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Are data scientists the highest paid professionals? Posted on : Aug 10 - 2018

There is considerable hype around data science. Websites and social media are flooded with articles on Big Data, Data Science, and Data Analytics. These fields are projected as top fields, while data scientists are considered as saviours of the world and hence are supposed to be highest paid professionals. Most articles project how, using data science, companies have become super-intelligent in understanding their customers and hence are now able to sell products and services in a sophisticated manner. The marketing is now based on customers’ differential purchasing interest and buying behaviour.

Although all ‘data science’ hype is extravagant, its intensive publicity is unprecedented, and there is a high ‘promotional’ component, but it is becoming true with emerging real-world applications.

Practical applications of data science

When we talk about practical applications of data science, we somehow restrict ourselves from looking beyond intelligent search, recommender systems, and image/voice recognition. Most of the time when we think of ‘search’, we think of ‘Google’. Practically all searches make use of data science algorithms to deliver the best result. We treat algorithms as black-box tech and fail to understand the details involved. Any search query has three important aspects – speed, depth, and cost. Hence search techniques generally involve problem-solving methods. The search problem is formulated using a set of states and a set of operators.

From an initial state to a goal criterion, we can use search techniques to solve the problem. With the availability of big data, there is a need to systematically understand search and play it on a much more complex solution map. Most of the search algorithms are now heuristic searches, making use of the big data facts and simulating complex problem spaces resulting in ‘likelihood’ solutions. Hence here is the role of artificial intelligence systems to find ‘better solution’ in a fast and cost-effective manner and not necessarily a ‘best solution’ which is slow to find and expensive.

This type of information handling uses a heuristic evaluation function. There can be many practical applications that would require this approach of handling similar search complexity. Newer products and services come with more complicated problems – for example, playing a ‘new-age’ video game. This greatest form of entertainment has become so immersive and real that now it is competing with the real life. The success of such software capabilities comes through real-time analytics. In most of these games, you will find life-like freedom of movements, actions, and possible outcomes. View More