Simple Introduction to Neural Networks

This article is the first in a series of articles aimed at demystifying the theory behind neural networks and how to design and implement them. The article was designed to be a detailed and comprehensive introduction to neural networks that is accessible to a wide range of individuals: people who have little to no understanding of how a neural network works as well as those who are relatively well-versed in their uses, but perhaps not experts. In this article, I will cover the motivation and basics of neural networks. Future articles will go into more detailed topics about the design and optimization of neural networks and deep learning. These tutorials are largely based on the notes and examples from multiple classes taught at Harvard and Stanford in the computer science and data science departments.