A tensor is nothing but a flat array of numbers, plus some metadata telling you how to interpret those numbers as a multi-dimensional object.
Yikes! No.
I mean even for the intents and purposes of using this definition in ML, this might not be right.
I am trying not to be pedantic, so I will not go with the official/mathematical definition of a tensor as that could be incredibly confusing (look it up!!!).
But a tensor is a LOT more than that. Essentially it's a multilinear map that transforms a set of basis vectors in a certain way, and is coordinate agnostic.
This is not even half its definition so you can see how much the author left out.
Having said that, this is still a good way to start getting intuition into it and I urge the author to continue refining the definition as he/she learns more.
Disclaimer: MS in Math with concentration of GR.
EDIT: Also tensor aren't simply "flat" array of numbers. They are multidimensional. A grounded example, a rank 3 tensor is a collection of 2d matrices. Think of it as a bunch of 2d matrices stacked on top of each other. You need 3 indices to keep track of numbers --- sure in a programming language, it can be represented as a 1d array as well with 0s filling up empty spaces, but you get the idea.
Comments
Yikes! No.
I mean even for the intents and purposes of using this definition in ML, this might not be right.
I am trying not to be pedantic, so I will not go with the official/mathematical definition of a tensor as that could be incredibly confusing (look it up!!!).
But a tensor is a LOT more than that. Essentially it's a multilinear map that transforms a set of basis vectors in a certain way, and is coordinate agnostic.
This is not even half its definition so you can see how much the author left out.
Having said that, this is still a good way to start getting intuition into it and I urge the author to continue refining the definition as he/she learns more.
Disclaimer: MS in Math with concentration of GR.
EDIT: Also tensor aren't simply "flat" array of numbers. They are multidimensional. A grounded example, a rank 3 tensor is a collection of 2d matrices. Think of it as a bunch of 2d matrices stacked on top of each other. You need 3 indices to keep track of numbers --- sure in a programming language, it can be represented as a 1d array as well with 0s filling up empty spaces, but you get the idea.
They were speaking from an implementation perspective.