VIDEO: IBM's Supercomputer to go on Jeopardy!

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Way back in April of 2009, IBM announced plans to build a question answering (QA) computing system with the ability to understand complex questions and answer them with enough precision to compete against humans on Jeopardy!

Last year, Dr. David Ferrucci, leader of the IBM Watson project team, said the system named Watson would have to spend a lot of time studying before it was deemed ready to compete.

"The system would have 'read' many, many natural language texts -- books, reference materials, all kinds of information -- and tried to analyze and organize that information in such a way that it can see the meaning of the question and try to figure out what are likely answers," Ferrucci said.

Though the New York Times reports that Watson will not be appearing on Jeopardy! until this fall, we now have a video of Watson in action. Watch below to see what happens when Watson succeeds, and when he fails.

Read more here.

*Image via The New York Times

Jane McEntegart
52 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Parsian
    They should call it HAL-Prototype instead
    Reply
  • mlopinto2k1
    Deeply impressing.
    Reply
  • ohim
    One step closer to cyberdyne, but this time Arnie won`t be there to be back.
    Reply
  • proxy711
    Program it to search Wikipedia /gameover
    Reply
  • Parsian
    proxy711Program it to search Wikipedia /gameover
    Wolfram Alpha does something similar by looking through vast amount of information to compute an answer
    Reply
  • ecnovaec
    a very very expensive machine that does something you could easily do with a laptop, voice recognition software, and google lol.
    Reply
  • mlopinto2k1
    ecnovaeca very very expensive machine that does something you could easily do with a laptop, voice recognition software, and google lol.Would you mind providing us with an example?
    Reply
  • Ragnar-Kon
    sliemIf it runs on Windows, it'll crash in the middle of the game.HAHAH jk, I love Windows. This is nice though, however you can't replace a brain (unless it's a veggy brain or a retard brain).Probably runs a customized version of Linux, like all of IBM's super/custom computers.

    And I agree with mlopinto2k1, this is impressive (or at least very interesting)
    Reply
  • tainted_peak
    Think about having one of theses as a tutor or teacher. It would have so many uses in day to day life when questions arise that you can't seem to answer or explain.
    Reply
  • Parsian
    ecnovaeca very very expensive machine that does something you could easily do with a laptop, voice recognition software, and google lol.
    no, the AI has to analyze, verify, search, construct the appropriate answer to the question, then respond accordingly.

    that solution of simply voice recognition, only brings up relevant information but no specific answer
    Reply