Multi-layered semiotic mechanism for answering natural language questions using document retrieval combined with information extraction

A computer system, connectable to a network, the network capable of accessing a search engine and a group of documents, for extracting information using a pipe-lined finite-state architecture including a plurality of signatures and signature based rules, the system including software for processing the documents comprising a plurality of words to extract an answer from the documents, the software comprising instructions for

• parsing the plurality of words from a document in the set of documents;
• assigning a signature to each of the plurality of words;
• reading the signatures;
• creating a rule name by concatenating the read signatures;
• comparing the created rule name to the names of the plurality of rules;
• determining whether the created name matches any of the rule names;
• applying the matching rule to create a concept if a matching rule exists;
• and assigning the concept back into the window.

A method for combining a plurality of partial answers in a group of documents into a single answer, each document comprising a plurality of passages, the method comprising:

• retrieving a subset of documents from the group of documents, the subset comprising documents which include at least one partial answer;
• identifying a semantic answer in a document in the subset of documents;
• identifying a first most relevant passage in the document containing the semantic answer;
• identifying a most relevant document in the subset of documents;
• identifying a second most relevant passage in the most relevant document;
• determining whether the first most relevant passage and the second most relevant passage are the same passage;
• determining whether the first most relevant passage includes the semantic answer if the first most relevant passage and the second most relevant passage are the same passage;
• forming the single answer by conjoining the semantic answer and the first most relevant passage if the first most relevant passage does not include the semantic answer;
• and
• selecting the first most relevant passage as the single answer if the first most relevant passage includes the semantic answer.

A computer system, connectable to a network, the network capable of accessing a search engine and a group of documents, for extracting information using a pipe-lined finite-state architecture, the system including software for searching combining a plurality of partial answers in the group of documents into a single answer, each document comprising a plurality of passages, the software comprising instructions for

• retrieving a subset of documents from the group of documents, the subset comprising documents which include at least one partial answer;
• identifying a semantic answer in a document in the subset of documents;
• identifying a first most relevant passage in the document containing the semantic answer;
• identifying a most relevant document in the subset of documents;
• identifying a second most relevant passage in the most relevant document;
• determining whether the first most relevant passage and the second most relevant passage are the same passage;
• determining whether the first most relevant passage includes the semantic answer if the first most relevant passage and the second most relevant passage are the same passage;
• forming the single answer by conjoining the semantic answer and the first most relevant passage if the first most relevant passage does not include the semantic answer;
• and
• selecting the first most relevant passage as the single answer if the first most relevant passage includes the semantic answer.