Humans Not Replaceable Yet
July 5, 2010
The secret to national security is in searches, or so a recent Federal Times article tries to convince us. Citing the botched Christmas Day terror attempt, it claims that Homeland Security is deluged in so much data that agents could never be expected to stop a suspect in time. “Without better information systems,” the article says, “the intelligence community will be hamstrung in its efforts to transform information into intelligence.” The answer, it claims, are semantic searches that make preliminary conclusions on their own. So much faith in smart and semantic search capabilities is exciting, but overlooks the human element. High-powered search tools are great, but the technology still cannot surpass human instincts and knowledge, no matter how sensitive the equipment.
Jessica West Bratcher, July 5, 2010
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