Computer Program to Take On ‘Jeopardy!’
I.B.M. plans to announce Monday that it is in the final stages of completing a computer program to compete against human “Jeopardy!” contestants. If the program beats the humans, the field of artificial intelligence will have made a leap forward.
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The I.B.M. researchers and “Jeopardy!” producers said they were considering what form their cybercontestant would take and what gender it would assume. One possibility would be to use an animated avatar that would appear on a computer display.
“We’ve only begun to talk about it,” said Harry Friedman, the executive producer of “Jeopardy!” “We all agree that it shouldn’t look like Robby the Robot.”
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The real difficulty, Dr. Nyberg said, is not searching a database but getting the computer to understand what it should be searching for.
The system must be able to deal with analogies, puns, double entendres and relationships like size and location, all at lightning speed.
Thanks Schaaf!