Deep Learning Illustrated: A Visual, Interactive Guide to Artificial Intelligence

Preface

Commonly called brain cells, billions of interconnected neurons make up your nervous system, and they enable you to sense, to think, and to take action. By meticulously staining and examining thin slices of brain tissue, the Spanish physician Santiago Cajal (Figure P.1), was the first¹ to identify neurons (Figure P.2), and in the early half of the twentieth century, researchers began to shed light on how these biological cells work. By the 1950s, scientists inspired by our developing understanding of the brain were experimenting with computer-based artificial neurons, linking these together to form artificial neural networks that loosely mimic the operation of their natural namesake.

1. Cajal, S.-R. (1894). Les Nouvelles Idées sur la ...