Homebred AI wins a landslide victory over quiz wizards

Led by the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) and co-developed by 20 other research labs, the "Made in Korea" artificial intelligence (AI) Exobrain gained a landslide victory over humans in its first quiz contest.

Held at ETRI headquarters in Daejeon on Friday, Exobrain outpaced the human contestants at the Educational Broadcasting System's (EBS) quiz program "Janghak Quiz-Challenge the Exobrain!" Among a total of 600 points, contestants vied for 10 multiple-choice and 20 short-answer questions ranging from liberal arts, social studies, art, science, and more. Exobrain widened the gap with the 2nd runner by 160 points to win at 510 points. The contest will be aired on Dec. 31 on EBS. The name Exobrain was derived from external brain.

On the day, the institute revealed a rehearsal before the actual quiz to the press. When the show host read out the questions, contestants wrote down and presented their answers at the same time within the 15 seconds time limit. Only those with the right answers gained points. On this day, Exobrain received questions by pre-inputted texts.

"Exobrain cannot solve mathematical problems, which require visual and audio cognitive, judgmental abilities and deductive reasoning," senior researcher Park Sang-kyu said. "Since it gives exact educated answers regardless of the difficulty, Exobrain holds its value as a tool for supporting the decision-making process for professionals in the legal, medical and financial sectors."

kyungeun@donga.com