What’s the difference between machine learning and artificial intelligence?

John Naughton’s article in The Guardian, “Machine-learning systems are problematic. That’s why tech bosses call them ‘AI’”, provides an entertaining read about a machine learning issue I always focus on when teaching: using the term artificial intelligence or AI only reveals the ignorance of the user, and the inability, as the great Arthur C. Clarke explained in his Third Law, to differentiate a sufficiently advanced technology from magic. As I explain to my students, I use the term machine learning because some time ago I found that when I was talking to some journalists and the term artificial intelligence came up, they would typically illustrate their story with a photo of The Terminator :-)

Citing other examples of how language affects our perception, particularly in a field like technology where the novelty of the phenomenon often encourages “linguistic engineering”, John mentions terms such as “share”, which in practice means “allow a company to store your preferences” or “accept” when they mean “either say yes or go somewhere else”. But the “artificial intelligence” is even more interesting, because it includes issues we try to pass off as “normal and natural”, when in practice they are simply miscalculations, lack of caution or carelessness.