Why Watson's win doesn't make humanity obsolete -- yet

Despite Watson's tremendous performance, it struggles with simple questions most humans can answer easily. IBM's Watson computer doesn't really "think" anything; it struggles with simple questions Most of the clues on "Jeopardy!" IBM's Watson computer doesn't really "think" anything; it struggles with simple questions Watson's eventual commercial incarnation will be as a tool, not a human replacement Despite Watson's tremendous performance, the Final Jeopardy question at the end of Tuesday night's airing revealed the Achilles' heel that computer scientists have known all along: Watson doesn't really "think" anything, and it struggles with simple questions that most humans can answer without a second thought. "This gives the Watson algorithm a great deal of'traction.' To us viewing the show, it's impressive if it correctly knows that Franz Schubert's birth date was January 31, 1797. But if that date had been part of the clue, could Watson correctly pick out [Schubert's] maternal grandmother's birth date from a list where only one of the dates was earlier than 1797?"