As we enter into the third major era of computing, Cognitive Computing represents a whole new approach to solving complex data and information analysis problems.
Ninety
percent of the world's data was created in the last two years, and we
are rapidly approaching a point where more than 80 percent of it is
unstructured, including all of those documents, videos and audio files
flying around the internet. In fact, one of the greatest challenges
facing most businesses is how to make effective use of these enormous
and growing volumes of data, something we call big data.
In the medical field alone, the amount of information is doubling every
five years, yet healthcare providers have precious little time to keep
up with all of this information.
To address
these challenges, IBM is working on the next era of computing systems,
or the third major era of computing, which is called Cognitive Computing, or systems that can "learn" or "think."
As
the third major era of computing, Cognitive Computing follows the first
era, which consisted of tabulating machines and the second, the era of
programmable computers. Cognitive systems represent a whole new approach
to solving complex data and information analysis problems, in three
ways: They use deep analytics for huge amounts of data; they have
learning capabilities that allow the system to automatically learn and
improve over time; and, they have natural interfaces between humans and
computers.
IBM's Watson system is one of the
first systems built as a Cognitive Computing system. Watson applies deep
analytics to text and other unstructured data sources to extract
meaning from the data, and applies inference and reasoning to solve
complex problems. As a first step toward Cognitive Computing, Watson
expands the boundaries of human cognition by providing humans with fast,
efficient access to relevant knowledge trapped in huge volumes of
unstructured data. This capability can be used for complex problem
solving, such as helping health professionals to treat patients.
How does Watson work?
Watson provides significant value by using hundreds of analytics
that apply natural language processing, information retrieval, text
analysis, knowledge representation and reasoning, as well as machine
learning, to understand complex problems, generate possible answers, and
evaluate evidence from unstructured data. This processing is inspired
by how we as humans solve problems. At the same time, it provides a look
into the future where Cognitive Computing systems will perform tasks
that previously, only humans could do, thus freeing up humans to apply
our immense cognitive capabilities for significantly more complex
problems.
Think
about it: in the programmable systems era of computing, people had to
think and solve problems the way a machine processes information. For
the first time, Cognitive Computing systems will begin to move beyond
being blunt instruments of numbers and words to representing events in
the real world. Machines are beginning to understand our world as we do.
They will learn, much in the way we do: through the senses of sight,
smell, taste, hearing and touch.
In this new
era of computing, our machines will teach us and be taught by us. They
will know the world through diverse inputs -- digital and organic -- for
the purpose of helping people see through complexity, overcome bias,
keep up with the speed of information and make better decisions.
Cognitive computing is the driving force behind this change.
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