ZinkRns''pikjuRslH] adv. 不显著地，不引人注目的
lapse [lBps] n. 错失，疏忽
onset [''..nset, ''C：n-] n. 开始；发作
delirium [dH''lHrHRm] n. 精神错乱；（因发烧引起的）说胡话
utility [ju#XtHlRtH] adj. 实用的；有多种用途的
grid [grHd] n. 输电网；煤气输送网
tack on 附加，增添
initiative [H''nHSHRtHv; -SR-] n. 首创精神；积极性
pilot project 试点项目
water meter 水表，水量计
airborne [''eRbC#n] adj. 风媒的，空运的，空中传播的
evacuation [HZvBkjG''eHSRn] n. 疏散；撤离
civil liberties 公民自由；公民权力
deftly [''deftlH] adv. 灵巧地；敏捷地
a bundle of 一群；一捆；一大堆
leverage [''li#vRrHdJ; ''levRrHdJ] v. 起杠杆作用；利用
sentiment analysis 情感分析
decipher [dH''saHfR] v. 破译
smoke signal 烟雾信号；征兆
school feeding 学校供餐
be stepped up 升级；加紧
forge [fC#dJ] v. 锻造；建立同盟
strip of 从某人或某处夺走
philanthropy [fH''lBnFrRpH] n. 博爱；慈善行为；善事
Zynga 一个社交游戏公司，成立于2007年6月。Zynga开发的游戏多半是网页游戏，并发布于Facebook和MySpace一类的社交网站。公司的总部在美国旧金山。
Facebook 一个创办于美国的社交网络服务网站，于2004年2
Notes
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