Say it like this

One of the things you show a computer so it can learn. Show it a thousand and it starts noticing what they share.

For the grown-up

In machine learning an example is a single labelled item in the training set. The collection of examples defines the boundaries of what the resulting system can recognize, which is why the selection of examples matters at least as much as the technique applied to them.

The easy mistake

Careful here. If every example looks the same, the system will confidently treat anything different as an error. That is not a malfunction, it is the examples doing exactly what they were always going to do.

The full explanation

The Robot That Only Knew Cats

A glossary entry is the short version. This one has the child explanation, the grown-up explanation, the questions and an activity.

Read it

Words next to this one

Data All the little bits of information somebody collected. Facts, numbers, pictures, anything you can write down. Pattern Something that keeps happening the same way, so you can start guessing what comes next. Artificial Intelligence A computer that has looked at so many examples it can start guessing about things it has never seen before.