1. A method comprising: determining, by a question answering computer system, a set of search terms based on a given question; searching, by the question answering computer system, a document using the set of search terms; identifying, by the question answering computer system, a plurality of passages in the document in response to the searching, each of the plurality of passages including at least one search term in the set of search terms; selecting, by the question answering computer system, a passage from the plurality of passages; and generating, by the question answering computer system, a context based score of the selected passage that indicates a likelihood that the selected passage contains an answer to the question, the generating based on criteria that specify a relationship among the set of search terms, content of the passage, and content of at least one other passage in the plurality of passages comprising: calculating a first score based on the content of the selected passage and a first subset of the set of search terms, the content of the selected passage including the first subset; creating a list containing a second subset of the set of search terms, the second subset is different than the first subset and is not included in the content of the selected passage; performing repeatedly until the list is empty: determining whether there is at least one other passage in the plurality of passages; selecting one of the at least one other passage in response to determining that there is at least one other passage in the plurality of passages, the one of the at least one other passage contains at least one search term in the list, the selecting is performed in an order of closest proximity to the selected passage in the document; generating a second score by scoring the one of the at least one other passage based on the at least one search term in the list that is contained in the one of the at least one other passage, and removal of the first subset from the at least one other passage; updating the second score based on a distance in the document between the selected passage and the at least one other passage; aggregating the first score and the updated second score by adding the first score to the updated second score to generate the context based score; and in response to the adding, updating the list by removing from the list all search terms, including the at least one search term, contained in the at least one other passage.
1. A method comprising: determining, by a question answering computer system, a set of search terms based on a given question; searching, by the question answering computer system, a document using the set of search terms; identifying, by the question answering computer system, a plurality of passages in the document in response to the searching, each of the plurality of passages including at least one search term in the set of search terms; selecting, by the question answering computer system, a passage from the plurality of passages; and generating, by the question answering computer system, a context based score of the selected passage that indicates a likelihood that the selected passage contains an answer to the question, the generating based on criteria that specify a relationship among the set of search terms, content of the passage, and content of at least one other passage in the plurality of passages comprising: calculating a first score based on the content of the selected passage and a first subset of the set of search terms, the content of the selected passage including the first subset; creating a list containing a second subset of the set of search terms, the second subset is different than the first subset and is not included in the content of the selected passage; performing repeatedly until the list is empty: determining whether there is at least one other passage in the plurality of passages; selecting one of the at least one other passage in response to determining that there is at least one other passage in the plurality of passages, the one of the at least one other passage contains at least one search term in the list, the selecting is performed in an order of closest proximity to the selected passage in the document; generating a second score by scoring the one of the at least one other passage based on the at least one search term in the list that is contained in the one of the at least one other passage, and removal of the first subset from the at least one other passage; updating the second score based on a distance in the document between the selected passage and the at least one other passage; aggregating the first score and the updated second score by adding the first score to the updated second score to generate the context based score; and in response to the adding, updating the list by removing from the list all search terms, including the at least one search term, contained in the at least one other passage. 5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the document contains unstructured content that is organized in one of a narrative form and a hierarchy form.