IBM’s ‘Watson’ focus of Pittsburgh-based symposium

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh are hosting a symposium featuring a discussion of the capabilities of Watson, the question-answering IBM computer that made headlines by competing against humans on the game show Jeopardy!

Students from both schools will compete in a mock game show demonstration of the computer this afternoon at Carnegie Mellon, whose researchers helped IBM develop the computer’s unique question-answering technology.

Before and after that, however, experts will discuss how those developing technologies might be applied to fields including medicine, law, business, computer science and engineering.