Chapter 2. Linear Regression – The Blocking and Tackling of Machine Learning

	"Some people try to find things in this game that don't exist, but football is only two things – blocking and tackling."
	--Vince Lombardi, Hall of Fame Football Coach

It is important that we get started with a simple, yet extremely effective, technique that has been used for a long time: linear regression. Albert Einstein is believed to have remarked at one time or another that things should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler. This is sage advice and a good rule of thumb in the development of algorithms for machine learning. Considering the other techniques that we will discuss later, there is no simpler model than the tried and tested linear regression, which uses the least squares approach to predict a quantitative outcome. In fact, one could consider it to be the foundation of all the methods that we will discuss later, many of which are mere...