The diagram above uses synthetic data to show how a threshold classifier works. As you can see, picking a threshold requires some tradeoffs. Too low, and the bank gives loans to many people who default. Too high, and many people who deserve a loan won't get one. So what is the best threshold?

When Uber chose to test its robot-driven taxis in Pittsburgh, some may have wondered why the tech company had chosen America's former capital of steel for its road test into the future. But for those in the know, Pennsylvania's second city is well on its way to establishing itself as the Silicon Valley of the east – and even its roads are helping. Unlike many American cities, Pittsburgh road system is literally off the grid, its origins dating back to twisty, pre-revolution forest trails. Then there are the city's 446 bridges to navigate. More importantly Pittsburgh boasts the robotics department at Carnegie-Mellon University, recognized as the leading academic institution in the field. It was here last month that Pittsburgh opened its doors to show the world why it is so well positioned to be a new tech hub.

It should probably come as no surprise that artificial intelligence was absent from the first presidential debate. AI hasn't made much of a splash in this election cycle, and the subject matter is notoriously confusing. Even so, given some of the headline-grabbing developments in autonomous vehicle technology, one might expect a greater focus on this issue -- especially as ongoing advancements herald significant changes to American life. Uber is now deploying autonomous vehicles on the roads of Pittsburgh. Tesla's Autopilot is being implicated in a recent spat of roadway deaths.

As machine learning - the ability of computers to learn without being explicitly programmed - gets more mainstream and involved in our lives, here is how machines learn.

Star Trek got it right: In the future, we'll use computers by talking to them. Artificial intelligence will open the door to ever-more devastating attacks - but the most effective ones may be the most subtle, Darktrace's Dave Palmer says.China Photos/Getty Images Computational sustainability is a new interdisciplinary research field with the overarching goal of developing computational models, methods, and tools to help manage the balance between environmental, economic, and societal needs for a sustainable future. I will provide examples of computational sustainability problems, ranging from wildlife conservation and biodiversity, to poverty mitigation, to materials discovery for renewable energy materials. Technology # In the AI wars, Google wants to change the world one'Pixel' at a time By ECONOMICTIMES.COM Updated: 8 Oct, 2016, 11:50 hrs IST VIEW IN APP Hardware devices launched by Google are beads of pearl strung together by their A.I. powered technology running on clouds. By Sreeraman Thiagarajan Since Steve Jobs' version of Macintosh the one that was'the computer for the rest of us', to today's iPhone7, hardware devices are the strategy and cloud is a tactic at App...

The migration to online and mobile has created a conundrum for banks. They have worked hard to sell the convenience of digital channels to the point that they now find themselves in reactive mode -- they are waiting for customers to need something. The 20 startups selected for this year's FinTech Forward Companies to Watch are helping banks replicate, and in some cases enhance, the close bonds they often share with their customers in person through digital channels. The companies are redefining personal banking and personal security. They're using artificial intelligence to offer virtual assistance.

Sources of inspiration is one thing we do not lack in machine learning. This is what, for me at least, makes machine learning research such a rewarding and exciting area to work in. We gain inspiration from our traditional neighbours in statistics, signal processing and control engineering, information theory and statistical physics. But our fortune continues, and we can take further inspiration from biological and evolutionary systems and, of importance to this series, the cognitive sciences of sociology, psychology and neuroscience. I previously explored important inspirations for machine learning offered by neuroscience and unpacked the role of prediction, sparsity, modularity and complementary learning in building learning systems.

There is a trend in machine learning right now towards automated machine learning pipelines. These automated machine learning pipes condense the model selection and optimization phase into a single step. They perform a random (or some sort of optimized) search over hyperparameters and models to pick the "best" set based on some evaluation metric. Basically all you have to do is plug in data. This automated process might appear to make things easier, but it can be a harmful practice.

Virtual assistants are transforming the customer service industry and the deployment of these virtual staff at RBS, Natwest and SEB banks is testament to this. The web-based Luvo software will be able to engage humans in real time by answering simple banking queries. "Virtual assistants (VAs) are transforming how consumers interact with businesses – especially in customer services. Many forward-thinking banks are now incorporating VAs into their offering to respond to simpler customer queries quicker," said Sebastian Reeve, director product management, Nuance Communications. Virtual voice detection has come on leaps and bounds in the last few years and technology like Luvo and Siri can understand human diction at 90%.

Artificial intelligence will open the door to ever-more devastating attacks -- but the most effective ones may be the most subtle, Darktrace's Dave Palmer says. Imagine you've got a meeting with a client, and shortly before you leave, they send you over a confirmation and a map with directions to where you're planning to meet. It all looks normal -- but the entire message was actually written by a piece of smart malware mimicking the client's email mannerisms, with a virus attached to the map. It sounds pretty far out -- and it is, for now. But that's the direction that Dave Palmer, director of technology at cybersecurity firm Darktrace, thinks the arms race between hackers and security firms is heading.