Computers binge on TV to solve problems

IT is a hit US television show in which forensic investigators solve cases by scouring the crime scene.

Now computers are being trained to solve problems by bingeing on episodes of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

Edinburgh University researchers fed footage, dialogue and background sounds from an episode of the show – used because of its adherence to formulaic plots – into a computer programmed to process the plot as each episode unfolded.

The study was designed to establish if and how computers can solve problems that humans find challenging.

Human participants who watched 39 episodes identified who was responsible 85 per cent of the time, the study found.

The computer identified the perpetrator 60 per cent of the time but did so much more quickly than humans, the study published in scientific journal Transactions of the Association for Computational Linguistics found.

Dr Lea Frermann, of the university’s School of Informatics, said: ‘We hope our findings will aid the development of machines that can take on board – and make sense of – large streams of information in real time.’

Researchers hope the study will develop better ways to answer questions posed online, such as helping internet search engines find better results.