"Mad Data Science" By Matt Eland

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are awesome and powerful things that let us have things like self-driving cars, medical scanners, and even help get cereal boxes to your local supermarket on time. But AI doesn't require you to have a master's degree and it certainly doesn't have to be used for just serious business. In this session we'll interact with AI and machine learning and see how they work on a trial and error basis. We'll see reinforcement learning in action as we train a digital squirrel to find an acorn and get safely back home to its tree. We'll see artificial intelligence at work as we interact with a talking dog that can hear us, see us, and respond to us in its own voice - and see how changing a few settings results in a completely different experience. We'll also see how machine learning can help predict future decisions - based on the choices we make together. The session will be good for a laugh, but before its done you'll learn the basics of artificial intelligence, machine learning, and more, with practical examples cited using Azure and .NET code. An AI Specialist and Wizard at Leading EDJE who is known to teach software engineering, AI, and data science concepts in the most ridiculous ways possible. Matt has used machine learning to settle debates over whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie, reinforcement learning to drive the behavior of digital squirrels, data analytics to suggest improvements to his favorite TV show, and AI agents to play board games and create an AI agent with the personality of a dog. Matt is the author of "Data Science in .NET with Polyglot Notebooks" and "Refactoring with C#" as well as several LinkedIn Learning courses. Matt helps organize the Central Ohio .NET Developer Group, runs several blogs and a YouTube channel, has a Master’s of Science in Data Analytics, and is a current Microsoft MVP in AI and .NET. This is a recording of a presentation at the Global AI Bootcamp 2025 - Cleveland: https://globalai.community/bootcamp/united-states-cleveland-ohio/