Machine learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are terms that have been discussed a lot over the past few years in the tech industry. But the question that many have been asking is, what exactly do these terms mean? They are often confused and incorrectly used interchangeably, especially by marketing departments that want to sell something at a higher price. In reality, machine learning and AI are two completely different things, with very different implications for what computers can do and how they interact with us. In this beginners’ guide, we will be explaining what these terms mean and what are their main differences.
Machine Learning – Essence and Use
Machine learning is a branch of computer science and artificial intelligence that focuses on the usage of algorithms and data. It aims to imitate the way humans learn and improve its accuracy. Today, machine learning is already used in multiple fields and industries. One of its most common uses is in image recognition. This mechanism is used to identify objects within images and classify them into specific categories. Machine learning can also be used to recognize faces in an image. A great example is the automatic suggestions for tagging friends on Facebook or any other social media platform. Facebook uses facial recognition and image recognition to automatically find the face of the person whose match is in the database and offers us to tag that face.
With the help of Data Robot’s machine learning, companies offering online casino games can identify the players to market to and the offers that will work best for them. Another important application of machine learning is virtual personal assistants. As the name suggests, these virtual assistants help people find useful information when requested via text or voice. Some of the main applications of machine learning here are voice recognition, speech-to-text conversion, text-to-speech conversion, and natural language processing. We must also mention Google Neural Machine Translation. It is a machine learning that works on thousands of languages and uses natural language processing to provide the most accurate translation of any sentence or word.
Another application of Machine learning is in the medical field. To be more precise, it is used in techniques and tools that can help diagnose different diseases. Specialists use it for analysis of clinical parameters and their combination for prognosis (for example, prediction of disease progression, therapy planning, and patient monitoring). These are some of the successful implementations of machine learning methods. They can help in the integration of computer-based systems in the healthcare sector.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) – What It Is
Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be defined as the ability of a machine to demonstrate abilities inherent in humans – to plan, learn, create, etc. We talk about artificial intelligence when technical systems monitor their environment, receive data, process it, and perform actions related to achieving a specific goal. Artificial intelligence systems are able to adapt their behavior to some extent by analyzing the results of previous actions and operating autonomously. According to predictions, AI will lead to major changes, even a complete digital transformation of society.
There are two forms of artificial intelligence – software and physical form. Examples of AI in software are virtual assistants, online search engines, speech, and face recognition systems, and image recognition systems. Artificial intelligence with physical form can be robots, autonomous cars, and drones. AI is already at the heart of many applications that we use every day. It is widely used to provide personalized purchase suggestions to people based on what they are looking for or have purchased in the past.
Artificial intelligence in e-commerce is very important because it helps to optimize products and their delivery, to plan the necessary stocks, and other things. Another application of AI is a machine translation. Language translation software relies on artificial intelligence to perform and improve translations. Similar technologies are used to automatically create subtitles for movies.
Differences Between AI and Machine Learning
Many people think that machine learning and artificial intelligence are basically the same, but this isn’t true. Artificial intelligence is software that can mimic human cognition and perform various complex tasks. On the other hand, we have machine learning which is a subfield of AI. It uses specific algorithms which are trained on data to perform different tasks.
Over the last few years, information technology, and artificial intelligence, in particular, have fundamentally changed the way we live. And while in the media, there are often exaggerated facts about the dangers and expectations, one thing is certain – we will definitely have to coexist with artificial intelligence in the future. Whether it will be for good – we are about to find out.
