Science for SEO: questions

January 26, 2009

Question everything

When I'm in a situation where I'm talking about the stuff I really know, I'm an expert. I'm confident I can answer and help. If I am surrounded by people who want and need to know about what I'm good at, it's great! I obviously enjoy the topics and get a buzz from sharing.

Some of these areas are:

- Translation

- NLP

- IR

- NLG/U

- Yoga

- Research skills

- SEO

- Running

- blah, probably some others

When I'm in a situation where I either don't really know about the topic or am not as proficient as the other people, I'm a learner. I question, see what I can get from this.

Some of these areas are:

- Programming (Gasp! - yes, your programming geeks will get the job done much faster than me)

- Computer graphics

- Speech technology

- Robotics

- Windsurfing

- Skydiving

- Fixing computers

- Cooking (I know, and I'm half French)

- and endless others

What I know is that both situations are fun and exciting for the most part. I am actually always learning, and sometimes a non-expert can really shed light on something for me. I'm open to learning anything and everything (even dreaded cooking). All of the topics that touch my life converge somewhere and bits from yoga get used in computing and bits from running get used in writing.

I'm not always the expert and that's fine, in fact that's a relief. What a privilege to be a n00b and be allowed to make all sorts of mistakes and ask all those silly questions unabashed, no expectations. How cool to be average at something and learn from someone who inspires you and get better at it.

The message is I guess to not be afraid of those situations. Not be afraid of looking more vulnerable than usual sometimes and also not being afraid of being the expert too. I've found out that I am not judged by my questions, level of ability, or education but by my attitude. In fact I was once told that it's not the questions that are stupid, just the idiots who think they're above them. And that applies in both situations.

This blog I realise isn't always easy for everyone to digest so I want to encourage you to get in touch with either me or other people you have questions for. You'll probably be surprised at how much I/they learn from you too. None of us would want to pass up that opportunity. Doing this opens up the discussion.

Don't be afraid of asking a well known scientist why they hadn't thought of doing x,y or z or why their theory doesn't work in a particular case. It isn't an attack on their work and won't be percieved that way (as long as you attitude doesn't suck). They either have the answers or you both have an interesting conversation coming up :)

“Socrates, you will remember, asked all the important questions - but he never answered any of them” (Dickinson Richards)

October 13, 2008

Cognition - a short interview

I've been playing with the Cognition search engine for a while now and also sent the link on to some colleagues of which my friend Dan who is a proper algorithm geek, like I am. Dr Kathleen Dahlgren from Cognition answered some questions for us, here they are:

- How does cognition feel about personalised search?

Personalized search can be augmented when the search engine understands language and can automatically see relationships that are opaque to pattern-matchers. For example, if a person is interested in rhythm and blues, they are also interested in R&B, and probably blues as well. But not blues meaning a bad mood. These subtleties are all handled by Cognition.

- Are there plans for a multilingual solution?

There are plans. The semantic map is relevant in all languages; it is universal. But linguists need to tie concepts to the words of other languages.

- How are the ontologies constructed?

Originally they were constructed by hand. Currently Cognition adds digitized ontologies automatically.

- Cognition claims that no other NLP processing technology comes close in breadth and depth of understanding of English... how so?

The closest semantic map, WordNet, has 2.5 times fewer word stems and 20 times less

semantic information.

- What exactly is meant by the "context" of the text they are processing?

The context is the other words in a sentence. So in “strike a match”, “strike” means “ignite” and “match” means “phosphorus-tipped stick”. But in “striking workers”, “strike” means “walkout”.

- What metrics are used to measure the quality of the engine?

We have many different metrics and regression tests. Our main method is to index identical content with another search engine, produce 50 typical queries, and test them for relevance using the two search engines. Recall is measured as relative recall, lacking a gold standard in which all documents have been inspected. In relative recall, the total of relevant search results by the two search engines is counted as full recall. In such tests, Cognition always performs with over 90% precision and recall. Google, for example, in 3 such tests had 20% precision and 20% recall.

- What exactly is meant by a "phrase" in the stat database?

A phrase is a frequently-occurring set of terms that are always juxtaposed, such as The Bill of Rights, U.S. Congress, United Airlines, or Securities and Exchange Commission.

- Are there prebuilt macros for common phrases?

Yes – 200,000 of them.

It's really a very interesting system to use, and I reckon it'll improve leaps and bounds in the future as well. We will be playing with this a great deal, I'll blog about it again, so watch this space!