Wolfram|Alpha. I was born on November 17, 1947. Yes, I know, that makes me an old man; especially by techno nerd standards. Be that as it may, I was curious about the new computational knowledge engine from Wolfram Research, Wolfram/Alpha. So, on a whim I typed: "What was the weather in St. Louis, Missouri, on November 17, 1947?" The computer hummed and whirred, and progress bars appeared across the screen, and, in a couple of minutes, this image appeared:
I never knew that I was born on a Monday, and that the weather was cloudy, and that the temperature was almost freezing. But, it explains a lot. The historical temperature and weather charts are a bit much for my non-scientific personage; however, it is nice to know that all that knowledge is out there, and that Professor Wolfram and his colleagues have the computing power to analyze it.
this is mind blowing! I had a look at the demo which was very impressive. I toyed with site a little but didn't get any meaningful results when I typed 'web 2.0' or 'who coined the term web 2.0' but I am assuming it is a matter of time for the engine to 'mature' and become more intelligent. this is scary, beautifully amazing, and scary.
Posted by: Alin Wagner-Lahmy | May 17, 2009 at 04:37 PM
I’m excited to see how this innovative CKE will give answers to questions directly. A mixture of clever algorithms and intelligent linguistic discovery software that calculates results from various sources, giving you detailed answers and other related info, will be amazing...
Posted by: Kelly Frame | May 18, 2009 at 10:23 AM