AI & Machine learning – an Overview!

The first part of our series on artificial intelligence (AI) is focused on defining and understanding the most important terms.

As already mentioned, AI stands for artificial intelligence and is just a broad category and more of a buzz word. According to our software engineer Jan Hünnemeyer, asking the question what AI is, is as ridiculous as asking someone to explain a broad term like mathematics. The more specific the question, the less philosophical the answer. However, artificial intelligence (AI) basically means that a computer takes over the human process of thinking, evaluating and making decisions. Even a boring old chess computer is an AI. It's just a rule-based system, only as intelligent as the rules are.

Machine learning is sub-category of AI. Our expert Jan Hünnemeyer explained it like this:

Deep learning is another sub-category of AI but also a sub-category of machine learning and describes a method used for machine learning.

This time, the algorithm is a crude simplification of how our own network of neurons, the brain, works. Each neuron is connected to other neurons. Neurons fire once they get a certain amount of input an can amplify or dampen signals this way. Just like human neural networks, artificial ones rely on training data to learn and improve their accuracy over time.?

But how does this transfer in practical use? Next week, Jan Hünnemeyer will explain how we use AI and give you a specific example of deep learning.

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