1. A method, in a data processing system comprising a processor and a memory configured to implement a question and answer system (QA), for improving answers to an input question, the method comprising: receiving, in the data processing system, the input question; processing, by the data processing system, the input question to generate at least one query; extracting, by the data processing system, one or more selections of evidence portions from a corpus of information which match the at least one query; generating, by the data processing system, one or more candidate answers based on the one or more selections of evidence portions; for at least one candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers, determining, by the data processing system, whether there are one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information that would refine an inclusion or exclusion of the candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers; outputting, by the data processing system, the one or more candidate answers, the one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information that would refine the inclusion or exclusion of the candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers, and the selections of evidence portions for evaluation by the user; outputting, by the data processing system, one or more pieces of criteria that identifies conditions met by each candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers in relation to the input question; generating, by the data processing system, one or more confidence scores for each of the one or more candidate answers by applying one or more reasoning algorithms to language of the input question and language of the one or more candidate answers; comparing, by the data processing system, results of each of the one or more reasoning algorithms to a statistical model; based on the comparison of the results to the statistical model, modifying, by the data processing system, the statistical model; applying, by the data processing system, statistical weights to confidence scores associated with each of the one or more reasoning algorithms in accordance with the statistical model; and synthesizing, by the data processing system, the one or more confidence scores for each of the one or more candidate answers, thereby creating a one or more final answers.
1. A method, in a data processing system comprising a processor and a memory configured to implement a question and answer system (QA), for improving answers to an input question, the method comprising: receiving, in the data processing system, the input question; processing, by the data processing system, the input question to generate at least one query; extracting, by the data processing system, one or more selections of evidence portions from a corpus of information which match the at least one query; generating, by the data processing system, one or more candidate answers based on the one or more selections of evidence portions; for at least one candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers, determining, by the data processing system, whether there are one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information that would refine an inclusion or exclusion of the candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers; outputting, by the data processing system, the one or more candidate answers, the one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information that would refine the inclusion or exclusion of the candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers, and the selections of evidence portions for evaluation by the user; outputting, by the data processing system, one or more pieces of criteria that identifies conditions met by each candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers in relation to the input question; generating, by the data processing system, one or more confidence scores for each of the one or more candidate answers by applying one or more reasoning algorithms to language of the input question and language of the one or more candidate answers; comparing, by the data processing system, results of each of the one or more reasoning algorithms to a statistical model; based on the comparison of the results to the statistical model, modifying, by the data processing system, the statistical model; applying, by the data processing system, statistical weights to confidence scores associated with each of the one or more reasoning algorithms in accordance with the statistical model; and synthesizing, by the data processing system, the one or more confidence scores for each of the one or more candidate answers, thereby creating a one or more final answers. 4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising: receiving, by the data processing system, user input that modifies at least one of the one or more candidate answers or the evidence portions or provides input that provides or clarifies the one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information; re-processing, by the data processing system, the input question to generate at least one second query for application to the corpus of information; applying, by the data processing system, the at least one second query to the corpus of information to generate one or more updated candidate answers to the input question and corresponding updated selections of evidence portions of the corpus of information providing evidence in support of the at least one candidate answer in the one or more candidate answers being the correct answer for the input question; for each updated candidate answer in the one or more updated candidate answers, determining, by the data processing system, whether there are one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information that would refine the inclusion or exclusion of the updated candidate answer in the one or more updated candidate answers; and outputting, by the data processing system, the one or more updated candidate answers, the one or more missing or ambiguous pieces of information that would refine the inclusion or exclusion of the updated candidate answer in the one or more updated candidate answers, and the updated selections of evidence portions for evaluation by the user.