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
uncle_shel_s_rainy_day_sauce is a condiment	1111	06-jul-2018	99.8
flathead_beacon is a publication	1111	06-jul-2018	90.6
sen__elizabeth_dole is a politician	1111	06-jul-2018	90.1
two_wisconsin is a parlour game	1111	06-jul-2018	100.0
n02_02_10 is a term used by physicists	1111	06-jul-2018	92.5
jobs is a person who moved to the state hawaii	1115	03-sep-2018	99.6
whirlpool is often found in bathroom	1114	25-aug-2018	96.7
diet can cause blood_sugar	1113	15-aug-2018	100.0
austin_zoo is a zoo in the city austin	1116	12-sep-2018	100.0
two_men participated in the event crimes	1113	15-aug-2018	99.2