$1M Human vs AI Wager Will Rest on Duke-Houston Game

As the NCAA March Madness reaches its fever pitch, a dramatic $1 million wager between a seasoned gambler and a savvy AI site will boil down to the clash between Duke and Houston in the Final Four. Who will have the final slam dunk in this high-stakes matchup of man versus machine?

• In the NCAA March Madness tournament, a $1 million wager between pro gambler Sean Perry and AI site 4C Predictions hinges on the Duke-Houston Final Four game, the AP reports.
• Perry backed 5 1/2-point favorite Duke. 4C Predictions chose Houston. Perry has missed 13 picks in 60 games; the AI has missed 10. Both correctly predicted the Final Four teams. Alan Levy, who runs 4C Predictions, says his AI's 50 correct picks out of 60 places it in humans' 95th percentile, "which has gone beyond even what we expected at the start."

• The leaders in some of the multimillion-person bracket pools on ESPN, Yahoo and CBS are getting 55 or 56 picks right.
• The human and the AI both chose Auburn to beat Florida in Saturday's other semifinal. Though the AI has gotten more right, it could still lose because the picks become worth more points as the tournament progresses.
• The tournament has largely been a bust for people who love upsets—good news for both these brackets, which largely stayed away from picking them. Both had Memphis and St. John's winning multiple games. Memphis fell to Colorado State in the first round and St. John's was gone after the second.
• "You can't take the element of fun and luck out of it," Levy said of March Madness predictions last month. "Having said that, as AI develops, it's going to get creepier and creepier and the predictions are going to get more and more accurate, and it's all around data sets." MarketWatch notes that no human or robot has ever filled out a perfect bracket and Warren Buffett once offered $1 billion to any employee who could.

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