Mastering Scala Machine Learning

Problem dimensionality

The larger the attribute space or the number of dimensions, the harder it is to usually predict the label for a given combination of attribute values. This is mostly due to the fact that the total number of possible distinct combinations of attributes increases exponentially with the dimensionality of the attribute space—at least in the case of discrete variables (in case of continuous variables, the situation is more complex and depends on the metrics used), and it is becoming harder to generalize.

The effective dimensionality of the problem might be different from the dimensionality of the input space. For example, if the label depends only on the linear combination of the (continuous) input attributes, the problem is called ...