System and method for the calibration of a scoring function

A system and method for calibrating a scoring function. The scoring function S(input, classification) provides a score based on the amount of evidence a particular input has in connection with a particular classification. For example, a street level image may be OCR'ed so as to indicate the names of establishments contained within the image, and the scoring function indicates how much evidence exists within the image for a particular establishment. Some establishments (i.e. classifications) may produce higher scores based on the nature of the establishment rather than the nature of the image (i.e. input) causing any ranking of establishments done on the basis of the scoring function to be biased. Accordingly, the scoring function is calibrated by determining the probability distribution of scores for an establishment over a false set of images that do not display the establishment. The scoring function is calibrated so as to adjust the score to overcome such bias.