AI Doesn't Know Anything. It Just Passes Tests.

On the internet, the algorithms are all around you.

You are watching this video because an algorithm brought it to you (among others) to click,

which you did, and the algorithm took note.

When you open the TweetBook, A the algorithm decides what you see.

When you search through your photos, A the algorithm does the finding.

Maybe even makes a little movie for you.

When you buy something, A the algorithm sets the price

and A the algorithm is at your bank watching transactions for fraud.

The stock market is full of algorithms

trading with algorithms.

Given this, you might want to know how these little algorithmic bots shaping your world work,

especially when they don't.

In Ye Olden Days,

humans built algorithmic bots by giving them instructions the humans could explain.

"If this, then that."

But many problems are just too big and hard for a human to write simple instructions for.

There's a gazillion financial transactions a second, which ones are fraudulent?

There's octillion videos on NetMeTube.

Which eight should the user see as recommendations? Which shouldn't be allowed on the site at all?

For this airline seat, what is the maximum price this user will pay right now?

Algorithmic bots give answers to these questions.

Not perfect answers, but much better than a human could do.

But how these bots work exactly, more and more, no one knows.

Not even the humans who built them,

or "built them",

as we will see...

Now companies that use these bots don't want to talk about how they work

because the bots are valuable employees.

Very, VERY valuable.

And how their brains are built is a fiercely guarded trade secret.

Right now the cutting edge is most likely very

'I hope you like linear algebra',

but what the current hotness is on any particular site

and how the bots work, is a bit "I dunno", and always will be.

So let's talk about one of the more quaint but understandable ways bots CAN be "built"

without understanding how their brains work.

Say you want a bot that can recognize what is in a picture.

Is it a bee, or is it a three?

It's easy for humans (even little humans),