just a few questions

Corey and I were at a dinner party with some friends last night and our pal Jamen pulled out one of these little electronic games. It was called "20Q" and it was one of the most mind-blowing little gadgets I've ever met.

Here's how it works: it's basically the old game of "20 questions", but the little ball (about the size of a yo-yo) asks all the questions. And you can press one of four buttons after each question: YES, NO, SOMETIMES, or UNKNOWN. The yo-yo asks you a series of twenty questions (most of them pretty standard, like "Is it flat?") after which it guesses what you're thinking of. And about eight times out of ten, the little magic yo-yo gets it right. Yeah, really! We thought of things as obscure as "plutonium", "jicama", "shopping cart", and "torpedo", and the damn thing guessed them. Unbelievable. We were able to stump it, but were surprised more than not to find the word that we were thinking of printed on its little screen.

The website claims that it has "artificial intelligence" but I have to admit that I don't really know what that means any more. Does it learn from each round of playing? Does it adapt to how I answer the questions? One of the scientists at my new job has a Ph.D. in artificial intelligence. Maybe I should ask him.

Anyway, we played with this thing for hours. Great fun. Click on the picture above, and you'll be deposited at a website where you can play a virtual version . . .

Posted: Sun - January 16, 2005 at 10:01 PM

getBlogName(); > getCategoryName("C1887902091"); >

just a few questions

> >