Man vs. Machine

I'm sure you've heard about the Watson computer that IBM has made. Their methodology of proving it's intelligence? Putting it into a competition against homo sapiens in America's favorite game show: Jeopardy.

I'll admit, I usually don't watch Jeopardy (it's on during Seinfeld, obviously you know what I'm watching) but when I do I always learn something - and always feel proud of myself when I know something. I went through a game-show phase where my favorite thing ever was Game Show Network. I literally could not get enough. Anyways.

I caught some of the Jeopardy Watson episode tonight. It's an absolute joke because think about it, who is going to know more: Google or You? Who is going to think of it faster: You or Google? This machine basically uses Google, types the words into its "brain," and gets the answer. Of course it's going to know more than you, and it's going to be able to get the answer faster than you can think about it. You always have those things where you "can't think what it was" and then it may come to you 4 hours later. Google's able to figure it out in less than a second.

Watson is wrecking house. It usually knows the answer with 90% accuracy, and answers in less than a second. You can tell Ken Jennings is just pissed because he doesn't have the split second to process the question before buzzing in. He can't even buzz in and stop to think about it, because Watson is too fast.

What does this really prove? Nothing. Of course the computer is going to be smarter, answer faster, etc. The impressive part is that it "think" for itself. I don't fully understand the technology, but it seems like it's able to understand Mr. Trebek (I'll take The Rapists for 20), process the information, and then respond almost instantly - in English and in the "What is X" format. Watson choose the category it wants to answer, the money it wants to wager. There are a few times it is completely wrong and has an answer from left field, but usually it's dead on. In two days it's up at 38 some thousand.

It's impressive technology, but it scares me to think where this technology will be in 10, 20 years. We've seen too many Hollywood movies to think it could be anything good (Terminator, I Robot), but maybe it could be. Or it could turn into SkyNet and destroy us all. Either way, for right now, it's impressive. Is it necessary? Absolutely not. It's probably the beginning of the end. Embrace what time we have left humans.