Python and R have seen immense growth in popularity in the “Machine Learning Age”. They both are high-level languages that are easy to learn and write. The language you use will depend on your background and field of study and work. R is a language made by and for statisticians, whereas Python is a more general purpose programming language. Regardless of the background, there will be times when a particular algorithm is implemented in one language and not the other, a feature is better documented, or simply, the tutorial you found online uses Python instead of R.

In either case, this would require the R user to work in Python to get his/her work done, or try to understand how something is implemented in Python for it to be translated into R. This course helps you cross the R-Python language barrier.