There has been some recent national media coverage about local authorities using ‘algorithms' to predict the likelihood of a child being abused. Should the prospect of a ‘Big Brother' approach worry us, or should we be encouraged by the possibility of improving outcomes for children?
Algorithms, machine learning and AI tend to get confused. A useful starting point is that algorithms don't need computers. The word itself derives from a Persian mathematician based in Baghdad, al-Khwarizmi, who was working around the time of 780 CE - no computers were available then! An algorithm is just a list of instructions showing how to accomplish a task.
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