dxbydt nailed it on the head: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12362642 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12362642 If you want to make actual contributi

dxbydt nailed it on the head: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12362642 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12362642 If you want to make actual contributions to the machine learning part of machine learning (i.e. not building infrastructure and pipelines), then you need to get your math into a really good state. That comes first before you can even hope to begin to learn ML. That means acing probability and linear algebra, which is most of what ML is based off of. If you have no experience with probability or linear algebra, it'll take you at least a year of solid studying to get up to speed. Then, you can start taking ML courses. That will take you another year to really understand well. At that point, as dxbydt said, you should find a ML PhD who is willing to mentor you. Otherwise, you will not be able to make meaningful contributions, since there are thousands of ML PhDs out there who are much better skilled than you are, and companies would rather hire them than you. So the ultimate answer is: yes, with a ton of sacrifices and years of work. The only question for you to answer is whether or not you want to make those sacrifices and put in that work.