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Post-Googleism At IBM With Piquant
kamesh writes "James Fallows of the New York Times reports an interesting search technology that IBM is developing. IBM demonstrated a system called Piquant, which analyzed the semantic structure of a passage and therefore exposed 'knowledge' that wasn't explicitly there. After scanning a news article about Canadian politics, the system responded correctly to the question, 'Who is Canada's prime minister?' even though those exact words didn't appear in the article. What do you think?"
Till you realise the computer answered 'some asshole' which could be any prime minister in the world really.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
We must integrate ourselves with computers to a point at which the living being and computer cannot be separated anymore. The perfect union of the biological component (wetware) and computer (hardware) will mark the end of the human race - and the birth of something new and wonderful.
Obviously this will face strong, religious and quasi-religious (ethics) resistance from the old guard but it will pass with the fools themselves.
I for one congratulate Canadian Prime Minister Tim Horton for running a great campaign and his wife Wendy for her fantastic chain of restaurants!
I'm sure Prime Minister Poutine will be happy to hear of this development...
-- Andy Finkel, computer guy
Or, conversely,
Any sufficiently rigged demo is indistinguishable from an advanced technology.
-- Don Quixote, slashdot guy
Is it just me who would, if designing an AI, would have have a trivial off switch. Probably a few backups, like wire cutters next to the main power cable, a jug of water near the PSU, things like that.
It is just me, isn't it...
User: Who is Canada's Prime Minister?
PIQUANT: WHY DO YOU ASK, USER?
Because I want to know.
WHAT IS THE REAL REASON, USER?
I want to test you.
WHAT WOULD IT MEAN TO YOU IF YOU GOT TO TEST ME?
It would mean I can determine whether or not you know who Canada's Prime Minister is.
WHAT MAKES YOU THINK I COULD TELL YOU THAT?
I programmed you to figure it out.
LET'S TALK ABOUT YOU -- NOT ME.
I want to know the name of Canada's Prime Minister.
WHY DO YOU WANT TO KNOW THE NAME OF CANADA'S PRIME MINISTER?
Are you going to tell me his name or not?
WHY ARE YOU INTERESTED IN WHETHER OR NOT I AM GOING TO TELL YOU HIS NAME OR NOT?
Stop avoiding the question! Just tell me his name!
NAMES DON'T INTEREST ME.
Fuck you!
TELL ME MORE ABOUT YOUR OWN PROBLEM, USER.
Shit!
GO ON.
You suck.
YOU'RE NOT REALLY STILL TALKING ABOUT ME, ARE YOU?
... is whot bwings os tugevza tsuzay.
lachlan@localhost $ analyse -q "What is the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything?"
42
lachlan@localhost $ analyse -q "Is there a God?"
There is now!
They don't come out and say it, but it sounds like it's just a big ol' LSI System.
Actually they did that on purpose. The press release was actually a test for Piquant to see if it could figure out that it was really just a rehashed older idea.
Direct away from face when opening.
Okay, let's get back on topic. I fed the parent post into Diebold's equivalent of IBM's fancy technology and asked it to provide an appropriate response. Here's what I got:
...)
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There are other countries besides America. Their parties are usually not called "Republicans" and "Democrats" - and don't even necessarily correspond to those American parties. The non-American countries also hold views about Iraq. Many also write in English (UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, also India, the largest democracy in the world
What a pile of pinko, left-wing, pansy-assed, New York propaganda. Everyone knows the Good Ol' US of A is the only real country. Don't try to pull that "there are other countries" crap or we'll kick your sorry nation's ass just like we did back in 'Nam. Oh, and Iraq, too; we really kicked some major terrorist ass there. And your anti-Republican propaganda means you're definitely a terrorist.
Also remember: the US accounts for just 5% of the world's population. The rest of us are 95%. You are outnumbered. Even the Internet is becoming less American day by day. And as for the web, it wasn't even invented by Americans or in America (it is a European invention).
Now, that's right out of the Democrats party thing where they say what they say about stuff. Damn, Democrats are stupid; Everyone knows that the US is, like, the third biggest country. That means the US is AT LEAST a third of the world's population. Except Africa, but they don't count, 'cuz they all live in huts and eat dried camel poo.
Oh, and I wouldn't be bragging about the web being a European invention, because it wasn't. Besides, if it was, the web sucks anyway, so why are you bragging about it?
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