Automated and Emerging Technologies · 4 question types
Past paper frequency (2018 to 2024)
This topic accounts for approximately 4% of your exam marks.
AI applications and machine learning concepts are growing in exam prominence.
The syllabus expects you to remember three characteristics that every AI system shares:
| Characteristic | What it means |
|---|---|
| Collection of data | An AI system needs large amounts of data to work; the data is what the system learns from and makes decisions about |
| Rules that process the data | The system applies algorithms or logical rules to the data, and those rules drive every decision and prediction it makes |
| Ability to reason | The system can change its own rules and data in response to new information, improving its behaviour over time |
A useful way to remember the three: data + rules + reasoning.
Common slip: writing "AI is just a robot" or "AI is just a computer program". Neither phrase earns marks. The exam wants the three characteristics named precisely.