In an Estimation problem, looking at a data to derive any inference about a'characteristic' of a Population, this approach mainly uses a sample taken at'random' from a collection of these similar items. An'estimate' of that characteristic (also known as a parameter) of the collection (or Universe, Population), is computed from that sample. This estimate is then tested to find out how close it might be to the original parameter, which is usually unknown. Graphical methods such EDA (Exploratory Data Analysis) are also used to study and guess the nature of the characteristic in the population, based on the data from the sample. Sampling is repeated or replicated several times, to reduce the error in the estimate.

WIRE)--VirtusaPolaris, the market-facing brand of Virtusa Corporation and Polaris Consulting & Services, Ltd. and a leading worldwide provider of information technology (IT) consulting and outsourcing services, and WorkFusion, the leading smart process automation (SPA) provider, today announced a partnership to deliver new smart automation solutions for the banking and financial services (BFS) market. The combination of VirtusaPolaris' deep BFS industry and process expertise and WorkFusion's cutting edge platform will help clients reduce operational costs, while improving quality, productivity and agility. "Most financial services organizations continue to struggle with inefficient legacy systems that have not kept pace with the change in business and regulations, introducing gaps in process automation that negatively impact efficiency of business operations. Many of these gaps are low complexity high volume routine process steps and most organizations have deployed large operational workforces, frequently offshore, to handle these processes," said Bob Graham, global solutions head, Banking and Financial Services at VirtusaPolaris. "WorkFusion's combination of robotic and cognitive automation supported by VirtusaPolaris' expert consulting and implementation services allow customers to improve quality through greater accuracy and the removal of human error, reduce costs through rapid automation of manual tasks, and accelerate time to market with our proven delivery approach."

Dreams are successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur usually involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep.[1] The content and purpose of dreams are not definitively understood, though they have been a topic of scientific speculation, as well as a subject of philosophical and religious interest, throughout recorded history. The scientific study of dreams is called oneirology.[2] Dreams mainly occur in the rapid-eye movement (REM) stage of sleep--when brain activity is high and resembles that of being awake. REM sleep is revealed by continuous movements of the eyes during sleep. At times, dreams may occur during other stages of sleep. However, these dreams tend to be much less vivid or memorable.[3] The length of a dream can vary; they may last for a few seconds, or approximately 20–30 minutes.[3] People are more likely to remember the dream if they are awakened during the REM phase. The average person has three to five dreams per night, and some may have up to seven;[4] however, most dreams are immediately or quickly forgotten.[5] Dreams tend to last longer as the night progresses. During a full eight-hour night sleep, most dreams occur in the typical two hours of REM.[6] In modern times, dreams have been seen as a connection to the unconscious mind. They range from normal and ordinary to overly surreal and bizarre. Dreams can have varying natures, such as being frightening, exciting, magical, melancholic, adventurous, or sexual. The events in dreams are generally outside the control of the dreamer, with the exception of lucid dreaming, where the dreamer is self-aware.[7]

Robotics scientists at the US's Stanford University have achieved a remarkable first: they have successfully sent an automated avatar – which they describe as a robo-mermaid – down to an ancient shipwreck to retrieve a vase from the sunken vessel. La Lune, the flagship of Louis XIV of France, sank 20 miles off the south coast city of Toulon in 1664. Only a few dozen of the hundreds of men on board survived. The wreck, which lies at a depth of 100 metres, had never been disturbed until the OceanOne robot craft reached it two weeks ago and recovered the grapefruit-size vase. The humanoid diving robot was piloted, using virtual reality techniques, by Oussama Khatib, professor of computer science at Stanford.

Currently I'm concerned about incredible overheating of "Artificial Intelligence" boom in Japan - while "Data Scientist" has gone. Google Trends shows Japanese people are getting just less attracted by statistics that is believed to be expertise of Data Scientist, and now they are enthusiastic about Artificial Intelligence. I feel this situation looks much puzzling. So, what's going on in 2015?... yes, I think not a few data science experts in Japan must agree that "Artificial Intelligence" explosively gets popular. Indeed we see a lot of media coverage whose title include "????" (artificial intelligence in Japanese) almost every day.

Ordinarily I greet Facebook events with a big, indifferent yawn. But the Facebook F8 developer show earned my eyeballs (full video replays here). The big question is: why bother? F8's centerpiece announcements pertained to Facebook Messenger – not exactly the app enterprise IT managers are eager to incorporate. But Facebook Messenger is no longer just a place to stalk annoy your old schoolmates. With the debut of several new bot-powered Messenger services, the commercial viability of AI (artificial intelligence) services is a pressing debate.

Forget PC doldrums and waning smartphone demand. Google thinks computers will one day cease being physical devices. "Looking to the future, the next big step will be for the very concept of the'device' to fade away," Google chief executive officer Sundar Pichai wrote on Thursday in a letter to shareholders of parent Alphabet Inc. "Over time, the computer itself -- whatever its form factor -- will be an intelligent assistant helping you through your day." Instead of online information and activity happening mostly on the rectangular touch screens of smartphones, Pichai sees artificial intelligence (AI) powering increasingly formless computers. "We will move from mobile-first to an AI-first world," he said.

It is said of the ancient Chinese game go that the number of possible positions on its board exceeds the number of atoms in the known universe. This is old news, presumably, to masters of go and master mathematicians. To the rest of us it came as something of a shock when it became common knowledge in March, the occasion being the defeat -- shocking in itself -- of a world-ranking go master by a mere (so we would have said, once upon a time) computer. Or perhaps, giving it a positive spin, we should say "victory" instead of "defeat": a computer's victory over a mere human. What is the human brain to make of such facts?

We're made of meat and they're made of silicon, but according to a new study, humans and computers might actually "see" using the same mechanisms. When you break it down, all vision really is, physiologically speaking, the transformation of light into electrical pulses that are then processed in stages by different parts of the brain. Sounds a lot like a computer, doesn't it? But computers aren't as good at reliably "seeing" and recognizing objects as humans are, at least not yet. According to some folks, this is because the brain simply isn't like a computer at all.

We're made of meat and they're made of silicon, but according to a new study, humans and computers might actually "see" using the same mechanisms. When you break it down, all vision really is, physiologically speaking, the transformation of light into electrical pulses that are then processed in stages by different parts of the brain. Sounds a lot like a computer, doesn't it? But computers aren't as good at reliably "seeing" and recognizing objects as humans are, at least not yet. According to some folks, this is because the brain simply isn't like a computer at all.