Read the Web
Research Project at Carnegie Mellon University

NELL: Never-Ending Language Learning

Browse the Knowledge Base!

Can computers learn to read? We think so. "Read the Web" is a research project that attempts to create a computer system that learns over time to read the web. Since January 2010, our computer system called NELL (Never-Ending Language Learner) has been running continuously, attempting to perform two tasks each day:

• First, it attempts to "read," or extract facts from text found in hundreds of millions of web pages (e.g., playsInstrument(George_Harrison, guitar)).
• Second, it attempts to improve its reading competence, so that tomorrow it can extract more facts from the web, more accurately.

So far, NELL has accumulated over 50 million candidate beliefs by reading the web, and it is considering these at different levels of confidence. NELL has high confidence in 2,810,379 of these beliefs — these are displayed on this website. It is not perfect, but NELL is learning. You can track NELL's progress below or @cmunell on Twitter, browse and download its knowledge base, read more about our technical approach, or join the discussion group.

Recently-Learned Facts

instance	iteration	date learned	confidence
heavy_balls is sports equipment	1111	06-jul-2018	95.5
randy_wolf is a Mexican person	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
mutualness is an emotion	1111	06-jul-2018	97.8
redhumped_caterpillar is an invertebrate	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
u_s__member is a job position	1111	06-jul-2018	98.5
apollo has sister artemis	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
coast_starlight is a transportation system located in the city los_angeles_ca	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
vauxhall is a specific automobile maker dealer in _uk	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
products looks like cable	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8
calhoun works for uconn	1111	06-jul-2018	93.8