Motion sickness
The upchuck wagon
How not to feel queasy in a self-driving motor car
晕动病
“令人作呕”的车
乘坐自动驾驶汽车时怎样才能不犯恶心
EXPECTATIONS are high, among those boosting the idea of self-driving cars, that people will be able to do other things, such as reading, working on a laptop or having a nap, when riding in such a vehicle. But for many that is an unlikely prospect. Apart from those who have no intention of even getting into an autonomous car, which currently amounts to some 23% of Americans, another 36% would be willing to ride but would not take their eyes off the road, according to a study published in 2014 by the University of Michigan. Some of those people will be looking out of the window because it helps to avoid nausea, dizziness and vomiting, particularly if they are among the 5-10% of the population who regularly experience the unpleasant symptoms of motion sickness.
那些致力推动自动驾驶汽车这一理念的人热切期望，人们在乘坐这种车时还可以做别的事，比如看书、用笔记本电脑工作，或者打个盹儿。但对很多人来说这不大可能实现。根据密歇根大学于2014年发布的一项研究，除去那些根本就无意乘坐自动驾驶汽车的人——目前约占美国人的23%，还有36%的人虽然愿意乘坐，但不会把眼睛从道路移开。这之中有些人会望向窗外，因为这能帮助避免头晕、恶心或呕吐。尤其如果他们属于人群中常出现晕动病不适症状的那5-10%，就更会往窗外看了。
Help, though, is at hand. The selfsame authors of the Michigan study, Michael Sivak and Brandon Schoettle, who both work for the university’s Transportation Research Institute, have just been awarded a patent for a device that could act as a countermeasure against the malady.
不过，帮助近在眼前。上述研究的作者、供职于密歇根大学交通研究所的迈克尔·西瓦克(Michael Sivak)和布兰登·索特尔(Brandon Schoettle)发明的一种设备刚刚获得了专利，可能成为晕车的解药。
Motion sickness is caused by a conflict between signals arriving in the brain from the inner ear (which forms the base of the vestibular system, the sensory apparatus that deals with movement and balance, and which detects motion mechanically), and from the eyes, which detect motion optically. If someone is looking at a stationary object within a vehicle, such as a magazine, his eyes will inform his brain that what he is viewing is not moving. His inner ears, however, will contradict this by sensing the motion of the vehicle. The resulting confusion, at least according to one theory, leads his brain to conclude that he is hallucinating because he has ingested poison. Hence the need to throw up, to rid the stomach of any toxins.
晕动病是大脑中来自内耳和眼睛的信号产生冲突所致。内耳是前庭系统这一应对运动和平衡的感觉器官的所在，通过机械的方式感知运动;眼睛则是通过视觉感知运动。如果一个人在车内注视一件静止的物品，比如一本杂志，他的眼睛就会传达给大脑：他正在看的这个物件没有移动。然而他的内耳却感觉到了汽车的运动，这就与眼睛传达的信息产生了冲突，从而造成混乱。起码有一种理论认为，这种混乱会让大脑断定这个人是因为服用了毒药而产生了幻觉，因此他需要呕吐，好把胃中的毒素排出来。
The idea that Dr Sivak and Mr Schoettle have come up with is to arrange for an array of small lights to appear in the periphery of a potential sufferer’s field of view, meaning that these lights can be seen regardless of what the person in question is looking at. Such lights, most probably small panels of LEDs, could be fitted into a headset, a hat or onto the frame of a pair of glasses. They would be controlled by various motion sensors and blink on and off in a way that is designed to mimic the velocity, rolling, pitching and other movements of a vehicle.
西瓦克和索特尔的点子是在有可能晕车的乘客的视野边缘布置一组小灯，这样无论该乘客在看什么，视域内都会出现这些小灯。这种小灯(很可能会是LED光源阵列)可以安装在头戴设备、帽子或眼镜框上，由多种运动传感器控制，通过闪烁来模拟汽车的速度、摇摆、颠簸以及其他动态。
For the wearer of such kit, the effect would be to provide a visual response that corresponds to the movements the inner ear is detecting. So, for instance, a panel of LEDs positioned at the side of each eye might flash from the front to the back when a vehicle is moving forward but stop when it is braking. Similarly, the lights could blink in sequence towards the left if the car was turning left. The speed of the flashing and the brightness of the lights could be tuned to match the intensity of the movement, such as the vehicle’s rate of acceleration. Dr Sivak and Mr Schoettle think the light arrays could also be fitted to various parts of vehicles’ interiors, such as their door pillars, sidewalls and seats. That way a passenger would be aware of them without having to don special equipment.
乘客佩戴该设备后，将会接收到与其内耳感知到的运动相一致的视觉响应。举例来说，当车辆行进时，两只眼睛旁边的LED光源阵列或许会自前向后发光，在车辆制动时停止闪光。同样，如果车辆左转，小灯可能会依次向左闪烁。或许还可以通过调整闪光的速度及光的亮度，使它们与车辆运动的强度相一致，例如加速度。西瓦克和索特尔认为这种光源阵列还可以安装在车内的多个位置上，比如车门立柱、侧壁和座椅，这样乘客不用穿戴特殊装备就能察觉到光亮。
The Michigan team are making a prototype and the university, which hopes to commercialise the idea, is in discussions with carmakers and automotive suppliers. The system could, of course, also be used by passengers who feel sick in cars with a driver at the wheel—a fate to which children seem particularly susceptible, for reasons that remain obscure. It might also help with other forms of motion sickness, such as airsickness or seasickness, although the ways aircraft and boats move are different from the movement of cars. For many, helping people feel well in cars would be enough. And for taxi companies like Uber and Lyft, which are planning to offer autonomous vehicles that can be summoned by an app, the flashing lights could save a fortune in cleaning bills.
这个密歇根大学的团队正在制造该设备的原型。该校希望能将这一创意成果商品化，正与汽车制造商和汽车零部件供应商洽谈。当然，这一系统也可供那些在有人驾驶的汽车上感到不舒服的乘客使用——小孩子似乎尤其容易出现这种情况，原因尚不清楚。这个设备也许还可以帮助克服其他类型的晕动病，比如晕机或晕船，尽管飞机和船的运动方式与汽车的运动不同。对很多人来说，能让人们在车上感觉舒服些就足够了。优步和Lyft正筹划推出可以通过应用来召车的无人驾驶汽车服务，对这些出租车公司来说，这些闪烁的小灯说不定能节省一大笔清洗费用呢。
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