John Butler visits D7 Educate Together
On Monday 22 April, John Butler delivered two engaging talks at D7 Educate Together Primary School in Grangegorman. He spoke about how mathematics and statistics link neuroscience and machine learning.
John first got their teachers to act as neurons that spiked (put their hands up) to only respond to left or right motion, which showed how binary is used in our brains. He then got all the students to act as neurons getting them to respond to left or right motion for a starfield where most of the dots were moving in random directions (see image) to show how a collection of neurons works together to give a more accurate answer. John drew parallels between neural processes and machine learning algorithms, particularly in motion detection - critical for technologies like self-driving cars. He also showed why algorithms can make mistakes because if an algorithm is only taught how to say left or right and it is shown up-down motion it will always give the wrong answer.