LLM is a learned distribution p on sequences of tokens. If you just sample a bunch of text from p willy nilly and put it in the training data and train you just get back p. But if you sample a bunch of text from p and throw out whatever's bad and train on what's left then you learn p(x|x is not bad)
Jul 13, 2026 at 5:17 PM
Why Are LLMs Smart?
A popular way to explain how current LLMs work is to say that “all” they do is predict the next most likely word in a sentence.
Large language model
A large language model (LLM) is a neural network trained on a vast amount of text for natural language processing tasks, especially language generation. LLMs can typically generate, summarize, translate, and analyze text in many contexts, and are a foundational technology behind modern chatbots.[1] Biased or inaccurate training data can make an LLM's output less reliable.[2]
There's Something Fundamentally Wrong With LLMs
LLMs aren't trained on the "vast majority of speech," experts warn, a major blind spot that could have sweeping consequences.
Take caution in using LLMs as human surrogates | PNAS
Recent studies suggest large language models (LLMs) can generate human-like responses, aligning with human behavior in economic experiments, survey...
How LLMs Actually Work
A from-the-ground-up walkthrough of how modern LLMs work, from tokens to transformer blocks to the next-token loop
Why do LLMs make stuff up? New research peers under the hood.
Claude's faulty "known entity" neurons sometimes override its "don't answer" circuitry.
LLM-generated skills work, if you generate them afterwards
LLM “skills” are a short explanatory prompt for a particular task, typically bundled with helper scripts. A recent paper showed that while skills are useful to LLMs, LLM-authored skills are not. From the abstract:
I Built an LLM From Scratch
ImportAI 449: LLMs training other LLMs; 72B distributed training run; computer vision is harder than generative text
Will AI cause a political interregnum
Brandon Stewart on Twitter / X
1/ New @Nature! We study how powerful institutions shape the information environment for LLMs. Commercial LLM training is opaque, so we trace a path from state-coordinated media -> training data -> model responses. pic.twitter.com/5LdFvzbFaf— Brandon Stewart (@b_m_stewart) May 13, 2026
Artificial
An LLM is a computer program. We should talk about it like a computer program.
