Like many of you, I'm a huge fan of the "Jeopardy" quiz program, and last night's episode -- pitting past champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter against IBM's "Watson" computer -- was truly fascinating. Through the years, humans have been preoccupied with the idea of machines replacing us in many facets of society. From the recent film "Surrogates" to "Terminator" to the works of Nebula Award-winning author Isaac Asimov, many gallons of ink have been spilled and miles of film shot for stories of machines helping society, then turning against us, forcing humans underground to survive. "Man vs. Machine" is a recurring theme in literature and movies, and it played out nicely on television last night. My favorite moment was when show host Alex Trebek

admonished the computer for giving the same incorrect answer that Jennings had just given -- "Ken just said that, Watson!" On straight trivia questions, the computer excelled, as expected. When it had to piece together two different concepts into the same answer, it had its problems. One "answer" was "Stylish elegance, or students who all graduated in the same year." The computer replied, "What is chic," clearly understanding the first part of the answer but failing to grok the second part. I could just imagine the team of IBM scientists behind the scenes, furiously rewriting algorithms for language comprehension. Of course, it's all been taped and decided already, but it'll be interesting to see how Watson fares tonight in the "double Jeopardy" round, and how Jennings and Rutter do as well.