Book Image

Machine Learning with R - Third Edition

By : Brett Lantz
Book Image

Machine Learning with R - Third Edition

By: Brett Lantz

Overview of this book

Machine learning, at its core, is concerned with transforming data into actionable knowledge. R offers a powerful set of machine learning methods to quickly and easily gain insight from your data. Machine Learning with R, Third Edition provides a hands-on, readable guide to applying machine learning to real-world problems. Whether you are an experienced R user or new to the language, Brett Lantz teaches you everything you need to uncover key insights, make new predictions, and visualize your findings. This new 3rd edition updates the classic R data science book to R 3.6 with newer and better libraries, advice on ethical and bias issues in machine learning, and an introduction to deep learning. Find powerful new insights in your data; discover machine learning with R.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
Machine Learning with R - Third Edition
Contributors
Preface
Other Books You May Enjoy
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Index

Chapter 4. Probabilistic Learning – Classification Using Naive Bayes

When a meteorologist provides a weather forecast, precipitation is typically described with phrases like "70 percent chance of rain." Such forecasts are known as probability of precipitation reports. Have you ever considered how they are calculated? It is a puzzling question because in reality, either it will rain or not.

Weather estimates are based on probabilistic methods, which are those concerned with describing uncertainty. They use data on past events to extrapolate future events. In the case of the weather, the chance of rain describes the proportion of prior days with similar atmospheric conditions in which precipitation occurred. A 70 percent chance of rain implies that in seven out of 10 past cases with similar conditions, precipitation occurred somewhere in the area.

This chapter covers the Naive Bayes algorithm, which uses probabilities in much the same way as a weather forecast. While studying this method, you...