Explain in few words how traditional exploratory data analysis (in statistics) is different from machine learning?


Answer: An important general difference in the focus and purpose between machine learning and the traditional Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA) is that machine learning is more oriented towards applications than explaining the basic nature of the underlying phenomena. Machine Learning is relatively less concerned with identifying the specific relations between the involved variables. For example, uncovering the nature of the underlying functions or the specific types of interactive, multivariate dependencies between variables are not the main goal of machine learning. Instead, the focus is on producing a solution that can generate useful predictions. Machine Learning accepts among others a "black box" type approach to data exploration or knowledge discovery and uses not only the traditional Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA) techniques, but also such techniques as Neural Networks which can generate valid predictions but are not capable of identifying the specific nature of the interrelations between the variables on which the predictions are based.