If you ask evolutionary biologists when did humans become humans, some of them will say that, well, at some point we started standing on our feet, became biped and became the masters of our environment. Others will say that because our brain started growing much bigger, that we were able to have much more complex cognitive processes. And others might argue that it's because we developed language that allowed us to evolve as a species. Interestingly, those three phenomena are all connected. We are not sure how or in which order, but they are all linked with the change of shape of a little bone in the back of your neck that changed the angle between our head and our body. That means we were able to stand upright but also for our brain to evolve in the back and for our voice box to grow from seven centimeters for primates to 11 and up to 17 centimetres for humans.
如果你問進化生物學家 人類何時成為了人類, 有些人認為 是在某個我們開始直立起來的時候, 我們成為兩足動物和環境的主人; 也有人認為是大腦開始變大的時候, 我們因而有了更複雜的認知過程; 還有其他人爭辯 人類物種能進化是因為語言的開發。 有趣的是,這三種現象相互關聯。 我們不確定到底如何或以何種順序, 但都與脖子後面 那塊小骨頭的形狀變化有關, 它改變了我們頭部和身體間的角度。 這意味著我們能夠直立, 大腦能夠在後面進化, 而且我們的喉頭 能從靈長類動物的 7 公分 增長到人類的 11 至 17 公分。
And this is called the descent of the larynx. And the larynx is the site of your voice. When baby humans are born today, their larynx is not descended yet. That only happens at about three months old. So, metaphorically, each of us here has relived the evolution of our whole species. And talking about babies, when you were starting to develop in your mother's womb, the first sensation that you had coming from the outside world, at only three weeks old, when you were about the size of a shrimp, were through the tactile sensation coming from the vibrations of your mother's voice.
這被稱為喉頭的下降。 喉頭是你發聲的部位。 現今的嬰兒出生時,喉頭還沒下降, 下降發生在三個月大左右。 因此隱喻地說,我們這裡的每一個人 都已重溫整個人類物種的進化過程。 談到嬰兒, 當你在母親的子宮裡開始發育, 你從外界得到的第一感覺── 當你只有三個星期大, 大約一隻蝦的大小── 是通過觸覺感受到 你母親的聲音震動。
So, as we can see, the human voice is quite meaningful and important at the level of the species, at the level of the society -- this is how we communicate and create bonds, and at the personal and interpersonal levels -- with our voice, we share much more than words and data, we share basically who we are. And our voice is indistinguishable from how other people see us. It is a mask that we wear in society. But our relationship with our own voice is far from obvious. We rarely use our voice for ourselves; we use it as a gift to give to others. It is how we touch each other. It's a dialectical grooming.
因此,正如我們所見, 人類的聲音在物種層面和社會層面上 非常有意義和非常重要。 我們用聲音來溝通和連結。 我們在個人和人際層面上, 用聲音比用文字或數據分享得更多, 我們基本上分享我們是誰。 別人對我們的看法 離不開我們的聲音。 這是我們在社會上戴的面具。 但我們與自己聲音間的關係不明顯。 我們很少用自己的聲音, 而是把它送給別人。 聲音是我們彼此接觸的方式, 是一種辯證。
But what do we think about our own voice? So please raise your hand if you don't like the sound of your voice when you hear it on a recording machine.
我們對自己的聲音有什麼看法? 如果你不喜歡 自己留在錄音機上的聲音,請舉手。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Yeah, thank you, indeed, most people report not liking the sound of their voice recording. So what does that mean? Let's try to understand that in the next 10 minutes. I'm a researcher at the MIT Media Lab, part of the Opera of the Future group, and my research focuses on the relationship people have with their own voice and with the voices of others. I study what we can learn from listening to voices, from the various fields, from neurology to biology, cognitive sciences, linguistics. In our group we create tools and experiences to help people gain a better applied understanding of their voice in order to reduce the biases, to become better listeners, to create more healthy relationships or just to understand themselves better.
好,謝謝, 的確大多數人不喜歡他們錄的聲音。 那是什麼意思? 讓我們試著在接下來的 10 分鐘內了解這一點。 我是麻省理工學院 媒體實驗室的研究員, 是未來歌劇團隊的一員, (註:Opera of the Future group) 我研究的重點在於 人與自己的聲音、 與別人的聲音間的關係。 我研究能從聆聽各種領域── 神經學、生物學、認知科學、 語言學──的聲音學到什麼。 我們小組創建工具和經驗, 幫助人們更理解、更會應用聲音, 從而減少偏見, 成為更好的聽眾, 創造更健康的關係, 或是更了解自己。
And this really has to come with a holistic approach on the voice. Because, think about all the applications and implications that the voice may have, as we discover more about it. Your voice is a very complex phenomenon. It requires a synchronization of more than 100 muscles in your body. And by listening to the voice, we can understand possible failures of what happens inside. For example: listening to very specific types of turbulences and nonlinearity of the voice can help predict very early stages of Parkinson's, just through a phone call. Listening to the breathlessness of the voice can help detect heart disease. And we also know that the changes of tempo inside individual words is a very good marker of depression.
真的必須有全面的方法來處理聲音。 因為當我們發現更多的聲音內容時, 試想所有它可能具有的應用和含義。 你的聲音是一個非常複雜的現象, 需要你身體裡 超過 100 個肌肉同步動作。 通過聽聲音, 能了解可能失常的身體狀況。 例如: 傾聽特定類型的不穩定氣流 和非線性的語音, 有助於偵測非常早期的帕金森氏症, 通過電話聽就能; 聆聽呼吸聲能幫助檢測心臟疾病; 我們還知道單詞內部的節奏變化 是個辨識抑鬱症的好標誌。
Your voice is also very linked with your hormone levels. Third parties listening to female voices were able to very accurately place the speaker on their menstrual cycle. Just with acoustic information. And now with technology listening to us all the time, Alexa from Amazon Echo might be able to predict if you're pregnant even before you know it. So think about --
你的聲音也與激素水平非常相關; 聆聽女人聲音的第三方人士, 能夠非常準確地 察覺發言者的月經週期, 依靠聲學的訊息就夠了。 現在科技一直聆聽著我們的聲音, 亞馬遜的 Echo & Alexa (註:兩種人工智能用品) 或許可以預測懷孕, 甚至在本人之前就知道了。 請思考
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Think about the ethical implications of that. Your voice is also very linked to how you create relationships. You have a different voice for every person you talk to. If I take a little snippet of your voice and I analyze it, I can know whether you're talking to your mother, to your brother, your friend or your boss. We can also use, as a predictor, the vocal posture. Meaning, how you decide to place your voice when you talk to someone. And you vocal posture, when you talk to your spouse, can help predict not only if, but also when you will divorce.
請思考那個應用的道德問題。 你的聲音也與如何建立關係很相關。 你用不同的聲音與每個人交談。 如果我採取並分析一小段你的聲音, 我能知道你說話的對象 是母親、兄弟、 朋友或老闆。 我們還能用人聲的姿勢來預測, 指的是你與人交談時聲音的位置。 你和配偶交談時聲音的姿勢 不僅有助於預測你會不會離婚, 還能預測你何時離婚。
So there is a lot to learn from listening to voices. And I believe this has to start with understanding that we have more than one voice. So, I'm going to talk about three voices that most of us posses, in a model of what I call the mask. So when you look at the mask, what you see is a projection of a character. Let's call that your outward voice. This is also the most classic way to think about the voice, it's a way of projecting yourself in the world. The mechanism for this projection is well understood. Your lungs contract your diaphragm and that creates a self-sustained vibration of your vocal fold, that creates a sound. And then the way you open and close the cavities in you mouth, your vocal tract is going to transform the sound.
所以傾聽聲音能學到很多東西。 我相信這必須從 理解我們擁有不止一個聲音開始。 我將以稱為「面具」的模型 來談論大多數人擁有的三種聲音。 當你看著面具, 看到的是個角色的投影。 讓我們稱之為「外傳聲音」。 這是最經典的聲音思考方式, 是一種投射自己的方式。 這投射機制已被理解透徹。 你的肺收縮橫隔膜, 產生持續的聲帶振動 而發出聲音。 當你張嘴和閉嘴時 聲道會改變聲音。
So everyone has the same mechanism. But voices are quite unique. It's because very subtle differences in size, physiology, in hormone levels are going to make very subtle differences in your outward voice. And your brain is very good at picking up those subtle differences from other people's outward voices. In our lab, we are working on teaching machines to understand those subtle differences. And we use deep learning to create a real-time speaker identification system to help raise awareness on the use of the shared vocal space -- so who talks and who never talks during meetings -- to increase group intelligence.
每個人的機制都相同, 但聲音很獨特。 這是因為體型、生理、 激素水平上的細微差異, 會使你的外傳聲音 產生非常微妙的差異, 加上你的大腦非常善於 從他人的外傳聲音攫取細微的差異。 我們實驗室正在教導機器 理解這些細微的差異。 我們以深度學習建立即時的系統 來辨識說話的人, 有助於提高認知 共享聲音空間的使用── 例如誰在會談中發言 和誰從不說話── 以增加集體的智慧。
And one of the difficulties with that is that your voice is also not static. We already said that it changes with every person you talk to but it also changes generally throughout your life. At the beginning and at the end of the journey, male and female voices are very similar. It's very hard to distinguish the voice of a very young girl from the voice of a very young boy. But in between, your voice becomes a marker of your fluid identity. Generally, for male voices there's a big change at puberty. And then for female voices, there is a change at each pregnancy and a big change at menopause. So all of that is the voice other people hear when you talk. So why is it that we're so unfamiliar with it? Why is it that it's not the voice that we hear? So, let's think about it.
困難之一是你的聲音並不是靜止的。 我們已經說過, 它隨著你交談的對象而改變, 也在你的一生中變化。 在人生旅程的開始和結束時, 男性和女性的聲音非常相似, 難以區分 女幼童和男幼童的聲音。 但在兩者之間, 你的聲音成為你流暢身份的標誌。 一般來說,男性的聲音 在青春期有個很大的變化。 而女性的聲音 每次懷孕都會有變化, 而更年期會發生巨大的變化。 這些全都是其他人聽到的你的語音。 為什麼我們不熟悉自己的聲音呢? 為什麼那不是我們聽到的聲音? 試想,
When you wear a mask, you actually don't see the mask. And when you try to observe it, what you will see is inside of the mask. And that's your inward voice. So to understand why it's different, let's try to understand the mechanism of perception of this inward voice. Because your body has many ways of filtering it differently from the outward voice. So to perceive this voice, it first has to travel to your ears. And your outward voice travels through the air while your inward voice travels through your bones. This is called bone conduction. Because of this, your inward voice is going to sound in a lower register and also more musically harmonical than your outward voice. Once it travels there, it has to access your inner ear. And there's this other mechanism taking place here. It's a mechanical filter, it's a little partition that comes and protects your inner ear each time you produce a sound. So it also reduces what you hear. And then there is a third filter, it's a biological filter. Your cochlea -- it's a part of your inner ear that processes the sound -- is made out of living cells. And those living cells are going to trigger differently according to how often they hear the sound. It's a habituation effect. So because of this, as your voice is the sound you hear the most in your life, you actually hear it less than other sounds.
你戴著面具時實際上看不到面具; 你試圖觀察它時會看到面具的裡面, 那就是你的「內傳聲音」。 因此,要理解它為什麼不同, 試著去理解內傳聲音的感知機制。 你的身體過濾內傳聲音的方法, 很多與過濾外傳聲音的不同。 被感知的聲音先要抵達你的耳朵。 外傳的聲音藉由空氣傳播, 而內傳的聲音藉由骨頭傳播。 這被稱為骨傳導。 正因為如此, 內傳的聲音會處於較低的音域, 比外傳的聲音更有共鳴。 一旦抵達,聲音必須進入你的內耳。 這裡還有其他的機制發生, 是個機械過濾器, 是一個小隔板, 每當你發聲時都會保護你的內耳, 所以也會減低你聽到的音量。 還有第三個過濾器, 是個生物過濾器:你的耳蝸。 它是內耳處理聲音的一部分, 由活細胞組成, 根據聽到聲音的頻率 觸發這些活細胞的頻率, 這是習慣效應。 因此, 因為你生活中聽到最多的聲音 是你自己的聲音, 你真的聽到它的時候, 比聽到其他的聲音少。
Finally, we have a fourth filter. It's a neurological filter. Neurologists found out recently that when you open your mouth to create a sound, your own auditory cortex shuts down. So you hear your voice but your brain actually never listens to the sound of your voice. Well, evolutionarily that might make sense, because we know cognitively what we are going to sound like so maybe we don't need to spend energy analyzing the signal. And this is called a corollary discharge and it happens for every motion that your body does. The exact definition of a corollary discharge is a copy of a motor command that is sent by the brain. This copy doesn't create any motion itself but instead is sent to other regions of the brain to inform them of the impending motion. And for the voice, this corollary discharge also has a different name. It is your inner voice.
最後,我們有第四個過濾器, 是個神經過濾器。 神經學家最近發現 當你張嘴發聲時, 你自己的聽覺皮層就會關閉。 所以你聽到自己的聲音, 但你的腦並不真的聆聽自己的聲音。 從進化的角度來看,這可能有道理, 因為我們認知 自己聽起來是什麼樣子, 也許毋需花費精力去分析訊號。 這被稱為「感知回饋」, 發生在你身體的每一個動作上。 感知回饋的確切定義 是由大腦發送的動作命令的副本。 該副本本身不產生任何動作, 而是發送到大腦的其他區域, 通知他它們即將發生的動作。 這種感知回饋在聲音上的名稱不同, 是你的「內在聲音」。
So let's recapitulate. We have the mask, the outward voice, the inside of the mask, your inward voice, and then you have your inner voice. And I like to see this one as the puppeteer that holds the strings of the whole system. Your inner voice is the one you hear when you read a text silently, when you rehearse for an important conversation. Sometimes is hard to turn it off, it's really hard to look at the text written in your native language, without having this inner voice read it. It's also the voice that refuse to stop singing the stupid song you have in your head.
讓我們重述一下。 我們有面具,外傳的聲音, 面具裡面是內傳的聲音, 然後是內在的聲音。 我喜歡將這視為 掌握整個系統弦樂的傀儡手。 當你為重要的會談排練時, 你默默地閱讀文本時 聽到的是你內在的聲音。 有時很難把它關掉; 看到用母語寫的文本時, 真的很難不用內在的聲音去讀它。 這也是難以關掉你腦袋裡 反覆播放著的愚蠢歌曲的原因。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
And for some people it's actually impossible to control it. And that's the case of schizophrenic patients, who have auditory hallucinations. Who can't distinguish at all between voices coming from inside and outside their head. So in our lab, we are also working on small devices to help those people make those distinctions and know if a voice is internal or external.
實際上有一些人無法控制它。 這就是患有幻聽的 精神分裂症患者的情況, 他們無法區分腦內、腦外的聲音。 因此我們實驗室正在研究小型設備, 來幫助這些人分辨這些區別, 是內部還是外部的聲音。
You can also think about the inner voice as the voice that speaks in your dream. This inner voice can take many forms. And in your dreams, you actually unleash the potential of this inner voice. That's another work we are doing in our lab: trying to access this inner voice in dreams. So even if you can't always control it, the inner voice -- you can always engage with it through dialogue, through inner dialogues. And you can even see this inner voice as the missing link between thought and actions.
你也能把內在的聲音 想成夢中說話的聲音。 這種內在的聲音能有多種形式。 在夢中,你實際上釋放了 這種內在聲音的潛力。 這是我們實驗室的另一項工作: 試圖在夢中獲得這種內在的聲音。 即使內在的聲音並不總是由你控制, 你能通過對話, 通過內心的對話來與之對話。 你甚至能將這種內在的聲音 看作是思想與行動之間缺失的聯繫。
So I hope I've left you with a better appreciation, a new appreciation of all of your voices and the role it plays inside and outside of you -- as your voice is a very critical determinant of what makes you humans and of how you interact with the world.
我希望我已經讓你更賞識 你所有的聲音, 以及對聲音在你內外 發揮的作用有了新的認識。 因為你的聲音是 讓你成為人類的關鍵決定因素, 讓你與世界互動。
Thank you.
謝謝。
(Applause)
(掌聲)