Friday, January 14, 2011

Ladies, gentlemen and robots - This is Jeopardy

And shortly, humans will be taken down another peg, and like chess, Jeopardy will be a game dominated by machines.

Watson is IBM's latest AI computer, which thanks to advances in natural language processing and parallel architecture/algorithms is able to parse and comprehend the riddle-like jeopardy questions.

On Feb 14th 2011, Watson will play 74-time Jeopardy champion Ken Jennings and Jeopardy all-time biggest money earner Brad Rutter.

And Watson is going to slaughter them. You can watch a short test-match they played here. Final Score: Watson - $4,400, Jennings - $3,400 and Rutter $1,200.

Notice how Watson consistently beats Jennings ringing in if they both know the answer. The humans wont even get a chance to buzz in if Watson wants to answer. Also notice how Watson was playing conservatively, not ringing in on answers where it was only ~60% confident. I wonder what the reason for that is? Wouldn't the rational thing be to answer the question as long as your at least 51% confident?

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