Learning-Based Processing of Natural Language Questions
First Claim
1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
- analyzing a natural language question to predict a question type and an answer type for the natural language question;
formulating a ranked plurality of search queries based at least partly on the question type and on one or more query units extracted from the natural language question;
determining one or more candidate answers from a plurality of search results resulting from execution of at least some of the ranked plurality of search queries by a search engine, the determining based at least partly on the answer type;
ranking the one or more candidate answers according to a confidence level determined for each of the one or more candidate answers; and
providing a highest-ranked candidate answer of the one or more candidate answers based at least partly on a determination that the highest-ranked candidate answer has a confidence level higher than a predetermined threshold confidence.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Techniques described enable answering a natural language question using machine learning-based methods to gather and analyze evidence from web searches. A received natural language question is analyzed to extract query units and to determine a question type, answer type, and/or lexical answer type using rules-based heuristics and/or machine learning trained classifiers. Query generation templates are employed to generate a plurality of ranked queries to be used to gather evidence to determine the answer to the natural language question. Candidate answers are extracted from the results based on the answer type and/or lexical answer type, and ranked using a ranker previously trained offline. Confidence levels are calculated for the candidate answers and top answer(s) may be provided to the user if the confidence levels of the top answer(s) surpass a threshold.
465 Citations
20 Claims
-
1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
-
analyzing a natural language question to predict a question type and an answer type for the natural language question; formulating a ranked plurality of search queries based at least partly on the question type and on one or more query units extracted from the natural language question; determining one or more candidate answers from a plurality of search results resulting from execution of at least some of the ranked plurality of search queries by a search engine, the determining based at least partly on the answer type; ranking the one or more candidate answers according to a confidence level determined for each of the one or more candidate answers; and providing a highest-ranked candidate answer of the one or more candidate answers based at least partly on a determination that the highest-ranked candidate answer has a confidence level higher than a predetermined threshold confidence. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
-
-
9. A system comprising:
-
at least one memory; at least one processor in communication with the at least one memory; and a natural language question processing component stored in the at least one memory and executed by the at least one processor to; analyze a received natural language question to determine a question type and an answer type for the natural language question; determine one or more query units from the natural language question; formulate a plurality of search queries based at least partly on the question type and the one or more query units; determine one or more candidate answers from a plurality of search results based at least partly on the answer type, the plurality of search results resulting from execution of at least some of the plurality of search queries by a search engine; and rank the one or more candidate answers based at least partly on a confidence level determined for each of the one or more candidate answers. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
-
-
17. One or more computer-readable storage media storing instructions that, when executed by at least one processor, instruct the at least one processor to perform actions comprising:
-
analyzing a received natural language question to determine a question type and an answer type for the natural language question; formulating a plurality of search queries based at least partly on the question type and on one or more query units extracted from the natural language question; extracting one or more candidate answers from a plurality of search results resulting from execution of at least some of the plurality of search queries; and ranking the one or more candidate answers according to a confidence level determined for each of the one or more candidate answers. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20)
-
Specification