Paul J. Ledak Vice President, IBM Research 2011 IBM Corporation
Watson answers a grand challenge Can we design a computing system that rivals a human s ability to answer questions posed in natural language, interpreting meaning and context and retrieving, analyzing and understanding vast amounts of lnowledge in real-time?
Want to Play Chess or Just Chat? Chess A finite, mathematically well-defined search space Limited number of moves and states All the symbols are completely grounded in the mathematical rules of the game Human Language Words by themselves have no meaning Only grounded in human cognition Words navigate, align and communicate an infinite space of intended meaning Computers can not ground words to human experiences to derive meaning
Easy Questions? ln((12,546,798 * π)) ^ 2 / 34,567.46 = 0.00885 Select Payment where Owner= David Jones and Type(Product)= Laptop, Owner David Jones Serial Number 45322190-AK Invoice # Vendor Payment INV10895 MyBuy $104.56 Serial Number Type Invoice # 45322190-AK LapTop INV10895 David Jones David Jones = Dave Jones David Jones 4 IBM Confidential
Hard Questions? Computer programs are explicit, fast and exacting with numbers and symbols. But Natural Language is highly contextual, ambiguous and often imprecise, using puns, slang, jargon, acronyms, and misused words. Structured Where was X born? Unstructured One day, from among his city views of Ulm, Otto chose a water color to send to Albert Einstein as a remembrance of Einstein s birthplace. Un dia, viendo la ciudad de Ulm, Otto escogio una acuarela para enviarsela a Albert Einstein como un recuerdo del lugar de naciemiento de Einstein. X ran this? If leadership is an art then surely Jack Welch has proved himself a master painter during his tenure at GE. Si el liderazgo es un arte, con toda seguridad Jack Welch ha demostrado ser un excelente artista durante su vinculacion a GE.
The Jeopardy! Challenge: A compelling way to conclusively demonstrate the technology of automatic Question Answering along 5 Key Dimensions Broad/Open Domain Complex Language High Precision Accurate Confidence High Speed $200 Si esta de pie, es la direccion en la cual debe mirear para ver el guardaexcoba. $600 En la division celular, la mitosis divide el nucleo y la citokinesis divide este liquido que protege el nucleo. $1000 La primera persona que se menciona por su nombre en El Hombre de la Mascara de Hierro es este heroe de un libro anterior de historietas del mismo autor $2000 De los 4 paises en el mundo con los cuales los Estados Unidos no mantiene relaciones diplomaticas, cual es el que esta ubicado mas al norte?
Watson an IBM Power 750 System Watson consists of 2,880 Power 7 Processor cores One question can take 2 hours on a single processor but must answer in 2-4 seconds 15 Terabytes RAM memory 500 Gigabytes of accumulated human knowledge in natural language text No connection to the internet 80 Teraflops 80 kw Power consumption w 25 tons of air conditioning 7
Broad Domain We do NOT attempt to anticipate all questions and build specialized databases. In a random sample of 20,000 questions we found 2,500 distinct types*. The most frequent occurring <3% of the timthe distribution has a very long tail. And for each these types 1000 s of different things may be asked. Even going for the head of the tail will barely make a dent *13% are non-distinct (e.g., it, this, these or NA) Our Focus is on reusable Natural Language Processing technology for analyzing volumes of as-is text. 8
Question DeepQA: The Technology Behind Watson Massively Parallel Probabilistic Evidence-Based Architecture Natural Language Text Analytics Solution Hypothesis and Evidence Profiles Machine Learning Question & Topic Analysis Primary Search Multiple Interpretations Answer Sources 100 s sources Question Decomposition Candidate Answer Generation 100 s Possible Answers Hypothesis Generation Answer Scoring 1000 s of Pieces of Evidence Evidence Sources Evidence Retrieval Hypothesis and Evidence Scoring Deep Evidence Scoring 100,000 s Scores from many Deep Analysis Algorithms Synthesis Learned Models help combine and weigh the Evidence Balance& Combine Models Models Models Models Models Models Final Confidence Merging & Ranking Analitica de Texto con Lenguage Natural Hipotesis y Perfiles de Evidencia La Maquina Aprende Answer & Confidence
Automatic Learning From Reading Sentence Parsing Generalization & Statistical Aggregation Volumes of Text Syntactic Frames subject verb object Semantic Frames Inventors patent inventions (.8) Officials Submit Resignations (.7) People earn degrees at schools (0.9) Fluid is a liquid (.6) Liquid is a fluid (.5) Vessels Sink (0.7) People sink 8-balls (0.5) (in pool/0.8)
Evaluating Possibilities and Their Evidence In cell division, mitosis splits the nucleus & cytokinesis splits this liquid cushioning the nucleus. En la division celular, la mitosis divide el nucleo y la citokinesis divide este liquido que protege el nucleo. Organelle Vacuole Cytoplasm Plasma Mitochondria Blood Is( Cytoplasm, liquid ) = 0.2 Is( organelle, liquid ) = 0.1 Is( vacuole, liquid ) = 0.2 Is( plasma, liquid ) = 0.7 Many candidate answers (CAs) are generated from many different searches Each possibility is evaluated according to different dimensions of evidence. Just One piece of evidence is the right type. In this case a liquid. Cytoplasm is a fluid surrounding the nucleus Wordnet Is_a(Fluid, Liquid)? Learned Is_a(Fluid, Liquid) yes.
Keyword Evidence In May 1898 Portugal celebrated the 400th anniversary of this explorer s arrival in India. En Mayo de 1898 Portugal celebro el 400 aniversario de la llegada de este explorador a la India. In May, Gary arrived in India after he celebrated his anniversary in Portugal. En Mayo, Gary llego a la India luego de celebrar su aniversario en Portugal. llego celebrao Keyword Matching celebrar In Mayo 1898 Keyword Matching In Mayo 400th aniversario Keyword Matching aniversario This evidence suggests Gary is the answer BUT the system must learn that keyword matching may be weak relative to other types of evidence Portugal llegada India explorerador Keyword Matching Keyword Matching Gary India in Portugal 12 IBM Confidential
Deeper Evidence In May 1898 Portugal celebrated the 400th anniversary of this explorer s arrival in India. En Mayo de 1898 Portugal celebro el 400 aniversario de la llegada de este explorador a la India. On the 27 th of May 1498, Vasco da Gama landed in Kappad Beach. El 27 de Mayo de 1498, Vasco da Gama arribo a la playa de Kappad. Search Far and Wide celebro Portugal Explore many hypotheses Find Judge Evidence arribo Mayo 1898 400th aniversario Many inference algorithms Temporal Reasoning Date Math 27th Mayo 1498 Stronger evidence can be much harder to find and score. llegada India explorador Statistical Paraphrasing GeoSpatial Reasoning Paraphrase s Geo- KB The evidence is still not 100% certain. Playa de Kappad Vasco da Gama 13
Evidence: Time, Popularity, Source, Classification etc. Clue: You ll find Bethel College and a Seminary in this holy Minnesota city. Podra encontrar la Universidad de Bethel y un Seminario en esta ciudad sagrada de Minnessota. There s a Bethel College and a Seminary in both cities. System is not weighing location evidence high enough to give St. Paul the edge.
Evidence: Puns Clue: You ll find Bethel College and a Seminary in this holy Minnesota city. Podra encontrar la Universidad de Bethel y un Seminario en esta ciudad sagrada de Minnessota. Humans may get this based on the pun since St. Paul since is a holy city. We added a Pun Scorer that discovers and scores Pun relationships.
DeepQA: Incremental Progress in Answering Precision on the Jeopardy Challenge: 6/2007-11/2010 IBM Watson Playing in the Winners Cloud v0.8 11/10 V0.7 04/10 v0.6 10/09 v0.5 05/09 v0.4 12/08 v0.3 08/08 v0.2 05/08 v0.1 12/07 Baseline 12/06
Potential Business Applications Healthcare / Life Sciences: Diagnostic Assistance, Evidenced- Based, Collaborative Medicine Tech Support: Help-desk, Contact Centers Enterprise Knowledge Management and Business Intelligence Government: Improved Information Sharing and Security
DeepQA in Continuous Evidence-Based Diagnostic Analysis Symptoms Considers and synthesizes a broad range of evidence improving quality, reducing cost Diagnosis Models Fin d M ed s Hist Fa m Symp Confidence Family History Patient History Medications Tests/Findings Renal failure UTI Diabetes Notes/Hypotheses Influenza hypokalemia esophogitis Most Confident Diagnosis: Diabetes UTI Influenza Most Confident Diagnosis: Diabetes and Esophogitis Huge Volumes of Texts, Journals, References, DBs etc.
Imagine if you had all the answers you need to win IBM Business Analytics and Optimization solutions can ensure that you do Used by Watson Related Innovations IBM Content Analytics Natural Language Processing and content analysis leveraging UIMA InfoSphere BigInsights Big Data analysis (Hadoop) IBM Power Systems Thousands of parallel processes InfoSphere Warehouse DB2, Informix, Netezza Aggregating and storing data and content InfoSphere Streams Massively parallel analysis Business Analytics BI, Predictive Analytics and more ECM Solutions IBM ediscovery Analyzer IBM Classification Module IBM OmniFind Enterprise Search Workload Optimized Systems Integrated, Optimized by Workload IBM Global Business Services Research, expertise and analytical assets
IBM Business Analytics and Optimization Solutions enable you apply capabilities like those in Watson to optimize your business IBM is uniquely qualified to help you Plan an Information Agenda Master Your Information Apply Business Analytics to align with your business strategy to ensure it is accurate, relevant and governed to anticipate and shape business outcomes 20 2011 IBM Corporation
GRACIAS IBM Confidential