The reason is that when multiple contestants know the correct response in Jeopardy!, it all comes down to reflexive timing. It's no surprise that a computer could buzz in faster than a human being, and there's no evidence that Watson knows more correct responses than the human competitors.
THATS FUCKING HUGE!!!
Again, I fully understand and appreciate what an advance in natural language processing and sheer computation Watson represents. Even being able to match a below-average human Jeopardy! contestant would be impressive. However, the true game-winning technique in Jeopardy! (when all three contestants are highly skilled) is buzzer reflexes.
It's clear that this is a huge achievement. However, it is different than a computer beating the human chess champion. All this will prove is that a computer is about the same as the best humans, not strictly better than them.
(And, that it is strictly better at timing its buzzer response, which is completely not impressive for a machine to excel at.)
Think of it this way: if you had a human standing in Watson's spot, with a monitor displaying Watson's suggested response, I don't think that human would perform as well against the other human contestants. Sure, Watson would often come up with the correct response while the clue was being spoken by the host, but the human would still have to buzz in when the light turns on. If you buzz in too early, you get locked out for something like a quarter of a second. Watson would still be extremely awesome technology, but I don't think a human with access to Watson's output would compete at anywhere near the level that Watson did in the video.
Do you see what you're saying.. "contestants of this skill level"? It's Ken Jennings, Brad Rutter, and WATSON. Discussion over. The fact that there is a computer that can answer questions in 3s that put it at the level of the two greatest trivia players in history is THE story.
Some jeopardy answers:
Anagramed Animals -- A furry little pet: the rams
Some say the Bush administration's domestic spying conflicts with FISA, the Foreign Intelligence this Act
"R"2"D"2 -- More rubicund
Half the people in the US probably couldn't answer any of these at all, much less necessarily even know what the answer was referring to, period.
The fact that the computer may have an advantage at pressing the buzzer against the two best buzzer pushers of all time is a pretty small deal. IMHO. :-)
This is the biggest innovation in computers in my lifetime and kids are like, "but its no Twitter".
Watson's human-level performance at Jeopardy comes from the combination of highly superhuman data retrieval with highly subhuman language processing.
Watson is more a spectacle than an innovation.
As soon as AI succeeds at something, it is simple.
Marvin the Paranoid Android, in HHGG
The additional fact that this computer can beat human players is not impressive to me, because I know how Jeopardy! works. To sum everything up: it's a great feat of artificial intelligence and computer performance for Watson to generate correct responses so quickly; it's not a great feat for Watson to be able to buzz in faster than human competitors. I think IBM could have chosen a better sort of competition to truly show off Watson's abilities than a competition with reflexes as the final layer of competition.
"The best human contestants don’t wait for, but instead anticipate when Trebek will finish reading a clue. They time their “buzz” for the instant when the last word leaves Trebek’s mouth and the “Buzzer Enable” light turns on. Watson cannot anticipate. He can only react to the enable signal. While Watson reacts at an impressive speed, humans can and do buzz in faster than his best possible reaction time."
I suspect if anyone is good at anticipating the buzzer it is Jennings and Rutter -- the two best Jeopardy players in history. At least until next week...
The eye to finger path for humans is about 200ms. It probably takes about 100ms for Watson to physically press the button. So Watson is about 100ms faster. But that also gives humans about a 100ms window in which to beat Watson. This means that you need to start your press 100-200ms before Trebek finishes his last word.
That's pretty good sized window for most people given you are reading the question along with Trebek. If the person who turns the light on is very consistent, I think a human who is good at this could consistently beat Watson.
Chess, in contrast, is a totally deterministic game and the game state can easily be fed into a computer. That computers are able to beat humans at that comes as no surprise.