The comparison was between AI and procedural programming, not between machine learning and AI. It was a reference to the more general second AI winter, which basically ended due to the success of neural-network approaches.<p>Ten years ago, a programmer in industry generally would not throw machine-learning at a problem as their first—or even their last—approach; it just wasn&#x27;t a tool in most non-academics&#x27; toolboxes, and even where it was, the common wisdom was that its application was limited to certain conventional uses, like spam filtering. Now we&#x27;ve basically landed in that &quot;throwing around learning models like they were if statements&quot; world that seemed like science fiction just a short while ago.