Watch the video in which Douglas Lenat discusses the uses of Cyc to improve search engine searches. when he says that if you have entered enough of these sentences, the system will be able to understand, or Continue until minute 20 or so, and you will be able to see a few examples of how Cyc can help.
Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAtn-4fhuWA
According to Douglas Lenat, Cyc can perform "semantic search". Google cannot reply to questions such as "What is the weather in the capital of France?", although it has access to web sites with information on the weather in Paris. It's search engine is syntactic (it looks for words). A search engine using Cyc, however, could answer this question correctly, because it would have the information that Paris is the capital of France as part of its database of commonsense knowledge. Douglas Lenat also shows how it could find a picture of a "man smiling" by identifying a caption that describes a man playing with his daughter. Cyc can consult its database and determine that parents spending time with their children will often be happy, and happy people often smile.
ESSAY QUESTIONS:
In answering the question, show that you understand the pros and cons of expert systems. Remember, your essay needs to have a clear thesis.
In the discussion, focus on the following sub-topics:
Does Cyc have knowledge, as Lenat claims, in a way that MYCIC does not? Is Lenat solving the problem of common sense, as discussed by John McCarthy (see readings)?