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Is Watson the supercomputer smarter than Congress?

T

tk149

Diamond Member
Watson, the 'Jeopardy!' champ, loses to Rep. Rush Holt

Reporting from Washington — Watson -- the IBM supercomputer that cleaned up on "Jeopardy!" -- lost to Rep. Rush Holt of New Jersey in a battle of wits Monday evening at a D.C. hotel. So it looks like we can put off welcoming our new machine overlords for one more day.

The faux "Jeopardy!" contest pitting Watson against Holt and some other House members was intended to emphasize the need for increased math and science education to bolster U.S. global competitiveness. Holt, a physicist who was a five-time winner on "Jeopardy!" 35 years ago, played the first round against Watson. The computer easily beat two rivals, including "Jeopardy!" legend Ken Jennings, in a TV tournament last month.

According to Holt's office, the Democratic congressman dusted the computer in categories such as "Presidential Rhyme Time" and "Also a Laundry Detergent." (Example: "What is a three-letter nickname for the Beatles?" Answer: "What is Fab?")

Watson outpaced Holt on the answer to the clue: "Ambrose Bierce described this as 'a temporary insanity curable by marriage.' " Watson answered, "What is love?" (You'll never know, computer.)

At the end of the round, Holt had earned $8,600 to Watson's $6,200. But Watson ultimately won the match against Congress overall.

"I was proud to hold my own with Watson," Holt said in a statement. "While it was fun to out-do Watson for one night in trivia; it is vital that, as a nation, we out-innovate, out-educate, and out-build the rest of the world for generations to come."

After the round, Watson, when pressed for comment, said, "Enjoy your day in the sun while you can, humans" -- and it then disintegrated several congressional staffers out of spite. All right, so that didn't actually happen. But after the match, Watson tweeted "Great game in DC this evening!"
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I think Watson deliberately let Holt win to lull us into a false sense of superiority. 😀

/cue Haddaway's "What is Love" song
 
If you think pure statistical analysis, and democracy are the only right answers in any government (note that democracy classically ignores the civil rights of any minority class) then yes, Watson would probably be more efficient in parsing money and supporting programs that effect the most people.

Of course, you must realize that Watson only knows what he has been told--how to decide on certain issues is not a mere matter of numbers.


Anyway, Watson is useless as legislative body. We'd still be living in the Jim Crow South were Watson allowed to preside over the legislative body for the previous 6 decades. (Though we probably would have moved off of the gold standard 3 or so decades earlier--it doesn't take much more than an imbecile to realize that when markets collapse and money suddenly disappears, those scraps of shiny metal that you've squirreled away under your bed will do you no good when there is no money to exchange for it)
 
Individual members of Congress may be smart, but taken as a whole, Congress is dumber than your average grade school student.
 
I don't think they have created a modules for deception, lying, scam, fraud, corruption etc.. How can the poor thing compete? its an unfair match.
 
article said:
...
According to Holt's office, the Democratic congressman dusted the computer in categories such as "Presidential Rhyme Time" and "Also a Laundry Detergent." (Example: "What is a three-letter nickname for the Beatles?" Answer: "What is Fab?")
...
But Watson ultimately won the match against Congress overall...
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"Presidential Rhyme Time"? "Also a Laundry Detergent"? Shouldn't all of the categories be about the law/constitution/politic?
 
zinfamous said:
If you think pure statistical analysis, and democracy are the only right answers in any government (note that democracy classically ignores the civil rights of any minority class) then yes, Watson would probably be more efficient in parsing money and supporting programs that effect the most people.

Of course, you must realize that Watson only knows what he has been told--how to decide on certain issues is not a mere matter of numbers.


Anyway, Watson is useless as legislative body. We'd still be living in the Jim Crow South were Watson allowed to preside over the legislative body for the previous 6 decades. (Though we probably would have moved off of the gold standard 3 or so decades earlier--it doesn't take much more than an imbecile to realize that when markets collapse and money suddenly disappears, those scraps of shiny metal that you've squirreled away under your bed will do you no good when there is no money to exchange for it)
Click to expand...

That's the key. A computer wouldn't be able to figure out what to do. It might be able to check a proposed bill against the Constitution to see if it's valid but it wouldn't know what law to create. It might be able to handle the budget but it would need input on what increasing or decreasing funding would do.
 
zinfamous said:
snipped

note that democracy classically ignores the civil rights of any minority class
Click to expand...
Only if you think a minority class should have different rights than any other class, in which csae you would be a *ist

Of course, you must realize that Watson only knows what he has been told--how to decide on certain issues is not a mere matter of numbers.
Click to expand...

This is incorrect. Watson does indeed "deduce" answers from other known knowledge. It's sort of the key of what makes it a big deal. Without that ability it would basically be Ask.com
 
Train said:
Only if you think a minority class should have different rights than any other class, in which csae you would be a *ist



This is incorrect. Watson does indeed "deduce" answers from other known knowledge. It's sort of the key of what makes it a big deal. Without that ability it would basically be Ask.com
Click to expand...

my point, is that his known knowledge is the knowledge that has been given to him.

granted, he has a much larger database than any single human with with to pull from, and yes--his skill is in deducing answers properly (it's more of figuring out language nuance." this is not the same as politics, and more to the point--one has to have an ability to understand what is right for one group of people is potentially not only not-right for another group, but potentially damaging. This is where he would fail, i think--b/c it is pure numbers. While this would probably eliminate the favoritism and personal benefit functions you expect in the ave politician, it removes the label of living, breathing human form those affected by the computers decisions.


and no--nothing about minority vs majority rights suggests that I think others should have different rights. The point is that a majority vote can not be an acceptable determinate to protect equal minority rights--and yes, this is about prop 8, and if you think current rights are completely equal, then you're either blind, stupid, or perhaps both regarding the issue.
 
zinfamous said:
my point, is that his known knowledge is the knowledge that has been given to him.

granted, he has a much larger database than any single human with with to pull from, and yes--his skill is in deducing answers properly (it's more of figuring out language nuance." this is not the same as politics, and more to the point--one has to have an ability to understand what is right for one group of people is potentially not only not-right for another group, but potentially damaging. This is where he would fail, i think--b/c it is pure numbers. While this would probably eliminate the favoritism and personal benefit functions you expect in the ave politician, it removes the label of living, breathing human form those affected by the computers decisions.
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Sigh, why do I even respond to you? Do you ever get tired of being told you are so off topic that what you have posted becomes irrelevant?

guess, what, again, you have posted something irrelevant.

Watson can deduce new knowledge, this is a fact, its what mountains of academic papers about Watson were written on. This makes your statement false. End of discussion. Going on some rant about what a politician should be or that watson is not living, breating person is, oh whats that word again... irrelevant

and no--nothing about minority vs majority rights suggests that I think others should have different rights. The point is that a majority vote can not be an acceptable determinate to protect equal minority rights--and yes, this is about prop 8, and if you think current rights are completely equal, then you're either blind, stupid, or perhaps both regarding the issue.
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You've meshed legal definitions with rights to further your cause. Unfortunately it's not the correct way to further your cause.

But you are right on one thing, there certainly isnt equailty today. With affirmative action you have government sponsored racism and sexism. You can't really pretend to be an EO country when stuff like that is going on.
 
Train said:
Only if you think a minority class should have different rights than any other class, in which csae you would be a *ist



This is incorrect. Watson does indeed "deduce" answers from other known knowledge. It's sort of the key of what makes it a big deal. Without that ability it would basically be Ask.com
Click to expand...

It's not really deduction. More like searching through billions of words, finding matches, and spitting out the surrounding words as an answer.
 
Train said:
Watson can deduce new knowledge, this is a fact, its what mountains of academic papers about Watson were written on. This makes your statement false. End of discussion.
Click to expand...

It may be new knowledge to a single person, but not to the mankind.
 
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