TED Talk - Kevin Slavin: How Algorithms Shape Our World

TED Talk has been a great source to convey knowledge, opinions, latest discoveries, and valuable experience. I came cross this inspiring speech that talked about how algorithms (algos) shape our world. See below for link if you are interested in watching the video:

Algorithms Shape the World

Real Cases of Algos being Used in Our Life

Algorithms may be more rapidly taking over our decision making process than we ever thought. In finance, traders are leveraging algorithms to make high frequency trades, set limit the mitigate risks; entertainment and media companies are trying to learn our preferences and tastes on shows, movies and music to make us stay on the platform as long as we can; online shopping sites and digital marketing companies go hand in hand study what we searched in the internet and come up with product recommendations for us to purchase; even influencers are utilizing algorithms to create content in order to attract traffic into their accounts. As a matter of fact, even a small robotic vacuum has its own algos to clean up our house, and different algos may result in different outcomes. There are all strong evidences for us to say algorithms shape our world.

Some Cool Examples of the Myth of Algos

What amazed me after viewing this TED speech conducted by Kevin Slavin is that, even though we consider ourselves as the creators of the algos, until this day, we still do not fully understand them! A strong example is that even there were over 20,000 top physicists on Wall Street developing the algos, the cause of “Flash Crash of 2:45”, an incident that caused stocks' disappearance without any human instruction, is still a myth to these physicists.

Kevin showed the audience the stunning fast speed of the calculation and how important it is for the information transmission from the speed perspective. Then, he also present a map which contains the algos' suggestion of setting the servers into the sea to ensure the most efficient data transmission and calculation in order to make money efficiently. However the map suggested that numerous servers should be set into the ocean. This interesting result make everyone confused of how and why the algos suggested this way?

To further proof his opinion, Kevin pointed out the similarities between algos and nature. Even though algos are artifacts, there are countless myths that are subject to be discovered underneath the codes. Just like the explorers to the mother nature.

How does data science come into play in this concept?

The view points of the speech are also applicable for data science: although data science is a hot topic and has been used in every way possible, there are still lots to be discovered. There are so many data analysis packages we can use to throw a set of data into. However, if we are not fully understand what does the package mean, the result of the analysis may not be that valuable to meet our goals. The algos under the data science tools are evolving with the data we feed into the tools, how we make updates to the algos itself, and how it learns from all the updates. Therefore, as data scientist, algos are going to be a subject open for cautious discussion, constant revisit and growing discovery.

What's your thoughts on the relationship between algos and the world?

(Photo shoot o May 13th at Weehawken, NJ)