Information extraction from natural language texts

1. A method, comprising:

extracting, by a computer system, a first plurality of information objects from a natural language text by applying, to a plurality of attributes of the natural language text, a machine learning classifier yielding a degree of association of a fragment of the natural language text with a pre-defined class of information objects;

extracting, from the natural language text, a second plurality of information objects;

identifying a set of conflicting information objects, such that a first information object of the set of conflicting information objects belongs to the first plurality of information objects and a second information object of the set of conflicting information objects belongs to the second plurality of information objects; and

producing a final list of information objects extracted from the natural language text, by applying, to the set of conflicting information objects, a conflict arbitration function which performs at least one of: modifying the first information object, deleting the first information object, or merging two or more information objects of the set of conflicting information objects.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein extracting the first plurality of information objects is performed by a first information extraction technique and extracting the second plurality of information objects is performed by a second information extraction technique.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

utilizing the final list of information objects for performing a natural language processing operation.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

representing the final list of information objects by a Resource Definition Framework (RDF) graph.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein identifying the set of conflicting information objects further comprises:

determining that a first textual annotation associated with the first information object is overlapping with a second textual annotation associated with the second information object.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein identifying the set of conflicting information objects further comprises:

evaluating a logical condition comprising a first attribute of the first information object and a second attribute of the second information object.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein identifying the set of conflicting information objects further comprises:

identifying an information object having a number of attributes of a certain type exceeding a threshold number of attributes of the certain type.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein performing the conflict arbitration function further comprises:

applying a set of production rules to a second plurality of attributes of the natural language text.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein performing the conflict arbitration function further comprises:

applying, to a second plurality of attributes of the natural language text, a second machine learning classifier yielding at least one of: a likelihood of the first information object and the second information object representing a same object, a level of confidence of the first information object, or a level of confidence of the second information object.

10. The method of claim 9 , further comprising:

accepting a user input validating the final list of information objects;

appending, to a training data set, the natural language text accompanied by metadata comprising definitions and textual annotations of one or more information objects of the final list of information objects;

training, utilizing the training data set, the second machine learning classifier implementing the conflict arbitration function.

11. The method of claim 9 , wherein the second plurality of attributes of the natural language text comprises one or more confidence levels associated with respective information objects.

12. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

accepting a user input validating the first plurality of information objects to produce a training data set;

appending, to a training data set, the natural language text accompanied by metadata comprising definitions and textual annotations of one or more information objects of the first plurality of information objects;

training, utilizing the training data set, the machine learning classifier utilized for information extraction.

13. A computer system, comprising:

a memory;

a processor, coupled to the memory, the processor configured to:

extract, from a natural language text, a first plurality of information objects;

extract, from the natural language text, a second plurality of information objects;

identify a set of conflicting information objects, such that a first information object of the set of conflicting information objects belongs to the first plurality of information objects and a second information object of the set of conflicting information objects belongs to the second plurality of information objects; and

produce a final list of information objects extracted from the natural language text, by applying, to the set of conflicting information objects, a conflict arbitration function which performs at least one of: modifying the first information object, deleting the first information object, or merging two or more information objects of the set of conflicting information objects, wherein the conflict arbitration function implements a machine learning classifier yielding at least one of: a likelihood of the first information object and the second information object representing a same object, a level of confidence of the first information object, or a level of confidence of the second information object.

14. The computer system of claim 13 , wherein extracting the first plurality of information objects is performed by a first information extraction technique and extracting the second plurality of information objects is performed by a second information extraction technique.

15. The computer system of claim 13 , further comprising:

utilizing the final list of information objects for performing a natural language processing operation.

16. A computer-readable non-transitory storage medium comprising executable instructions that, when executed by a computer system, cause the computer system to:

extract, from a natural language text, a first plurality of information objects by applying, to a plurality of attributes of the natural language text, a machine learning classifier yielding a degree of association of a fragment of the natural language text with a pre-defined class of information objects;

extract, from the natural language text, a second plurality of information objects;

identify a set of conflicting information objects, such that a first information object of the set of conflicting information objects belongs to the first plurality of information objects and a second information object of the set of conflicting information objects belongs to the second plurality of information objects; and

produce a final list of information objects extracted from the natural language text, by applying, to the set of conflicting information objects, a conflict arbitration function which performs at least one of: modifying the first information object, deleting the first information object, or merging two or more information objects of the set of conflicting information objects.

17. The computer-readable non-transitory storage medium of claim 16 , wherein extracting the first plurality of information objects is performed by a first information extraction technique and extracting the second plurality of information objects is performed by a second information extraction technique.

18. The computer-readable non-transitory storage medium of claim 16 , further comprising:

utilizing the final list of information objects for performing a natural language processing operation.