Elements of AI

I undertook this course by chance, but now I can really treasure how much I have learnt into the world of AI, even though it was very basic and preliminary! It's just the beginning of a long journey, but once our spark is ignited by it's flavour and course material, it simply becomes amazing and you start to cherish the contents.

The course material got me completely fascinated and made me get engrossed so much I finished the entire 6 chapters in 2 and a Half weeks instead of 6! Spending more than 2-3 hrs every day. Many others have finished at speedneck speed of just 4-5 days.

Initially, I took it very casually in doing the exercises, even I did not register for the EoAI support platform, where you can find the Members receiving support from Dr. (Prof.) Teemu Roos (The Course Lead Instructor) from the Department of Computer Science, Univ. Of Helsinki. There were other staffs on the 'Spectrum' platform. The peer review is always there to to interact and extend the necessary help when required.

The subject is well designed, planned and executed with extraordinary simple language to understand and comprehend, followed by examples and Exercises to do immediately, which makes learning a fun!

I can keep writing of the benefits and the well deserved accolades for this course (and it's designers) which is rated very high amongst world rating of MOOC courses. My only suggestion, kindly delve more seriously and sincerely while undertaking the course and do the exercises taking pains to read the material provided repeatedly, since answers are hidden within the given statements. Moreover, attention to language is very important in the exercise questions. Fun Learning for Everyone!!! Cheers!!

My only suggestions to the Univ. Of Helsinki and Reaktor to kindly provide more live examples, which may ease in the understanding process, with Videos wherever possible. Otherwise a stupendous work and the Certificate that you receive is equally remarkable and admirable, and that too absolutely Free of any Cost / Charge........!!!! Isn't that amazing....??

Thanks to everyone at Reaktor and University of Helsinki, and the Finnish Govt. without which I am sure this would not have been possible.

Warm Regards to everyone,

Sujit

I think it was an interesting course and something I have been searching for. I already had some pre-knowledge about AI, but this course put it into a better context and made me think critical about certain aspects of AI.

One example where I got more knowledge is the difference between general AI compared to specific AI. When you read about AI in media you get the picture that general AI is something that will come, even if I have been questioning this. Through this course I got more knowledge why to be critical towards progress in general AI. However, it should be valuable to see the other side as well, since I met several people from tech who believe in the progress of general AI.

I appreciate most of the tasks in the course, even if I sometimes did not understand what the goal was or the purpose. One example of a task which I misunderstood was chapter 3, Bayers' theorem. I read in Spectrum that it also was many other who misunderstood the purpose and how to do. I have actually studied statistics and have been working with Bayers' theorem before (however it was described different then), but I still did not get it in this context, it was something with the description which I did not grasp.

I think it was good with information about what you can do next after the course, i.e. links to other courses and youtube talks. I would also think it should be valuable to get information about real meeting places or activities where you can learn or discuss AI after the course. I still have a lot of questions about AI and how to implement it and it's not enough with just online courses, I want to talk with people in real life!

On my quest to understand and explore the world of data-science, I found the course, Elements of AI, in a Medium post about top 20 courses for data-science beginners. I started right away. I found the lessons to be exclusively written for beginners with simple to understand language with real-world examples. The homework problems were provided to be solved on an easy to use interface. The lessons pick up pace and complexity from beginning to the end. The homework makes you think hard about your personal opinion on the techniques and ways to understand the digital world around you in a mind-blowing fashion! At the least, that was what I felt.

All through it was a wonderfully interactive course and kudos to the teachers and the content developers. It was a enlightening experience. Although the course can be revisited even after completion for the lessons, my personal advise would be to take notes for every lesson and read through the sources provided and get a deeper and better understanding of AI through this course.

Tack för en givande kurs. Initiativet till den är mycket bra och jag önskar att många tar tillfället i akt att ta den.

Jag uppskattade ’tonen’ ni håller. Inte akademiskt styltad men heller inte alltför förenklad för oss vanliga dödliga. Lite humor här och där skadade inte heller.

Min bakgrund är: Civ.ing 1966. Jobbat med telecom i 40 år. Bakgrunden färgar givetvis min feedback, därav nämnandet.

Synpunkter:

- Definitionsavsnittet är mycket bra. Tar ner ämnet på jorden samtidigt som man stimuleras att lära sig mer.

- Sannolikhetslära, statistik, Bayes teorem etc. är viktigt för förståelsen. Jag tycker dock att avsnitten var lite väl långrandiga. Enkla för mig men hur uppfattas de av personer utan någon bakgrund i dessa ting? Kan de förkortas och ändå ge förståelse för begreppen? Svår balansgång, medgives.

- De konkreta exemplen på tillämpningar är utmärkta. Gärna fler. (Fyll på i den takt de kommer).

- Sociala och politiska konsekvenser belyses ok, men jag ville se mer av detta.

Väl valda citat från erkända tänkare vore intressant att se.

- Uppgifterna där man uppmanas att formulera egna tankar är utmärkta.

- Editoriell kommentar: Det finns många exempel på konstig svenska. Detta är irriterande i en för övrigt mycket professionell text. En duktig korrekturläsare vore nog en vettig investering.

Sammanfattning: Kul och givande. Jag är stolt över mitt livs första studiepoäng vid 78 års ålder.

Tack än en gång.

Göran Fröling