Jeopardy: Human vs. Machine

[Scott Greczkowski]

Man seems like I said this yesterday...

Furthermore, Breeden writes, "The fact that Watson had a buzzing device is irrelevant. It already knew how it would answer before the question was finished being read, and the humans were still gathering input. And considering that the questions on last night’s show were actually pretty easy for “Jeopardy!” and that Jennings and Rutter obviously knew most of the answers, what Watson really excelled at was buzzing in faster than the humans."

Tech Commentator: Watson Won on 'Jeopardy!' Because the Exhibition 'was set up in a blatantly unfair way to favor the computer.' Also, He Says About IBM's Watson--Which Trounced Its Human Opponents--'All very rudimentary work for a computer' : TVBizw

 

[Foxbat]

Maybe if the text form of the clue had been given to Watson at 110 baud? Then, like a person, Watson could be parsing its "question" and making changes as Alex read the clue. But really, Watson needed "ears", if nothing else, to prevent the glaring "he gave the same answer as someone who was wrong" scenario. If the SYNC system in my car can understand me in a noisy environment, Watson should have been able to have speech recognition added (what, maybe 1-2 of his PPC750 cores?) I thought having the animation on Watson's avatar gave some insight into the timing of the clues. I also liked the "Top 3" and percentages assigned to each possible result which showed some "how the hell did Watson come up with that?"

I took this exhibition to be exactly that, a demonstration of programming ability and raw computational power. Watson is still a collection of silicon (with impurities) that was programmed to be able to use a feedback mechanism to further aid it in parsing a clue and finding what was probably the intended answer (in the form of a question). Watson showed little "understanding" of when to use "who" or "what" in some of its "answers". In the Beatle's People category, Watson "thought" that the subject of a song title was a thing and not a person, so you got "What is Lady Madonna?" instead of "Who is Lady Madonna?"

Plus, the whole Toronto is now part of the United States thing was pretty funny, along with the wacky Daily Double wagers. I wonder how the programmers came up with that strategy? But overall, I was entertained as was my wife. It's the first time I recall us sitting down and watching "Jeopardy!" together...

 

[John Kotches]

Foxbat:

I agree with most of what you said.

I do believe that if speech recognition were required it could have changed the outcome. English is a brutal language with homonyms and contextual meanings that are difficult to handle.

Moar gees with gginggerbread and tapatalk!

 

[diogen]

A nice writeup
Watson Jeopardy! computer: Ken Jennings describes what it's like to play against a machine. - By Ken Jennings - Slate Magazine

Watson has lots in common with a top-ranked human Jeopardy! player: It's very smart, very fast,
speaks in an uneven monotone, and has never known the touch of a woman. But unlike us, Watson
cannot be intimidated. It never gets cocky or discouraged. It plays its game coldly, implacably...

Not to downplay IBM's achievements, but this is actually the first triumph of a machine over human.
The Kasparov win wasn't it. At least there are too many unanswered questions about that event.

IBM knows how to play those "games" better than anybody...

Diogen.

 

[jayn_j]

A nice writeup
Watson Jeopardy! computer: Ken Jennings describes what it's like to play against a machine. - By Ken Jennings - Slate Magazine


Not to downplay IBM's achievements, but this is actually the first triumph of a machine over human.
The Kasparov win wasn't it. At least there are too many unanswered questions about that event.

IBM knows how to play those "games" better than anybody...

Diogen.

But the controversy is here as well with the "buzzer advantage" controversy.

 

[diogen]

But the controversy is here as well with the "buzzer advantage" controversy.

You are right...
But at least there is no point in claiming Watson was getting help.
With Kasparov it is not as obvious.

Diogen.