] The world's knowledge reservoir has long since grown way
] too deep for anyone to do that, but Microsoft co-founder
] Paul Allen is throwing money into pursuing this
] extraordinarily far-out notion: Can a computer be loaded
] with the world's textbook-science knowledge, reason
] through it and then answer questions in plain English
] like a phenomenal teacher, a "Digital Aristotle"?

See http://www.projecthalo.com/ for more detail. The Phase I results in the Chemistry domain are very compelling. Check out the Project Halo Results browser to see for the examination results for three knowledge-based representation and reasoning (KRR) systems.

The browser lays out how 100 questions were encoded for each of the systems, the answer produced, and a translation of the answer back into natural language. The coolest thing are PDF images of the annotations made by the three subject matter experts (SME's) on the answers provided.

The Seattle Times: Nation & World: Vulcan project aims to build 'Digital Aristotle'