AI vs ML: know the difference

It seems like everyone today has an opinion on AI.
But let’s be honest: not everyone is an expert 😅

As a fellow tech enthusiast with a strong background in Computer Science, I often see terms like Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence being used interchangeably, and that’s not quite right.

These are my two cents, trying to understand the distinctions between these two buzzwords in order to use them correctly in any conversation.

What are AI and ML?

Artificial Intelligence is a field of research aiming to build smart algorithms that try to simulate human reasoning. Machine Learning is part of this research and is related to statistical methods.

It’s like talking about Medicine and Oncology. Got it?

So, Machine Learning (ML) is a subset of Artificial Intelligence, where algorithms improve their performance on a task by learning from data. Deep Learning, a subset of ML, is where data features are automatically built by a training procedure.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) could be defined by its purpose: to simulate human intelligence through technology.

Real World examples

At University and during my PhD, I’ve always struggled when concepts were explained but no practical examples were presented.

I strongly believe that theory must be followed by actual examples. It’s not always easy, but I give it a shot 💪

Probably, talking about AI brings us to the idea of the Terminator movies. There are plenty of other examples with a much less dystopian view, such as Data from Star Trek or R2D2 from Star Wars, but all of them share one thing: despite their appearance, they all behave like humans.

In 2020, OpenAI’s language model GPT-3, aka ChatGPT, made headlines for its impressive ability to generate human-like text. Its level of natural language understanding and generation was previously thought to be possible only by human writers.

That’s impressive… You should try it.

One real-world example of Machine Learning is recommendation systems, often seen in popular streaming services like Netflix, Spotify, and YouTube.

Did your wife watch a romantic movie with your account? It’s time to replace The Rock with Brad Pitt ❤️

Yeah, that’s pretty much how recommendation works.

Final thoughts

Without a doubt, AI is the new industry and ML is probably the haviest weapon in your arsenal.

By appreciating the distinctions between AI and ML, we can better grasp the possibilities and limitations of each. So, the next time you find yourself discussing these buzzwords, remember: AI is the bigger picture, while ML is a key piece of the puzzle.

Use this concepts wisely and keep learning 😄