Jennings was amusingly frustrated every time Watson would beat him out for an answer. Brad seemed to be unconcerned by the end, but Ken fought the fight a lot longer. Ken did give up at the end - that final jeopardy wager was aimed at finishing second, not first.
I wonder if Jennings' wager would have differed if the winner wasn't determined by a cumulative total, but rather a best out of three scenario.
Jennings looked like he was coming out of his seat with frustration, especially when Watson took that second Daily Double in the Double Jeopardy round.
They claimed that Watson doesn't have an advantage with the light cue, but I'm not at all convinced. A colleague was on the show once, and he echoed Teapot's sentiment that the click-in strategy is a pretty important part of the game. Having a computer that can react nearly instantly means any slight delay sinks you.
Originally posted by A Smarter Planet blogFirst, the category names on Jeopardy! are tricky. The answers often do not exactly fit the category. Watson, in his training phase, learned that categories only weakly suggest the kind of answer that is expected, and, therefore, the machine downgrades their significance.
The thing is, the Final Jeopardy categories are NEVER tricky. They are straightforward: U.S. Cities, 20th Century Literature, Presidential Cabinet Members, etc. It seems like Watson should be programmed to give more weight to the Final Jeopardy category.
(edited by SchippeWreck on 16.2.11 1156)
Not exactly. Here's one from last month:
WORLD LANGUAGES Of all the countries with Spanish as an official language, this one is last alphabetically
It's about languages, but the correct response is not a language. And that's all Ferrucci is saying there. After analyzing thousands and thousands of FJs, Watson figured out that the category in FJ is not always proscriptive of the type of answer it should give.
Final Jeopardy is obviously where Watson is weakest. It has ~60x the data to learn from for the first two rounds. And FJ tends less towards the straight fact regurgitation that's prevalent in J/DJ and more towards puzzle-it-out questions like the one above, which Watson's going to have trouble with.
Originally posted by LeroyI wonder if Jennings' wager would have differed if the winner wasn't determined by a cumulative total, but rather a best out of three scenario.
I also wonder if the wager would have been different if it wasn't for charity. If Jennings risked it all and lost, just for the sake of trying to beat a machine, he'd have looked like a petulant jerk. I'm sure if Jennings was playing for himself, he'd have risked it all and gone out in a blaze of glory.
All in all, I think Jennings rebounded nicely today. His stock took a major hit yesterday with that meager total. He makes too much on speaking gigs, appearances, and his Mental Floss column to have his mystique take that kind of hit.
Watson may have crushed the competition, but it'll never be able to bring the hilarity like Jennings did with his Simpsons reference last night in Final Jeopardy.
About the "US Cities/Toronto" Final Jeopardy thing ... My brother is absolutely convinced that Watson has become self-aware and understands the human concept of sarcasm; therefore, since it was so far ahead of its two competitors, it purposefully chose a non-US city as its response in kind of a "fuck-you" move to the entire human race.
I am totally serious, that's what he believes ... Watson was thumbing its nose at the inferior human competition by giving a bogus answer and "laughing" all the way to the (virtual) bank. He's also convinced that its final wager of $974 has some kind of hidden significance.
"All RAW is these days is a cheap version of Saturday Night Live, so if you wanna tune in to watch the amazing star power of Al Sharpton and Nancy O'Dell, go ahead! Who's gonna host next week, Big Bird? Wow, that's must-see TV!" - John Morrison (10/16/09 Smackdown!)
The New York Times has a post game article, with the button press speed and "US Cities" answer both discussed. And Ken Jennings wrote a very good (and funny) blog post on Slate about this experience.
Originally posted by AlessandroAbout the "US Cities/Toronto" Final Jeopardy thing ... My brother is absolutely convinced that Watson has become self-aware and understands the human concept of sarcasm; therefore, since it was so far ahead of its two competitors, it purposefully chose a non-US city as its response in kind of a "fuck-you" move to the entire human race.
I am totally serious, that's what he believes ... Watson was thumbing its nose at the inferior human competition by giving a bogus answer and "laughing" all the way to the (virtual) bank. He's also convinced that its final wager of $974 has some kind of hidden significance.
Even the remote possibility of this being correct terrifies me.
Actually, his new theory is that Watson purposefully got the answer blatantly (and embarrassingly) wrong to throw people off its trail ... so that we won't realize how smart it really is before it's too late.
"All RAW is these days is a cheap version of Saturday Night Live, so if you wanna tune in to watch the amazing star power of Al Sharpton and Nancy O'Dell, go ahead! Who's gonna host next week, Big Bird? Wow, that's must-see TV!" - John Morrison (10/16/09 Smackdown!)
"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." -- Ken Jennings
"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone." --- Bart Giamatti, on baseball
Originally posted by Teapot Not exactly. Here's one from last month:
WORLD LANGUAGES Of all the countries with Spanish as an official language, this one is last alphabetically
It's about languages, but the correct response is not a language. And that's all Ferrucci is saying there. After analyzing thousands and thousands of FJs, Watson figured out that the category in FJ is not always proscriptive of the type of answer it should give.
Well, yes, but the world language in question is in the clue! Since there was no US city in the clue for his question, it follows that the answer sought would be a US city. And in any event I can't imagine the answer to an FJ clue in "US Cities" being a non-US city, although I can imagine the answer not being a city at all.
To It's False, I don't think Jennings would have looked bad if he had risked it all. It's not as though it would actually reduce the amount going to charity--at worst it would have meant his charity getting less and Rutter's getting more.
I don't know how they chose the categories, but I agree with Matt that it would have been nice to see them throw something like "Before And After" at Watson. Heck, they could have just shown us how it dealt with that type of question in the practice games.
(via Twitter from...hmmm, one of you. I've already forgotten? We both won, I remember THAT)
I don't know if it's the same answers for everyone, but with the correct answer of "Batman and Robin Hood", watson gave a .521 probability that the correct answer was "Lincoln Green Revolution". That's one of those embarrassing answers. But it did say it got "Black Death of a Salesman" and "Charlie Brown Recluse" pretty easily.
Originally posted by Mr. Boffo I don't know if it's the same answers for everyone, but with the correct answer of "Batman and Robin Hood", watson gave a .521 probability that the correct answer was "Lincoln Green Revolution". That's one of those embarrassing answers. But it did say it got "Black Death of a Salesman" and "Charlie Brown Recluse" pretty easily.
That's pretty impressive. Too bad they didn't include something like that on the televised game, then.
What sort of music do you think Lincoln Green Revolution will play when they form? B^)
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