Question

What is data? Does data have to be collected for it to be considered data?

How do data scientists use data?

Answer 1

Data is information that can be referenced, pertaining to the variable amount of information, quantitatively to then be visualized, analyzed, and utilized as an actionable set of values.

Yes, data has to be collected from appropriate sources in order for it to be classified as data, otherwise, we can just relate it to information or even randomized sets of numbers and letters that have the information embedded in it which cannot be extracted for our processes.

Data science, as a field has flourished in recent years, with the access to a high volume of information generated through sources like social media, and through the use of processes like web scraping, data scientists have been able to collect, process and explore the unlimited amount of data, utilize it in the fields like machine learning, robotics, economics, disaster management, and technologies like a self-driving car.

The data is collected, processed according to their parameters, necessary values are extrapolated and the unused data is safely discarded allowing the data scientist to then create predictive models to further their research.

** Leaving a thumbs-up would really help me out. Let me know if you face any problems.