As we mentioned in an earlier Blog, the US television show Jeopardy! has agreed to host a showdown between a new question-answering computer system developed by IBM and two former Jeopardy! champions. The new system, named “Watson” by IBM, accepts input in the form of natural English inquiries, and then responds with its best determination of the answer. For the Jeopardy! contest, of course, the roles of “question” and “answer” are reversed.
In a practice round conducted on 13 Jan 2011 at IBM’s Yorktown Heights Research Center, Watson defeated its human challengers (former Jeopardy! champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter). The final winnings were: Watson $4400, Jennings $3400, Rutter $1200.
As an example of the questions in the test round, the host read the following clue (in the category “Chicks Dig It”): “Kathleen Kenyon’s excavation of this city mentioned in Joshua shows that the walls had been repaired 17 times.”
IBM’s Watson immediately answered “What is Jericho?” in a simulated male voice. Watson went on to answer the next four clues in this category before the humans recovered and answered one.
The real Jeopardy! challenge will be televised on Feb. 14, 15, 16. Some additional details are available at Wall Street Journal article.