Machine Learning for Fun: Finding Bigfoot

General, 0

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Bigfoot has been a staple of American folklore since the 19th century. The stories originate from Native Americans in the Pacific Northwest and likely go back centuries or more. The term sasquatch itself is an Anglicized derivative of the Halkomelem word sásq’ets. Many people are convinced that Bigfoot is real. Others suggest that he is a cultural phenomenon. Some just want to believe. There is even a group, the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization, that tracks Bigfoot sightings. They have data— thousands of reports—available on the Internet. And, where there is data, we can apply the power of machine learning. Let’s get to the bottom of this mystery! We’ll use machine learning to forecast the number of Bigfoot sightings for the coming months and years. We’ll measure the impact of key cultural phenomena—primarily the airing of The X-Files—on Bigfoot sightings. And, we’ll see if we can classify some Bigfoot sightings of our own using natural language processing. Not super-familiar with machine learning? Not a problem. We’ll explore the types of problems above (forecasting, impact analysis, and classification) and I’ll show you how to solve each of them using a little bit of code in assorted languages and the Nexosis API. So, come and get your feet wet (big or small) and begin learning about machine learning. The truth is out there.